Draping--Sort Of--A Sacque, Part Six. The Stomacher

Draping a robe a la francaise, or sacque. An eight part series! Click the tag or go to the tutorial page for links to all parts.

Stomachers are extremely easy to do. I had initially planned on doing this in muslin, but decided on using my dress fabric once I realized to get to the muslin, I'd have to go past the litter box. Since I was already taking out everything with my yet to be hemmed dress, I thought that might not be the best thing to do!



I started with a rectangle of fabric just a little longer than I wanted and wider than I needed



I then pinned the top edge down and pinned it into my dress.



Pin the bottom edge up into a pleasing shape.



A little hard to see, but place pins at the edges of the dress. These mark the edges of the stomacher before seam allowances and room for overlap.



Here's the stomacher once it's unpinned from the dress.

To cut the stomacher out, add a seam allowance of about an inch or so on the sides, and half inch on the top and bottom. The actual shape of the stomacher that shows is marked by pins.





I folded it in half to make sure it was even.



Cut a corresponding piece of linen.





Fold the seam allowances under and edge stitch together. Then decorate. That's it! You can do a boned lining too--it just depends on the style you're after.