A History of Women's Clothing Sizes

Our workroom supervisor, Brittany, 

e-mailed me a great article today from TIME about women's clothing sizes in history.

Here are some interesting facts I gathered!:

- True sizing standards didn't develop until the 1940's

- Initial sizing was based on a person's age, so a child of the age of 8 would wear a size 8. (How did that work??)

- U.S. manufacturers wanted a change in the sizing system when it was estimated that they were losing up to $10 million a year

- The National Bureau of Standards re-analyzed the sizes of women's clothing by basing the measurements of women who had served in the Air Force, this created a sizing scale of 8 to 38 with height indications of tall, regular, or short.

- There were no size "0", let alone triple zero as we have today.

- The original 1940's sizing standards were withdrawn in 1983 because of vanity sizing, thus numbers started to get smaller.

- In 1958, a size 8 corresponded with a bust of 31 inches, a waist of 23.5 inches and a hip girth of 32.5 inches. In ASTM’s 2008 standards, a size 8 had increased by five to six inches in each of those three measurements, becoming the rough equivalent of a size 14 or 16 in 1958. We can see size inflation happening over shorter time spans as well; a size 2 in the 2011 ASTM standard falls between a 1995 standard size 4 and 6. (Slate)

- In the 40's a model was a size 16, in the 60's a 12 - which was the size of Marilyn Monroe.

To read the full article, click HERE.

Friday Flashback: Bridal Gown

Whenever the studio re-designs a garment, (and gets permission to post the photos, of course :)) we will feature it on our "Flashback Friday" entry with the original garment and the re-designed one so you can see what's going on in the studio!

Today's first "flashback" features a client from a couple weeks ago who used her mother's wedding dress for her wedding day. She and her mother graciously gave us permission to show the beautiful dress' "before" and "after" to you!

Beautiful!

The top 20 Halloween Costumes of 2014

Halloween is around the corner and we've been getting lots of client requests for custom made costumes. So I got to thinking, what are the most popular costumes of 2014?

According to Yahoo, this year's top 20 most-searched Halloween costumes are:

1. Ninja Turtle Costumes

2. Pirates 

3. Star Wars Costumes

4. Poison Ivy 

5. Superhero Costumes

6. Catwoman 

7. Monster High 

8. Olaf Costumes

9. Frozen Elsa

10. Tinkerbell

11. Pocahontas

12. Minnie Mouse

13. Alice in Wonderland

14. Little Red Riding Hood

15. Great Gatsby

16. Minion Costume

17. Maleficent Costume

18. Wonder Woman

19. Frozen Anna

20. Katniss Everdeen Costume

To read about other costumes that made the list, click here. They also compiled a list of the most popular kids costumes, costumes based on recent movie characters, and classic ones too!

10 Interesting Facts About Sewing

1. Archaeologists believe that people used to sew together fur, hide, skin, and bark for clothing as far back as 25,000 years ago.

2. Early sewing thread consisted of thin strips of animal hide that were used to stitch together larger pieces of hide and fur.

3. The sewing machine was invented in 1790 by Thomas Saint.

4. The Singer sewing machine was patented by Isaac Merritt Singer in 1851.

5. Singer's patent was the most dominant firm in the industry compared to other competitors.

6. Early sewing needles were made of bone and ivory.

7. "The whole nine yards," a common phrase, came from the fabric that was needed to make the fanciest coat for a man of fashion.

8. In the 20th century, more than 4,000 different kinds of sewing machines were made.

9. Women began forming sewing society's in the 1860's where they would gather together and make quilts to sell at church bazaars.

10. The 1950's are regarded as sewing's "golden age" because of a strong focus on fashion sewing, designer patterns, and copying Hollywood looks.

Sources: sewingmantra.com, sewmuchmore,biz, historytoday.com, sewnplace.com, sewretrothebook.com, encyclopedia.com

Hello Again!

Apologies for not writing in a few months! We've been keeping very busy! And now that it's almost Halloween, we're going to be even MORE busy which we love!

We have a ton of costumes and clothing to choose from at the studio. From medieval to superheroes, from sports stars to famous icons, we have all that and more!

Here's just ONE of our new costumes channeling Marilyn Monroe in her iconic scene in The Seven Year Itch.

Still not sure who you want to be this year? That's okay! We will be sharing more costume photos over Facebook for the next three weeks before Halloween. 

If there is something specific you would like us to create or alter, send us a message at info@sewingdesignstudio.com or call us! We also have rentals as well so even if you just need one last piece to complete your costume, we probably have it!