← Threads Magazine Podcast: "Sewing With Threads"
Threads Magazine Podcast: "Sewing With Threads"
Creating Fitted Bodices, with Gretchen Hirsch | Episode 87
00:39:34
Pattern designer, sewing teacher, and author Gretchen Hirsch talks about sewing fitted bodices, working with boning, and what's in her latest book.
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- [00:00]
Rena O
Join us on an exclusive trip to London in May 2025. Highlights of this tour are a glovemaking masterclass with luxury designer Rena O, an embroidery workshop at Hand and Lock, a visit to a renowned theatrical costume house, and a guided tour of Savile Row. We'll also visit specialty fabric shops and enjoy afternoon tea at Fortnum and Mason. To find out more, go to threadsmagazine.com.
- [00:31]
Jeanine Clegg
Welcome to Sewing with Threads, the monthly podcast from Threads magazine. I'm Jeanine Clegg, co hosting with Threads editor Carol Frazia. Hello, Carol.
- [00:40]
Carol Frazia
Hi, Janine.
- [00:42]
Jeanine Clegg
Our guest today is Gretchen Hirsch, the founder of Charm Patterns, known to many as Gertie. She's a pattern designer, teacher, the author of Six Sisters Sewing related books, and a lover of 1950s fashion and other vintage styles. Welcome.
- [00:58]
Gretchen Hirsch
Thank you so much for having me. It's so good to see you both.
- [01:01]
Jeanine Clegg
Yes, likewise. And happy New Year, too. We're recording this pretty much right after the new year has turned over, and we want to just chat a bit about creating fitted bodices with you. It's a topic that we are pretty sure is near and dear to you.
- [01:21]
Gretchen Hirsch
It sure is. It sure is. I love this topic, by the way.
- [01:24]
Jeanine Clegg
Well, good. And you know your most recent book, Gertie's Charmed Sewing Studio, you provide instructions and access to three new patterns that are based on classic designs. The Madeline dress, the Camille sheath, and Lillian jacket. I think I have that right. And these patterns have extended sizing and are very fitted. But unlike some of your other patterns, there is no boning involved. And I'm wondering, how did you achieve the structure you want for these garments without the boning?
- [02:00]
Gretchen Hirsch
It is funny that I wrote a book without any patterns with boning in it, because that's kind of been my thing historically. But this. This book is really different from some of my past books in that it's not primarily a pattern book. I was inspired to write it because I've just always been so inspired by the space that I work in by my studio here in Newburgh, New York. Just really, I felt like it's like this magical place and there's something about it that's really special. And so that's why it's called the Charm Sewing Studio. And I wanted to sort of use the studio as the setting for this book. And there are six chapters, and I take the reader sort of on a journey of creating six different patterns that I've already designed. And it's really more of a, like, narrative fashion history book. So I wanted to Include three new patterns. So take the reader through the process of designing six patterns and then design three new ones, sort of talking them through the process of how do you do the research? How do you decide on how something is constructed for a modern sewist? And the three patterns that I included, just so happened to note, really need boning. They were sort of. They were all really based very strongly on historical garments. And the Camille sheath, I think, is the one that I might have considered using boning in. But I was using dresses designed by Alfred shaheen from the 50s. Looking at these dresses, and they didn't have boning. They had the structure that I wanted with just lining and the fabric and the pleats, the darts, all of that was creating the structure. I think one big difference is the undergarments that people wear now and that they wore then. Right. So I think at this time, you might have wore. You might have worn a boned Merry Widow under your Camille sheath, and it would have given you that structure. And the dress is just sort of like floating over the undergarment. So I was surprised to find that that dress didn't have boning. And I really wanted to stick. Stick to the historical inspiration, and so did it without. It ended up working really well. We still do a lot of sort of boned, strapless and strappy bodices. I think that's sort of our specialty at Charm. We do really fitted bodices with spiral steel boning sewn into the lining primarily. And I think we will never, you know, that will always sort of be our bread and butter at Charm. And I love doing that type of bodice.
- [04:27]
Jeanine Clegg
And I was wondering also, you know, you mentioned a few years ago that folks always ask if they can leave out the boning in your garments. Were these garments also in response to that, I mean, you just talked about, you know, you wanted to stick with the historical, you know, stick with those. Be inspired by those older garments. But I'm wondering if that had played a role as well.
