Violetta Craft's Arc

Chapter 42 of 65

Monday morning Violetta pulled the purple bodice off the form and laid it flat on the office desk. She stared at it for a long time. It was clean work. The seams were tight, the placket sat right, the color still held her eye. But it was the same dress that had won her the junior showcase. Judges at the senior level would know it on sight. They would call it a repeat. Second place again, or worse. She had five months and no new idea, and the thought of starting over made her stomach tight. She put Elowen down for a nap and sat on the floor with her sketchbook. Nothing came. She flipped past six blank pages before she got up and walked downstairs. Missy was on the couch in a pink floral sundress with thin straps and a full skirt, the kind of cheap thing their mother had ordered online for summer. Missy spun once to show it off. The pattern was loud and simple. One idea, roses on a soft background, and the shape did the rest. Violetta thought of what the judge had told her a year ago. One clear idea. Cut everything else. She asked Missy to stand still and pulled out her phone and took three pictures of the neckline and the waist seam. She went back upstairs and opened the sketchbook again. This time she drew fast. A fitted sweetheart bodice. A gathered midi skirt. No placket, no color blocking, no layered overlay. One fabric, one print she would design and have printed herself, roses she would draw by hand from the garden out back. She wrote across the top of the page: Atelier. She would call the dress after the small studio house she wanted to own one day, the one she kept pinned above her desk. She tore the purple dress off the form and folded it into the closet. She emailed the showcase coordinator and changed her entry title from Purple A-Line to Atelier. Then she pulled out fresh muslin and started cutting a new bodice pattern from scratch. Five months. One idea. She pressed the shears through the cloth and did not stop until the first piece lay clean on the table.