The “Perfect” Cinderella Dress – Process & Finished
The “Perfect” Cinderella Dress – Process & Finished

The “Perfect” Cinderella Dress – Process & Finished

IMG_3999A few years back, I posted about the “perfect” Cinderella dress. I never posted finished photos, nor the process, mostly due to not taking enough photos.

A year later, I was blessed to create a second, upgraded, Cinderella dress for a customer…this time I took photos!

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Hand-sewing the hoop skirt’s boning channels!
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Most of the boning is inserted!

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This time around, I used this industrial Singer for my ruffles! No more wearing out my Bernina! Plus, I’m using a ruffler foot for the first time…it worked wonders!
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Another first timer…I decided to serge my several layers of ruffles together! I’m so glad I did; no more fraying!
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And another first timer! I added a detachable ruffled “skirt” to the hoop skirt. It’s hides the hoop skirt when you’re twirling!
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One of the most frustrating things about sewing the Cinderella dress…trying to sew the petticoat together! So many frills!
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In order to create 3 layers of Silk Gauze skirts, I needed to cut 39 skirt pieces. My way of doing it; taping the pattern piece on the floor and laying several layers of fabric on top! (Then you cut them all out!)

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All 6 layers of the outer skirt!

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When you need to hem several layers, you’ve got to get the other layers out of the way! It kinda looks like a mountain, doesn’t it?
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Getting the boning channels placed! I placed more channels than previous dresses.

IMG_3884IMG_3890In order to create the bodice fabric, I glue 5 different fabrics together. As the glue drys, I pinned the the pattern piece to the form. This way, the piece was formed in the perfect shape!

“Glueing fabric” sounds bad, but I use a spray adhesive that only puts a light amount on; perfect for keeping the several fabrics together!IMG_3891Here’s a tip for the perfect bodice…cut the fabric on bias!IMG_3894The first step for creating the bertha: attaching the several pieces of fabric and then gathering the center front and back.
IMG_3913IMG_3916IMG_3918IMG_3923IMG_3925IMG_3933All that’s left is to add the butterflies! I hand-make them for the upgraded version. There you have it; the “perfect” Cinderella dress! Truth be told, this is my absolute favorite Cinderella dress I’ve ever made!

~ All Finished ~IMG_3974IMG_4080IMG_4087IMG_4106IMG_4121IMG_4124IMG_4148

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I just had to try it on and give it a twirl!

IMG_4248IMG_4-68IMG_4-67IMG_4-66IMG_4-65IMG_4-64IMG_4-29IMG_4-10IMG_4-8Here’s some photos of my lovely costumer in the dress!


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Thanks for looking and learning with me!

33 Comments

  1. Alex

    Hi! I’m interested in making a dress like this one! I have one question: How do I find out how much fabric I should get when making this? I’m taller than most people and not very skinny.

    1. Well, that’s a hard question. But fortunately, size doesn’t have too much to do with this. The the outer layers of the skirt I used about 20 yards of fabric for each layer.
      For the frills, well… I actually don’t have the numbers for that. I just have a stash of Cinderella frills I’ve made and just use them as I need them. This is something you’ll have to experiment with. For my first dress, I ordered 6 bolts of tulle (40yds each). I didn’t use all of it, but it got me started. I also ordered about 10 yards of each of the other fabrics I use.

      For this upgraded version I use mostly nylon chiffon. I believe I used 270 yards of nylon frills (before it’s gathered.)
      Hopefully that gets you started!
      Isabella

  2. Samantha

    Hello! I’m a huge fan of all your designs and you give me so much inspiration to make costumes and to not give up! I was wondering if you had a detailed version of how you made the petticoat layers? And what fabrics/colours you may had used where? I’d really like to recreate the Cinderella dress and this is the most amazing recreation I have ever seen! Love your work and can’t wait to see more of your creation!

    1. Hi! Thank you for those kind words! I always wonder if this blog is servicing it’s purpose…thank you for answering that!
      At this point, this blog post is all I’m willing to offer. But I will let you know the colors I used for the frills: Blue, Lilac, Lavender, Silver, Green, Turquoise, and Iridescent White.
      Thanks again!