- [04:53]
Gretchen Hirsch
Not really. I mean, I. Yeah, people do always ask if they can leave out boning, and I try to, like, encourage people to be brave and try it, and it's not as scary as they think. So, yeah, I do want to challenge people in that way, but I think it was more just really the historical inspiration. And we're still very much pro boning here at Charm. But I also think, you know, as I get a little further in my career, I have been experimenting a little bit more with a bit softer silhouette. I think early on, you Know, I really. I was so excited by the techniques of building and structure into garments, and I wanted to do everything in every garment. I really wanted to try everything out. And so I think maybe things were a little over engineered at times just because I was so excited about the techniques. And now I'm seeing that, you know, looking at some of these vintage garments, I could actually pull back a little and really be very strategic about when and where to include that type of structure.
- [05:44]
Carol Frazia
Gretchen, could you. Could you just give us a quick explanation of how the engineering of boning actually works? Like what. How does it. How does it provide that structure on your body and for the garment?
- [05:55]
Gretchen Hirsch
I have to say, I love that you all are asking me this, because I really learned all these techniques from Threads magazine, so it's. So. It just is really tickling me to hear you all ask me this. Yeah. I'm a longtime fan reader of Threads magazine, and I learned a lot of these techniques from back issues that I bought on ebay. And I have a whole stack of them still in the studio. And one article in particular really resonated with me, and I still pull it out every now and then in the studio. And the way it works, like you asked and like you all taught me, is that you have this sort of, like, vertical structure, right? You have these vertical spiral steel bones, and they need to be anchored somewhere. So you have a sort of anchor at the. At the waist. And often we build that in with a waist stay. So you have a lot of structure. A lot of our bodices can stand up on their own because we use muslin underlining, plus the spiral steel boning in the lining. And then it won't just stand on your body alone. You need something to anchor it at the waist. And this is where a lot of, I think, like, modern strapless bras fail. Like, everyone hates strapless bras. There's nothing to anchor them. Right. They just slide down your body. So the thing about strapless bodices is they're anchored with that waist stay, and then the vertical bones can do their job.
- [07:11]
Carol Frazia
Yes, that is exactly it. And I know exactly what you mean about the strapless bras that just want to wander around. Or nowadays they put that sort of silicone beading in there that's supposed to stick to you. That's really not fun.
- [07:27]
Gretchen Hirsch
It's not fun.
- [07:29]
Carol Frazia
In some of your designs, I noticed that the boning goes from the waist up and over the bust point to sort of the top edge. How does that work? So that it doesn't kind of remove the bust shaping completely or flatten out the bust shape.
- [07:44]
Gretchen Hirsch
That's a tricky one. That's the hardest one to sew, that one that goes over the princess seam because it's such a curvy seam, I think. Part. Yeah. I used to think that maybe that wasn't an ideal area for boning, but the more, the more I've seen it at work. If the bodice is fitted closely enough, which it needs to be in these dresses, right. You can't have a. You can't have really any ease in a strapless bone bodice. It needs to be zero ease, so it's held so tightly to the body that it's, you know, spiral steel boning is so great because it bends in both directions, so side to side and then also laterally front to back, so it's curving over the bust and it's being held by the zero e's of the bodice to your body and it's curving over the bust because of its spiral steel structure. So I found that it works really well. But, yeah, you have to be careful that the bone isn't too long so it's not popping out of the seam at the top.
- [08:41]
Jeanine Clegg
That was my question. How do you decide how, how long or short to make the boning so that it's not poking you or is not doing its job of giving you the support you need?
- [08:55]
Gretchen Hirsch
I always make it a quarter inch shorter than the seam line where it's being inserted. So take away the seam allowances and then take away another quarter inch after that. So it has just enough ease to kind of move around. It's not too tight, so it's going to be putting pressure on the. The neckline seam, and that seems to do the trick.
- [09:16]
Carol Frazia
When you use spiral steel boning, do you? I know that you can buy it in certain lengths, but probably it needs to be customized. If you've actually fitted your bodice to yourself. I think nobody's a perfect, you know, 16 inches or whatever it might be. How do you do that? I know there are end caps you can put on and various dips and that sort of thing.
