Challenge 6 - The Alex Challenge

Well, the Alex challenge! I have never really looked at the Alex dolls, I have no idea why? However, as the challenge began and my doll arrived just in the nick of time, (courtesy of a wonderful eBay seller, interknitter), I have to admit, I was impressed! She is a lovely doll, with a very expressive face, her eyes are lovely with the added eyelashes. Her articulation is particularly good, she even has articulated feet so that she can wear heels and flat shoes.

As for the challenge, famous woman, famous film, famous dress. Sounds easy? No way!
The ideas came but…
Moulin Rouge, Romeo and Juliet, Annie Get Your Gun, The King And I- Historical outfits but not distinctive enough, you could do a fabulous outfit but would you immediately associate it with the film, or the actress??

Austin Powers, Rocky Horror Picture Show - great fun outfits to make, but again, would you associate it with the film or the actress?
Some ideas I would have liked to have done would have been..

Bedazzled, lots of scope for sexy, red sparkly outfits.

Cleopatra, would have been good, it certainly helped with Elizabeth Taylor’s career.

Miss Potter - Imagine an outfit with a portfolio of paintings!

The Mask of Zorro - Women never really got a chance to save the day here, (well, apart from the film “The Black Whip”) a tight black trouser suit and flowing cape?

Barbarella - a real chance to do an exotic space age outfit.

My Fair Lady? The Ascot gown is very distinctive to the film and Audrey Hepburn.

Cecil Beaton did a wonderful job on the wardrobe for this film. He used colours, fabrics and textures to create a real feast for the eyes. The dress is very iconic both for the film and Audrey Hepburn.
Recreating it is not going to be easy!
Throughout the film Cecil Beaton has used colours with great effect, in the opening sequences from the film, the upper class patrons leave the opera house in Covent Garden and mingle with the poorer lower classes. To make the distinction between the characters greater than ever, Cecil used rich jewel colours in the fabrics of the upper classes and dirty looking earthy colours for the lower class folk.
Later on in the film in the Ballroom scenes, he used muted pastel colours for the ballgowns, this gave the sequence a softer dreamy look.
For the Ascot Race Day he used only black, grey and white fabrics. An incredibly unusual choice for such elaborate costumes which worked amazingly well.
Cecil obviously could not use colour to make an impact, with the black, white and grey. He did however, manage to achieve it by the creativeness of the costumes.
This does not make my job any easier!
The fun bit is doing all the research and finding the fashions of the day…

Fashions from around 1900 to 1920 changed at an incredible rate for a period of only 20 years. So I decided to use the period 1910 to 1915 as this era seemed to fit well into the My Fair Lady film.

It is obvious just from the few pictures above that the outfit would have to include a hat, gloves and a parasol. Also, that there would be a lot of work involved and attention to detail would be more important than ever.

Well, lots of ideas there. But where do you start?

Well, the hat has to be big enough to make a “Look who’s here!” kind of statement and the dress has to show off the figure. The dress has to have a touch of comedy about it and has to be completely over the top!
I wanted to use mostly white without it looking like a wedding dress, too much black would have looked like funeral attire!

I kept the entire dress white and used the most sumptuous white silk dupion, using the black in all the trimmings.
I started off with her underwear, as the dress needed a bustle, the underwear would be a necessary part of the outfit. She has white silk bloomers, trimmed with white lace around the legs.
Then the bustle, without this, the dress hangs too flat at the back but with it, you get a better hourglass shaped figure which looks more balanced. This is made in silk too and trimmed with more lace, well, why not? It has a satin belt fastening with a press stud at the front.
Then, as I wanted to be able to see her boots, she needed stockings. Having sheer stockings would not work as they were not really worn then, so I used white jersey fine knitted fabric, this is great as it stretches and fit’s the leg really well without getting too wrinkly. The stocking tops were trimmed with white elasticated lace to keep them up.

The boots were not too easy, as the Alex doll has articulated feet that just will not stay still for a fitting, so I had to use another doll as a stand in for that part!
The boots are made in the silk dupion, a little zip fastens up the back of each boot and a row of beads are sewn up the side to represent the rows of tiny buttons that were usually found on these boots.
The dress itself is a complicated affair. It is made in various panels that are fitted to the body, I wanted to keep the bodice really closely fitted and take this down to hip length. I used the front panel of the dress to emphasise the figure with the outlining of the black braid giving it an exaggerated hourglass shape. The buttons also give it a nice detailed period feel. The front panel crosses over and fastens down the side with hidden press studs.

The neckline is finished off with black lace and an overlarge bow. Leg of mutton sleeves were very typical for this period, so they were done and long cuffs covered with lace and plenty more buttons up the sides.
The skirt has a straight section at the front and a very full almost circular back section which flows to the floor over her bustle. The front draped section of the skirt is made in pure silk, which is a great fabric to work in scale outfits as you can spay it with water and pull it into the correct shape, when it dries it holds the shape and the folds and draping look more realistic.

Of course with an outfit like this she needs accessories, and lots of them! Her hat is an obvious accessory, without it there is no outfit. It has to be massive, it has to swirl, it has to be over decorated! The base of the hat was fun to do using iron on stiffener onto the silk, the crown and brim were made separately covered in silk dupion. Then they were hand sewn together. The flowers and feathers are sewn on - liberally. I wanted the “Splash of Red” to be something whimsical, after all the scene in which Eliza appears is a comedy sketch. So I found these cute little red dragonflies, in just the right shade of red, and decided to have one flying free on the hat, this would give the hat extra movement and bring a bit of life to it. The dragonfly is attached to fine wire and sewn to the hat.


Parasols were used in their day as a way to show off a garment, or person for that matter. In these outfits, you couldn't simply stand with your hands by your sides and ruin the line of the dress, neither could you stand with your hands clasped in front of you hiding your fabulous outfit and figure!! So this parasol has an extra long handle which would ensure that doll holds it away from her, with her arm out away from her body, you get to see more of the dress.
It was great fun to make, I used a wooden skewer and glued beads on both ends, then painted the whole thing white. The fabric was trimmed and sewn on and a little tassel added to the handle for a finishing touch.

A little bag was also a necessary item, nothing on the lines of the original bag in the film, which was frankly ridiculous, (but probably the comedy element!) I wanted something more fitting to the era, delicate and matching the outfit.
To finish off she has tiny white lace gloves, you simply could not be seen outdoors without the gloves!