A Sacque--Or Robe a la Francaise--Tutorial, Part Nine--Separate Front Skirts

Since the rest of this tutorial tells how to make a sacque with the skirt and front bodice cut in one, but many sacques--especially later ones--were cut with separate skirts, I thought I'd go ahead and update this tutorial!


I'm mainly basing this off the robe a la francaise in Patterns of Fashion 1.

This tutorial picks up after Part Three, The Back of the last tutorial. No need to repeat myself!

The only difference between the pleats in this dress and the rest of the tutorial is I made them narrower, and to do this, I put a small pleat under the back pleats, as seen in this entry on a cotton sacque at The Sign of the Golden Scissors.


The back is pleated, the side back pieces sewn on, and it's ready for the side skirt to be pleated in the above picture.

The side back pieces are quite simple to sew on. I like to start them about an inch above the lining (wiggle room is always good!), then just sew with a running stitch to the hem.

The side skirt on this sacque is different than the chocolate francaise. While that skirt was straight, the pieces of this skirt are gored. The back of the skirt is straight, and the side piece has one straight edge and one gored edge. The straight edge of this piece is sewn to the back skirt, and the gored side is sewn to front skirt, and left open for the pocket slit at the top. The front of the skirt is essentially a trapezoid, with two parallel gored edges. This makes much more sense with the pattern draft in front of you!


The pocket slit will be on the gored edge of this piece. Hem that first. It's much easier when you pleat it! Just hem about 8 or 9 inches from the top. Then make stacked knife pleat as shown, with the hemmed edge of the pocket slit on the outer edge.


Baste that into place. Later, you'll sew it to the lining, but basting it now makes it much less prone to wiggling out of place later on!


Tuck the pleats underneath the bodice back. Snip the bodice edge above that so that both the pleats and the bodice edge can lie flat.

And yes, these pictures are from opposite sides of the skirt!


Now it's time for the front pieces. I cut these to the same size as my pattern pieces with a little extra seam allowance. Because of my figure, I didn't need to dart this piece, but they usually were darted. It'll be hidden by trim anyway! It's a figure specific thing, so look at a few originals (I do suggest that a lot, don't I?) and do what your figure needs!

I started at the back, and pinned the bodice piece into place, folding the edge under as I went.


Then I continued down the front edge, pinning and smoothing as I went.


Then I continued at the bottom edge, still smooothing...


Then, up the back. Still smoothing, of course! It should extend just past the back pleats. Don't worry about following your lining's seamline. Just make an attractive angle.

And now, sew all that down! I used a spaced backstich and point a rabbatre sous le main. A much easier stitch than it sounds, really :)



And now, the skirt! It's topstitched on based on an example in Fitting and Proper.

Hem a few inches of the front edge opening, or turn it under as if you were going to hem it. Then fold the top edge over, and pin it to the front of the skirt. Now, the front panel is slanted, so you need to make the fold deeper at the opening of the skirt than the side seam. Here's the fun part--play with the pleat until your skirt hangs correctly.


Now you're going to make a stacked pleat to mirror the back pleat. Again, the pocket slit should be hemmed. To do this, I just pinned the first pleat, then continued making pleats over that. Once the pleats are done, pin the rest into place.


The kind of finished skirt pinned on! It just needs the stacked pleat. I initially read the draft incorrectly, and then forgot to take a picture of the correct way! With the extra pleat, it didn't hang right over the pocket hoops. Uh, oops? :)


Then take the dress off the form, line up the skirt side so it's even, and sew the skirt side seam!


And here's the finished dress! Admittedly, much was skipped in this part of the tutorial, but it is all covered elsewhere!

Robings--I left robings off this dress. It looked like some originals were done this way, and my fabric is a quilting weight cotton--I really didn't want to add extra weight. Here's my Pinterest board of cotton sacques

Now, if you want robings, you can make them like the ones on my anglaise, or you can cut the bodice piece extra wide, and then make them like on my chocolate francaise, except, of course, just bodice length. I was going to do that on the yellow sacque I just made, but make a cutting mistake and did it like the anglaise. Oops. both are period, right?