- [09:35]
Gretchen Hirsch
Oh, my gosh, what a journey. I went on discovering my favorite method for doing all of this. I hate those end caps. They're the worst, you know, And I feel like a lot of books or articles will just say, just put the end cap on with pliers. And then you try to do it at home and you can't get it on. It keeps falling off. So what I found that Works best for me for finishing the ends is Teflon tape, also known as plumbing tape. And you can get it at Home Depot or a hardware store and you just wrap the ends with it and sort of smush it on with your fingers and sort of like sticks to itself. And so that has worked really well for me. And it's easy to source, it's no fuss and it doesn't come off. So that's my favorite method in terms of the lengths I buy. You can buy it by the yard. I came across accidentally a method a few years ago when the only length I could get from my local supplier were the 18 inch lengths, which is really long, but I ended up buying a gross of them. So I had 144 of these 18 inch bones and I found that they're kind of the perfect length because you can cut two shorter bones from them for a bodice and one end is already finished and then so you just have to finish one end. So that has become my main method is to just only buy 18 inch lengths and know that I can usually get two or sometimes more bones out of that length.
- [10:58]
Carol Frazia
Do you ever use any of the other type of boning that exists, the plastic kinds that come with the casing or that you can sew through?
- [11:06]
Gretchen Hirsch
No, I'm really not a plant. A fan, a fan of the plastic originalene boning, personally, just because I find that it does crease a little bit when it's worn. So for me I love that spiral steel really holds its shape. The one other type of bone that we sometimes use is the flat bones. So for corsetry kind of work. And that type of bone is. It's a little harder to cut, but it can be done and it doesn't bend like spiral steel does. So we've done a pattern for a waist cincher meant to be an undergarment. And that one has the flat steels at center front and center back. So it can only be used on a like, you know, a very straight seam and not anywhere that the body creases in.
- [11:57]
Jeanine Clegg
Do you have any trouble washing clothes that have steel boning in them?
- [12:01]
Gretchen Hirsch
No, not really. I used to be really sort of delicate about it and I worried about it a lot. And then I found that you can put them in the washing machine on delicate and line dry these garments. I mean, of course, you know, providing that your fabric will allow that kind of treatment. I did an experiment with a spiral steel bone and put it in a glass of water for a few weeks to see what would happen? Because I think people worry about it. Right. Dusting, and, you know, it never rusts. It just never rusts. It's treated in a certain way that it's. That is not a concern. I think the concern would be more that it's sort of the coating starts to come off a little bit and the texture gets a little weird. But hopefully you're not. You're not leaving your dresses underwater for weeks at a time, so should not be a concern.
- [12:45]
Carol Frazia
Right.
- [12:47]
Jeanine Clegg
So in general, how do you know where to place the boning? Certainly at seams, but some people maybe need more or less. So where do you. How do you know where to place?
- [13:00]
Gretchen Hirsch
Yeah, I mean, I think I've, you know, over time developed my key areas that I want to see bones. Center back is really important because we generally have center back zippers. And so you know how often you'll get, like, those ripples and a center back zipper on a strapless dress, a bone on either side of the zipper will eliminate that. I like to do side seams there to get a nice smooth silhouette at the side seam. I do front and back princess seams. And then the other key area that I really like is a diagonal bone that goes from the underarm inward towards the front princess seam at the waist. So you know how sometimes you get those diagonal drag lines next to the bust on a strapless bodice, that really helps give more structure and eliminate those drag lines. And one thing I'll say is that we have a really inclusive size range at Charm. We go up to a size 32 dress size. And so one thing that I found is, you know, what I recommended for a sample size is not going to work through our entire range. So I really recommend experimenting for yourself because you might find, I mean, especially like on a back princess seam, you could add two or more bones in between, you know, the side seam and the back princess seam, if your size calls for it, or if you feel like you need a little bit more structure in the back.
- [14:21]
Jeanine Clegg
Certainly, though it doesn't substitute for making sure that your garment fits first, you do have to do the fitting first. Right.
- [14:30]
Gretchen Hirsch
This is true. This is true. We can't get out of that step. Yeah. So doing a muslin is always really important in these types of fitted bodices. And you can also even put boning into your muslin. My favorite technique for that is to use masking tape and to just tape the bone down onto the seam allowances so that you can get a sense of what it's going to look like.
- [14:52]
Jeanine Clegg
What a great idea.
- [14:53]
Carol Frazia
That is a really good tip because I feel like, as you said, putting in boning isn't necessarily super complicated. It just feels fussy and like, oh, my gosh, what if I did it wrong somehow? Or. I don't know. I think that sewing along the boning, which is not what's happening, you're just making the casing and then inserting the bone afterwards. But I know that I look at it and think, oh, my God, I could break a needle on that. And you're not going to do that if you do it the right way.
- [15:16]
Gretchen Hirsch
That's true. That's true. And I think having the right tools is really important. And one thing that I had to learn early on, I found my favorite type of metal cutters, the Greenlee 722. I recommend it to everyone. You can get it on Amazon. It cuts right through a bone in one go. And early on, people would tell me, like, oh, use these tiny little metal snips, and you're trying to snip on either end. And I would struggle so much with cutting it. And once I got the right tool, I was like, oh, this is so easy. And then, you know, finding out how I like to finish the ends, it really is not, you know, it's not intimidating or hard at all. You just have to know your. Your approach and have good tools.
- [15:55]
Jeanine Clegg
Probably practice a few times as well, right?
- [15:57]
Gretchen Hirsch
Yes. And wear protective eyewear.
- [16:00]
Jeanine Clegg
Get those goggles out. Okay. You know, I want to talk to you for a second about these dresses. The unlined Madeline dress and the Camille sheath. Now, the unlined Madeline dress has a waist stay, and the Camille dress has elastic stays to keep the neckline in place. Do you think these provide enough needed structure?
- [16:24]
Gretchen Hirsch
I'm so excited to talk about these dress patterns, so thank you for asking. The Madeline dress is a princess seam dress that flares out, doesn't have a waistline seam, and it flares out into gores with box pleats. And it has panels that are sewn to the box pleats underneath. So you can use a contrast fabric, which is a really fun treatment to have it sort of peeking out of your box pleats. But what happens with this dress is that you then, since it's unlined, you have all these crazy seam allowances at the waist and unsecured box pleats on the inside of the dress. So we were looking for a really tidy vintage style way to control that mess on the inside of the dress. And Andrea, my production manager who I work with, she has A background in costume design, and she's always thinking of, like, creative ideas for finishing. And she said, what about a, you know, some grosgrain tape here? And we do a sort of way stay treatment. So we sew the grosgrain ribbon to those seam allowance at the waistline. And then it also serves as a waist stay when you put a hook and eye in the back, so you actually anchor it to your waist so it gives you a bit of a cinching effect, which is great in this style of dress. And it also controls all those seam allowances on the inside of the dress.
- [17:45]
Carol Frazia
And I would imagine it would support the extra weight of all of those gores and pleats that could be pulling down and causing some drag lines at the top or just not a good hang on the upper part of the dress.
- [17:59]
Gretchen Hirsch
Exactly, yes. So that was the thinking behind that one. And then the Camille sheath. I love this dress so much. I could talk about this dress for hours. So just stop me if I go on too long. But this dress was inspired. In 2012, I wrote an article for a sewing magazine about Alfred Shaheen. And I ended up contacting someone from his website. You know, he. He's since passed, but I contacted the. The press person, started talking to her, asked if I could interview her, and through the course of the interview, it turns out that it was his daughter. It's Alfred Shaheen's daughter, Camille, and I named the dress after her. But one of the stories that she told me, you know, she's the main collector of her father's work. So if you don't know Alfred Shaheen, he was a designer in Hawaii in the 50s and did a lot of what we think of as, you know, Vin Tropical. He was credited with inventing the Hawaiian shirt. You know, Elvis in blue Hawaii wears one of his designs. So she is the main collector of his work now because it is just sort of disseminated to vintage sellers. And she's trying to sort of get, you know, create an archive of his work. And she said one thing that she's found is there's this one dress style called the Shaheen sheath. And she always sees it when she sees it on ebay or on Etsy or other vintage sites that vintage sellers don't know what to do with this dress because the neckline appears to be all stretched out. And then it has these elastic. Has these elastic lengths inside the bodice, and they think that they're. But they become stretched out over time. Right. Because elastic erodes and completely loses its Effectiveness over, you know, five, six decades. So people didn't know what to do with this dress and thought, you know, they were, like, creating, you know, sewing new pleats at the neckline and stitching them down and using the elastic as, you know, dress hangers for, you know, to hang them on the, you know, a hanger. And it turns. What she told me is that those elastic stays are what create this design. So the neckline is sort of like, when you look at the pattern piece, it looks like a sort of stretched out scoop neckline, and you wonder how it would ever look good on a body. And then it has points where you tack elastic inside the dress and pull it around to the back, and it forms pleats at the neckline. So it kind of controls that excess in a really beautiful way, but you're still able to move, and it's a really beautiful effect. But no one really understood, you know, no modern vintage seller understood what this dress was. I was always so intrigued by that story. So I ended up, you know, starting to collect some of shaheen sheaths myself. And it really is fascinating looking at this neckline. And so we started to. I always wanted to do this pattern. I'm so excited about it. And so the way we did it was to take the dart excess that you would have in a bodice and rotate it out to the neckline so it's just a really wide neckline, and then tack the elastic onto the inside, and it just creates this beautiful effect. So that is really the focal point points of this design is those, you know, the pleats at the neckline.
