Butterfly dress a la Mcqeen

So I started making the dress. I made the pattern

I use heavy card stock in grey for my patterns, I like the weight of the card stock.

After the patterns are all drafted I cut the muslin from a cotton white fabric in medium weight. Since the dress has to balloon I need a stiffer fabric for the muslin as well.

I trace the pattern on the fabric. I use a vanishing marker for that. When I worked as a fashion designer, laying the pattern for maximum usage of the fabric was ingrained in me, and I still abide by this habit regardless of how much fabric I have.

This is when the heavy stock make sense, light weight fabric will not work it will fold and move and I will not attach the pattern pieces to the fabric with pins. No, not me.

Once I sewed the muslin, I make all the adjustments to the dress. In this case I had to make some adjustments to the overall fit and reduce the balloon, it was way too much.

Once I fix the pattern pieces based on the muslin, I mark the fabric and cut all the pieces.

I put the outer shell first before cutting the lining in order to test the fitting of the dress. even though the dress is not closed in the side seams, I can gauge by holding it along the sides if it will work or not. I hate ripping seams and more then that recutting all the pieces. So from past experience, I cut the lining after I made sure that the dress will fit nicely.