Why did it take me so long the first time?

My new partner came over today and we taped up the cloth. All 5 yards of it. In three hours.

So that's done. We did run out of duct tape about 1 row away from being finished, but it's basically done. I can't believe it took me so long to do just 4 yards...

He left his tux here, so sometime during this week I can draw up a pattern for the next time we get together.

(12 black, 6 chrome, 1 purpe)

Big Update! Steps 6 and 7? Idk anymore...

The dress is all put together. Here's a pic of most of the pieces before we taped them together by peeling the edges of the duct tape away from the cloth and interlocking the two pieces (layering from bottom up: cloth 1, cloth 2, duct tape 1, duct tape 2. The top layer of duct tape stuck to the duct tape directly under it, which stuck to the cloth that originally went with the top layer of duct tape. Hopefully that makes sense...). After that part of the "sewing" was done and smoothed out as much as possible, we took a long piece of black duct tape and went over the whole seam top to bottom. It's suprisingly secure. I've also adjusted the dress with darts around the waist and bust by pinching up the extra duct tape cloth (Duct tape cloth will now be refered to as DTC because I'm tired of typing out the whole thing), folding it over, and sticking it down with a long piece of duct tape. And in case anyone's wondering; yes, I did finish the dress form/mannequin thing, but I don't have a good picture of it since my dress has been hanging on it and my sisters stuffed it to the breaking point trying to make it look "realistic" (fat). :P

I'm working on the fancier stuff now, mostly the neckline. The neckline is an unusual original design, and when I'd worked on it a bit, I realized I'd have to move the planned zipper from the back to the side, otherwise I wouldn't be able to get into the dress. I've also evened out the bottom hem with a good pair of scissors (so much easier than working with normal cloth!) and added a curving slit (triangular cutout? wedge shaped clothless spot?) that ends right above my left knee. I'll be adding a bunch of stars there too, to circle around for the train.

Unfortunately I've had to find another partner, but the good news is within a week I found a friend of mine who's willing to give it a shot. We're going to meet on Saturday to work on his tux design and start making his DTC, so we'll see how it goes!

(I'll say one black to tape it together and one purple for the neckline, so 6 blacks, 6 chromes, and 1 purple)