Altered Dress Form

I always seem to be buying items with the full intention of altering them and then never getting around to doing it.  After altering my Valentine's day hearts, I decided to finish a metal dress form type of ornament that I bought and started last year.  But, unfortunately I made the mistake of popping into "Homesense"(our Canadian version of T. J. Maxx) last week and found yet another dress form that I thought would be fun to alter.  So, instead of working on the old one, I started but actually finished the new one! I was inspired by Graphic 45's new line, "Kraft Reflections" and the papers were perfect for this dress form.

The dress form is metal, except for the bodice part. I first cut out the cards on the paper"All Decked out" and layered them for the skirt.  One of the papers is a thin stripe(Straight to the Point) which I scored along the lines and made the shorter pleated skirt.  I then cut out the small decorative circles from a Memory Box die and layered them around the waist.  The tissue flowers were cut out with 7Gypsies tissue and the Tim Holtz Tattered Flower die.

For the inside floor, I used a wood Kaiser large doily which fit almost perfectly inside, I just had to shave a bit off one edge.  I had a vintage spool and bobbin that I used.  All the flowers, leaves and swirls were hand cut from the floral paper, "Bed of Roses" except two (those were the Tim Holtz tattered flower die and mini tattered flower die) I used snaps for the centers of those flowers.  The dress form was a Wendy Vecchi chipboard piece covered in paper and then crackled with Rock Candy.


I glued some of the leaves and flourishes on the outside of the dress form too.


The form had four metal hooks around the waist, so I punched out small tags to hang on them.  I then used the spool on the Tim Holtz dressmakers die, to cut out spools with chipboard, then covered with paper and glued those to the center of the tags. Colored some seam binding ribbon with Distress Stain, and tied them to the hooks.  I cut out some butterflies from one of the papers and adhered them on the tissue and one at the top with wire.  That's it for my FINISHED altered dress form!  Now I really need to finish  that other one!
Have a great weekend!

14 comments

Lynn said...

I'm in awe Jan. This is just so beautiful. You are the queen of altered items! I wish I could do what you do...

KellyCreates said...

Just saw this in the store....absolutely INCREDIBLE!!! you are so gifted, Jan :)

Tammy Tutterow said...

Jan!!! I have no words! Oh my!

Andrea said...

Wow! This is lovely! I love the "neutral" colors. Makes all of your beautiful design elements really stand out on their own. Thanks for sharing! Makes me want to go shopping at TJ Maxx. I haven't been there in years! :)

Shaunery said...

HOLY MOLY! I was originally inspired to play with my own paper mache dress form when Ranger started their extreme Stickles, but NOW I'm going a WHOLE NEW DIRECTION!

Cindy F said...

This is fabulous - I love it!

Nancy said...

How beautiful!!!

Angie Blom said...

wow.. this is just stunningly gorgeous!!

Alison said...

You are so talented - this is beautiful!

Candy C said...

Wow...this is absolutely beautiful! What amazing attention to detail and imagination! LOVE IT! <3 Candy

Michelle said...

Holy cow Jan! I'm totally gobsmacked by this stunning creation!!!!! This is outstanding...and as someone addicted to dress forms ...I can tell you I'm truly coveting this!You can ship it to Nfld when you get tired of looking at it! LOL

Wendy Aspinall said...

I'm speechless this is so stunning....
Hugs wendy
http://blissangles.blogspot.com

SueB said...

Amazing! Can't find words here...this is absolutely fabulous!

Freetany said...

Wow! this is absolutely fabulous!

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