Burda 2/1955: picking a pattern for generation challenge

See for all the posts of the generation challenge here.

See for the browse through of the magazine here.

The styles of the 50's

What we see foremost when we think of the 50's are dresses with cinched waists, pencil skirts and poodle skirts,

The colors or prints

All colors are to be seen in solid colors, gingham and polka dot.

And small prints, checks, plaid, and thin stripes.

Also, novelty prints came into fashion. Modemuze.nl has written a lovely post about this (in Dutch) which you can find here

Finding a working pattern

Okay, so there are a couple of problems which makes it more difficult to make something from this issue. First I only have pattern sheet 1 and 2. Next, I am missing the instructions. I have to figure out what number shown on the sheet corresponds with the right dress. No instructions also mean figuring the sewing out by myself. Next I have no idea what the sizing is. I think the sizing is smaller than we are used to now.

So I have dicided to make a couple of patterns and will sew them according to (what I think is the) difficulty.

The winning patterns

Dress one: easy.

Dress K8303 on sheet 2; size 46/48. I think the pattern pieces are very easy to find, sew and measure from paper and grade up when needed. With this dress I can tell if my current size 48 is similar to 65 years ago.

Dress two: intermediate.

Two piece K8306 on sheet 2; size 46/48. So the skirt is easy, I think. The top is a little bit trickier.

Dress three: difficult.

Blue dress K8255 on pattern sheet 1, size 44/46. Dress likely has to be graded up.

Dress four: difficult.

Dress K8299 on sheet 2; size 42/44. Sizing up.

The winning fabric

So all of the dresses would probably have been made from cotton. I really like african dutch wax. It is printed on both sides, is very cheap, colorful and wrinkles less then other cottons. My favorite is Africanfabs.

All links to generation challenge here: