A New Dress for an Old China Head

 

Recently, a friend from my doll club asked if I could make a dress for her antique, china head doll.  This is what she wanted me to use:

 

It appeared to be a vintage baby/toddler dress.  The material was a soft, loosely woven, homespun-type fabric in a delicious shade of peach that beautifully set off the doll's coloring.  I can see why my friend wanted it.  However, once I started on the project, I began to wonder what I had gotten myself into.  Notice how the dress is sleeveless?  Cute for a baby, but not so appropriate for a late, 1800's style dress.

 

I placed the dress over the doll, just to get an idea of what I might need to do in order to make it fit.  I knew for sure that it would need sleeves, but how was I going to make those when I didn't have much fabric to work with?  I wanted to leave the bodice as it was, and gather the bottom of it to a waistband, which was a popular dress style for these dolls.  I started by cutting the skirt from the bodice.  Then, I removed the lace from the armhole openings and cut in armhole curves from the bodice.  I discovered that there was quite a deep hem at the bottom of the skirt, so I decided to let it out. (It ended up being 4-5 inches in width)  This still wasn't wide enough from which to cut sleeves, but I could use this extra fabric for the waistband and trim on the sleeves.  Luckily, I ended up finding some cream colored, vintage fabric in my stash that worked perfectly for the sleeves.

 

After several hours of picking out seams and carefully planning how I was going to make this work, here is what I came up with!  I was pretty proud of myself when it was all said and done.

 

I realize this photo isn't completely in focus, but it's the only one I took of the detail on the sleeves.  Since I didn't want it to look like the sleeves were an afterthought, I added a strip of the dress fabric and the lace I removed from the armholes.  I think this helps tie the sleeves to the dress.

 

A closer view of the bodice.  Isn't this doll just gorgeous?  I forgot to measure her, but I think she was around 28" long.  Not sure of her maker, but probably Kestner or ABG.

 

Back view--the buttons and buttonholes were already there, so all I had to do was add a snap at the waist.

 

I took this little beauty to my friend today when we met for doll club.  She was thrilled with how it had turned out.  I was sad to see her go, but someday, I hope to own a beautiful china like this, also!