The stomacher--This dress has a compere opening--basically a split stomacher that closes with buttons. To make it, I traced the stomacher I made in this tutorial, and added a little overlap in the middle.

Sleeves--The sleeves on this are sandwiched between the lining and the outer fabric. I initially made them with the sleeve cap on top, but then I decided I wanted the narrower trim many original sacques seem to have. I have two sets of sleeve instructions up. these are the more detailed, and these show sleeves covered by robings on my chocolate francaise.

I believe this covers everything! For some reason, writing this one didn't come easily, well directions are never easy, but even less easy than usual! So please, if you have any questions, ask them! I do want these tutorials to be very, very helpful! I've already edited my anglaise tutorial based on a question, and I found an unclear spot in my francaise tutorial today as well. So please, do ask!

Draping--Sort Of--A Sacque, Part Seven. The Sleeves.

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.



To make the sleeves, I used a method I first saw Isis Wardrobe use on Live Journal probably a few years ago. I unfortunately don't have a link.

To do it, you put the right sides together on the silk, and right sides together on the linen and sew through all the layers. For the bottom inch or so, sew just the silk so that you can turn the edges under.

When you turn the sleeve right side out, it's lined! Truly like magic :)



The sleeves with the side seams sewn.





Fold back the robing and set the bottom of the sleeve as you normally would. Line up the back corner of the sleeve with the seam allowance of the back strap and sew around to about the corresponding part in front.





Ease the top of the sleeve over the shoulder. Pleat the back to fit.





Fold the robing over to make sure it covers the sleeve cap. Try it on at this point.



Fold the seam allowance of the lining under and pin. You'll whipstitch this to the sleeve.

After this, sew the top of the sleeve down. I used a spaced backstitch. You'll further secure it when you sew the robing over it.

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.

Draping--Sort Of--A Sacque, Part Five

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.

And now with the craziness that is Costume Con behind me, here's the next part of the sacque tutorial! Namely, the front.

Now, there are many ways to do the front. This is the style dress that's one piece of fabric from shoulder to hem.

A word of advice--if you do this style, make it longer than you think it needs to be. I cut it too short so ended up cutting it again, and well, too short again. I ended up piecing the front hem. I love my fabric though--it hides it so well!

For the front armscye, I just cut it to my pattern. However, I'd recommend adding a little to the edge of it if your lining dart is more than the cosmetic dart I have. It's easy enough to trim later!

I'm using the 1740-1750 sacque (diagram XV) in The Cut of Women's Clothes as my guide. Doing this is really pretty much playing around with the fabric until it works.



First, I put in a dart from about bust to waist level. This releases into the skirt and helps it sit smoothly over the hoop. My striped pet-en-l'air didn't have this and I needed to take a waist dart. My pink pet-en-l'air has a similar dart and didn't need a waist dart.



And next, a rather big jump! Fold the fabric that becomes the robing over. You're essentially making a box pleat.



Here's what the back looks like. Trim the lowest level of the robing to decrease bulk. You're going to turn the top layer under to cover any raw edges.



The turned under edge pinned in place.



A close up of the front. The raw edge is turned under. If you're lucky enough to have fabric with a clean selvage, you can leave it as is. If not, the skirt portion will get a narrow hem. You don't need to hem the bodice portion though, as when you tack the robing down, you can catch the raw edge to the lining.



Another shot of the robing--the bottom pin is placed approximately where the stitching will go.



Repeat, and you have most of a sacque!

Draping--Sort Of--A Sacque, Part Four

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.

Next up, the side seams and skirt pleats!



First, pin the skirt pieces to the back piece. The skirt should start about an inch above the waist--this makes it easy to hide the pleats in the side seam. The pictures show this from both the right and wrong sides.



Sew the seams for a few inches--just enough so you can pleat the sides. These are easy to finish later, but pleating pinned seams could get frustrating :)



Now it's time for the front piece. Pin it to the armscye to anchor it.



Sew the front of the side skirt piece to the front piece in the same way the back piece was sewn.



Mark the center of the side skirt piece.



Make a stacked box pleat. The center of this is the spot marked with a pin above.



Slip that pleat over the lining.



Fold the seam allowance of the front piece over to create a lapped seam, and pin into place. The side seam and pleats are done!