  3. ellek

    Hi Bella! I’m making a Cinderella dress for a school play…not nearly this huge or elaborate or beautiful! But hopefully it will echo your creation. Question: did you use any horsehair braid and/or fishing line to accentuate volume? Or just the astronomical yardage of ruffles to get the poof? I need to create volume without bulk as at least some of the dress has to fit inside a transformation peasant costume. Thanks for any advice you have to offer 🙂

  4. kur

    hello ma’am! your dress is absolutely gorgeous! i am so in love with it! i don’t know if you’d still be able to get to this, but i hope you can answer a short question of mine – is this a circle skirt or a double circle? i am making my wedding dress (hopefully successfully) and i just like how lovely the skirt of this looks like and the way it twirls (my fiance loves to dance so that’s definitely going to happen) hopefully you can answer and help me lots but i understand if you don’t 🙂 😀 thank you! your customer seemed so very happy! and she looks so pretty in it too!!

    1. Hi, Thanks for writing. The layers of this skirt are made of gores, not circles. There are 13 gores in each layer of the skirt. If you view the photo in the post where I talk about taping the pattern piece on the ground…that’s the shape of the gores!
      Hope that helps!

  5. Olivia

    Hi! I’m in the process of making a Cinderella dress similar to this one and I was wondering what kind of fiit you used for the frills of the petticoat and also if you hemmed the bottom of the frills. Thank you!

  6. Hey! I have a bunch of questions so no worries If you can’t answer all of them but I love your dress so much I thought I might as well ask.
    So first up, the bertha. Is there a layer of fabric sandwiched between the outside layer to get a watercolour effect? Or is it just one layer? And also, when you gather it, do you just ‘scrunch ‘ it and and sew it in place?
    The bodice, did you line it? And when you put boning into the channels, does it bend into a point (at the back of the dress the bodice is lifted up over the skirt and crinoline). (This also applies to the chest area, is it just quite low and flat?)
    The hoop skirt, did all of the channels have boning in apart from the directly vertical ones?
    And how do you get the flat front but voluminous back?
    For your petticoat, how many waistbands did you use? (One for the crinoline, dust ruffle bag and first layer? Then the bulk of the ruffles in another? Then the middle skirts with full length skirts and a ruffle on the bottom with another waistband. Then the top layer of skirts?)

    Sorry for all thses questions but I am cinderella OBSESSED

    1. Thanks for writing. I’l do my best to answer.
      With the bertha, yes. There’s a few layers of fabric in it (I think I did a pink organza and blue gauze…though I may have done a third layer, I can’t remember!) And yes, I simply gathered it and sewed it in place.

      With the bodice; yes, it’s lined. Yes, to your questions about boning (I think I know what you mean and with the extremely curved boning channels, I use spiral boning.)

      With the hoop skirt; yes, all the channels have boning in it. But the vertical strips are just ribbon, so they don’t have boning.
      To answer the flat front question…luck and some structural engineering! I just played around it with the boning placement until it did the correct thing!

      And lastly the petticoats. There’s a waist band for the hoop skirt, then the petticoat is divided into 2 waistbands. And then finally the outer skirt has it’s own waistband.

      Hope that helps! And a head up; I’m coming out with a full series about the making of this dress on YouTube. I hope to releasing it in August! Here’s my channel: http://youtube.com/c/BellaMaesDesigns

  7. Millie

    Oh my goodness thank you so much! I’m so glad you are making a youtube series, the best one I found was on the channel Traybuff and I look forward to seeing yours too. I’m about to buy fabric to make a live action cinderella dress and I’m extremely excited!

  8. Hannah S

    Hi! I’m making a wedding dress and I want the same floaty quality of the skirts you have here. Are the petticoats in the same colorful gauzy materials? or did you use just plain fabric for the petticoats and then added the colorful ruffle at the hem? If so, what material did you use for the petticoats to achieve that movement?

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