- [21:11]
Carol Frazia
I. I was looking at photos of this in your book, and it is really a graceful, really pretty sophisticated neckline. I. I love it too. And I wanted to ask you about how you got the bust shaping into it, whether the darts rotated up into that part of the neckline, which sounds like that's what you did. So the question I have is, at different points in your size range, does that pleat become bigger or smaller? And how does that affect the overall look neckline?
- [21:41]
Gretchen Hirsch
Yeah, that's a great question. And we test our patterns in very rigorously across our size range. And so this was a really tricky one because we found as we graded it up, we weren't getting the exact right amount of excess at the neckline. So it was a continued testing process to make sure that the pleat looked as beautiful on a size 8 as it does on a size, you know, 16, as it does a 32. So we were just continually testing and also you know, think about sewing pattern. You have to put that mark. Where do they put the elastic? And it may be different for everyone. So we really encourage people in the book to test it out. You know, this is another great reason to make a muslin. You can safety pin that elastic in at the neckline, see if you like where it's sitting, see if you like the length. The length is going to be different for everyone, too. So really important to do that testing process with this. With this dress.
- [22:37]
Jeanine Clegg
Some of the dresses in the book you recommend making muslins, but others you did not. Is it just because those were easier?
- [22:49]
Gretchen Hirsch
I think we're generally always pro muslin. I know I am. Just because, you know, it's so. Well, I'm going to say it's impossible to make one sewing pattern that's going to work for every body type. So, you know, we try to get as close to universal as possible. But of course, you know, everyone's going to want to make their own fit adjustments. So I definitely recommend a muslin for pretty much any sewing pattern. But things like the Lillian jacket that is, you know, requires really intricate fitting, I think. And it has a lot of opportunities for fitting because it has 12 panels. And this jacket was inspired by Lily Ann jackets and coats from the 50s that was a. A brand that's now highly collectible. And I've always really loved. And every name of the pattern in the book has a sort of historical significance. And this Lillian was the name of the wife of the man who started this company, so he called it Lillian after her. And so I thought Lillian jacket was fitting. So this jacket has both armhole princess seams and shoulder princess seams, which the reason for that was the historical inspiration. But also we were trying to make the pattern pieces as narrow as possible because initially we thought they might be printed, and we were trying to get them on really small sheets. And so I kept trying to make the pattern pieces as narrow as possible. And I thought, well, it wouldn't have been out of the question. A lot of these Lillian jackets have a lot of panels, and so ended up adding two princess seams. And that meant you have all these opportunities for fitting. And so we really recommend that people make a muslin of this in something a little heavier than muslin, I think is a good idea. Something like a cotton canvas or cotton twill will more replicate the structure of a tailoring fabric. And then once you see all those panels, you may want to nip it in here. You might want to take in the front Princess seam, the shoulder, princess seam. There's just so many seams. There's so many seams that you can work with there that I think the Lillian jacket is a really crucial one to make a muslin on.
- [25:04]
Jeanine Clegg
I like a lot of seams because I always need to fit further, further, further for myself. So I am looking forward to trying this pattern out.
- [25:12]
Gretchen Hirsch
I can't wait to see your version.
- [25:15]
Carol Frazia
So I wanted to ask you a number of your designs have what I think you call like a shelf bust bodice or something where there's a sort of a under bust seam and then some really great decorative pleating or sort of petaly stuff happening above that. How do you get that to fit? I mean, is that how. How does that work? I'm wondering as an individual, when you have the pattern, but I'm thinking also of like, you as the pattern designer, how do you make that work for every cup size from A to whatever. I know you go up to a higher cup size.
- [25:46]
Gretchen Hirsch
That pattern was so challenging. I'm thinking of the Liz. The Liz dress, which we did for charm patterns early on, you know, in. In charm patterns. And I really want to replicate that. That shelf bust style you're talking about, which, yeah, it's basically you create through a Princess Simbada. It's like a shelf for the bust and then there are cups set in with a pleated detail. Or sometimes, you know, in vintage dresses you would see ruffles or some sort of almost like people call it like a crumb catcher effect or something like that. So you have a sort of like built up shelf on the bust and then a strap that go underneath the bodice and twists around the shoulders to the center back. And it's a really challenging pattern to design. It was challenging to fit. I went through three pattern graders just through the process of designing that dress. And actually that's when I met my current pattern, pattern drafter, slash grader. And we've been together ever since because I was like, if, if you can get through this dress, you, I know you can do anything. And she loved the challenge of it and she's been amazing. So what I ended up doing for that one was that I didn't have mannequins. For every bra size that we make, we have A through H cup sizes at charm plus dress sizes 2 through. I think I said 32 earlier, but it's 34. So that's an enormous combination of dress sizes and cup sizes. And we don't have a mannequin or a fit model. For each one of those sizes. And so what I was doing at the time, which was my. This, like, it was just like mad, crazy, crazy days. But I bought bras, you know, molded cup bras in a variety of sizes that I was able to, like, put cups directly on those molded bras to see if the volume was correct for the cup size that I felt it was. And so we were doing crazy things like that, trying it on a variety of people, mannequins. And it was. It was the most laborious pattern we've ever made. And then, you know, once you release it to the public, then people are like, oh, my God, how do I fit this to my body? So we do sewing retreats at the Charm Studio, and people come in and they can sew whatever pattern of ours that they want. And the Liz dress is the most common one that people bring in because it really helps to have some fitting guidance. And we, you know, we fit people in that dress so much, and, you know, everyone is so different. Even just the straps, you know, if you have sloped shoulders, those straps are going to fall right off. So, you know, we have to engineer them. Sometimes we put elastic in them. But it's. It's a really. It's a challenging dress. But I just, you know, I think it's so worth it because of, you know, these vintage styles are so beautiful and be ashamed to just, you know, let them disappear.
- [28:30]
Carol Frazia
I wanted to ask you again, this is going back to what you said at the very beginning, that one of your. One of the sort of mainstays of your designs is the fitted bodice with the sort of. The midriff tends to be fitted, and then it's very fitted up and over the bust. And with boning, I think the impression is that the boning is there to mean that your whole body is being supported by the dress. Is that truly the case, or is the boning there to support the dress, and then your body needs other support as well, depending on your size and shape?
- [29:04]
Gretchen Hirsch
I love that question. That's another one we get a lot, is, can I forego a bra or foundation garments if I have boning in the dress? And certainly some people may find that if they're wearing a strapless bodice that's heavily boned, they may, you know, it's close. Closely fitted. They may not need a separate bra. But I think for me, like you said, the boning is there to support the dress, and it supports the structure of the dress. It's not meant to control your body necessarily. So Especially, you know, we have a lot of customers who are really into doing true vintage every day. They. They have that, you know, they want to get that silhouette. So, you know, I. I like for the. Our photo shoots and recommend for those customers wearing vintage style undergarments, which are. Are really going to shape your body. And then the boning on the dress is there to support the dress itself.
- [29:56]
Carol Frazia
And so what would be the advantage or disadvantage to creating, like, an entire internal corselet rather than just boning the dress?
- [30:08]
Gretchen Hirsch
I mean, that's something I kind of want to explore in the future, honestly, like, the more I get into the history behind these garments. Because if you look at something like, you know, a true Christian Dior from 1947, from the New look, it probably had, you know, a cotton tulle corselet built into the dress, and that's a really couture approach and certainly would be something that would control the body and support the dress as well. It would be a heck of a lot of work for one dress. You know, it's sort of like you could build a petticoat into a dress every time you make one, or you could have a separate petticoat and just keep switching that one out. Which one sounds more appealing? You know, I personally don't want to build a petticoat for every single dress I make. So just personally, I think it, you know, it's probably a little more practical for the modern woman to have, like, an arsenal of undergarments that she loves and to switch them out between dresses.
- [31:01]
Carol Frazia
That makes good sense to me. I really understand that.
- [31:04]
Jeanine Clegg
Do you?
- [31:06]
Gretchen Hirsch
Well, we came out with a petticoat pattern last year, and what we found is no one wants to. So, I mean, people, you know, our customers really do want to sew petticoats, and there aren't a lot of historically accurate ones available these days to buy. So this is something that people want. But generally, I would say, you know, you probably don't want to sew one of these more than once, you know, because they are really time consuming and just tedious sewing.
- [31:32]
Carol Frazia
So you can buy. I mean, I know you can buy, like, a full skirt petticoat without too much trouble. How does that differ from, like, a really accurate one that would really work for the style of dresses that you make?
- [31:44]
Gretchen Hirsch
Well, interestingly, there used to be some brands that really replicated this style, the 50s style, where you get a lot of volume under the skirt, and they're. They. They're becoming harder and harder to source. And the ones that you can get on Amazon are really sort of ineffective, I'll say, because they don't have a lot of layers. They're just, you know, they might be great for everyday wear, but you're not, you're not going to look at a picture of a Christian Dior dress and that fit and flare silhouette. You're not going to get that same silhouette from one of those petticoats. You could maybe layer five of them together and get it, but then you're creating a custom thing already, so why not sew your own? So the difference is the amount of layers and the density of the gathering and the fabrics used. So we have done petticoats that are just one layer and they're a little closer to the body. We made one that had three layers of silk organza and it was enormous. We started calling it the sea monster because it just took over the studio. It had these beautiful, like, I was calling it the jewels of the sea petticoat because it was beautiful. You know, these lovely pastel tones. And it like, it reminded me of this vintage ad called Jewels of the Sea for Rosemary Reed, who made swimsuits. And I kept calling it the Jewels of the sea petticoat. And then we saw how big it was getting and so it became the sea monster after that. But you can really build up so much volume through the layers.
- [33:12]
Jeanine Clegg
The petticoat pattern that you have, is that based on a vintage petticoat that you had?
- [33:19]
Gretchen Hirsch
Yeah, I mean, we have a ton of petticoats in the Charm Studio. We actually started hanging them from the ceiling because we weren't sure where to store them. So we have like, we have a metal beam on our ceiling. It's really high. It's like 17 foot ceilings. And we got these magnetic hooks and we now we store like rows of petticoats on the ceiling. And it's so beautiful to look up at these, like all this, like candy colored pastel goodness. So we have a lot of petticoats and some of them are vintage and some of them are, you know, vintage reproductions. But yeah, I definitely spent a lot of time looking at what, what was the sort of the construction we wanted to reproduce and that our customers would, would want in their garments.
- [34:03]
Carol Frazia
Is there any special need for a particular type of, say, crinoline? I mean, they were called crinolines. I don't know if they actually used crinoline in them. Do you have to get particular fabrics?
- [34:13]
Gretchen Hirsch
Yeah, I mean, they're. They all, you know, were made from different fabrics. I remember my mom complaining about wearing petticoats when she was little because they were made of really scratchy material and you would starch them. And she. They said they were so. She said they were so scratchy, and she hated them. And she can't. She doesn't understand why I. Why I'm, like, replicating this at all. But what I found is that they're, you know, they're made from different fabrics. You can use organ, you know, silk organza. Cotton organdy was another one that's a bit softer that was really popular in vintage petticoats, and I desperately wanted to recreate one until I saw how expensive good cotton organdy is. And I said, you know what? Maybe we won't do that. You know, when you're getting to, like, an $800 petticoat, you kind of have to rein it in a little bit.
- [34:56]
Jeanine Clegg
Dial it back.
- [34:57]
Gretchen Hirsch
Yeah, dial it back. Dial it back. So, yeah, we ended up doing. Actually, silk organza ended up being more economical than. Than cotton organdy. But, yes, softer fabric. You don't have to use scratchy tulle. You know, there is something called cancan tool, which I think is just a nightmare. It's so. It's so scratchy, but it does give you incredible volume. So I would say, you know, I tend to like woven fabrics for my petticoats rather than net, just because I think it gives you that sort of, like, softer, fluffier look.
- [35:27]
Jeanine Clegg
It's a lot heavier, though. No, it can be.
- [35:31]
Gretchen Hirsch
I mean, silk organza, you know, tends to be pretty light. But, yeah, I think any sort of cotton would probably get fairly heavy.
- [35:40]
Jeanine Clegg
Let me switch gears for a minute and ask you. We see you're working on the Hollywood icons theme in 2025, and you've started with the Hollywood dress and then the Hollywood robe. Will you be dipping into more of the past? Before the 1950s, for example? The 50s seem to be your favorite.
- [36:01]
Gretchen Hirsch
So for sure they are.
- [36:03]
Jeanine Clegg
And will there be some fitted bodices in there?
- [36:05]
Gretchen Hirsch
Yeah. So Hollywood Icons is our theme on Patreon this year. And that's where we have a sort of monthly subscription for content, video tutorials. And every year, I choose a new theme. It's an amazing community of sewists who love vintage style. And so every year, we do a new theme. We just launched this Hollywood Icons theme. I'm really excited about this one. So every month, we're going to use a different icon as our inspiration. The Hollywood dress. The inspiration for that was Jean Harlow in the movie dinner at 8. You know, the iconic photo of her wearing the dressing gown with the ostrich feather trim on the sleeves. And that one's more 30s inspired. And that was a little bit of a challenge for me because it's more of a softly draped bodice. It has pleats. You know, there's a little bit of blousing to it, which I'm not used to seeing in our bodices. So I had to get comfortable with that idea. And then the next few months, we're definitely going to be sticking more to our comfort zone with, you know, inspiration like Marilyn Monroe, Grace Kelly, you know, and this. These are all costumes designed by Edith Head. So you're looking at very fitted bodices, very much inspired by the new look. But I will say we're going to be dabbling in different decades this year. I have a little bit of Ingrid Bergman inspiration coming up, which is very 40s, and then something Elizabeth Taylor 60s style, which I'm super excited about. So we are going to be branching out a little bit.
- [37:35]
Jeanine Clegg
I better brush up on my old movies.
- [37:38]
Gretchen Hirsch
I mean, get that Turner Classic Movie Channel fired up. This is like my favorite thing to do, like, while I'm sketching is just see what's on TCM and. And find inspiration there.
- [37:48]
Carol Frazia
I hope you'll do the, you know, the suit with the blouse that Grace Kelly wears in Rear Window. It's kind of a pale green, I think. And then she takes off the jacket and it's backless. The white blouse.
- [38:00]
Gretchen Hirsch
I do know which one you mean. I love that movie. And while we're not doing that one, we do have something inspired coming up.
- [38:08]
Jeanine Clegg
Yeah, we're looking forward to it. Oh, boy.
- [38:11]
Gretchen Hirsch
Yeah. Yeah. It's going to be a really fun year.
- [38:14]
Jeanine Clegg
Well, Gretchen, I.
- [38:15]
Gretchen Hirsch
It's.
- [38:16]
Jeanine Clegg
Gosh, we've been talking and the time has just flown by. If folks want to learn more about you or charm patterns and what you're up to next, where should they go?
- [38:27]
Gretchen Hirsch
So you can go to my Instagram, which is urty18, and there you can see all of our recent designs on Patreon and through Charm Patterns. You can also go to my website, www.charmpatterns.com.
- [38:43]
Jeanine Clegg
Well, thank you. Thank you so much for talking to us today. Oh, my gosh, the time really did go by fast. And we appreciate all of your tips and advice. And for links to some of the things we talked about today, see this Episode's notes@threadsmagazine.com Thank you, Gretchen. Appreciate your time and we look forward to seeing you again soon.
- [39:04]
Gretchen Hirsch
Thank you so much for having me. It was so fun to catch up with you both.
- [39:08]
Jeanine Clegg
Thanks thank you to our guests for.
- [39:10]
Rena O
Joining us and thanks to all of you for listening.
- [39:13]
Jeanine Clegg
Please remember to send your comments, questions and suggestions to thhreadsmagazine.com and please like.
- [39:21]
Rena O
Comment and subscribe wherever you are listening. Until next time, keep on sewing with threads.