Getting to the UK one Frida at a time

Hi all, I am on a plane in 14 sleeps and the big old whiteboard is covered in things to do! I arrive at Heathrow on 24 October and will be back in New Zealand by 16 November.
I am broke, cassé, skint, and in order to be able to eat, travel and have somewhere to stay while I am there, I've been fundraising. The gigs I have do pay, and for that I am grateful, but to raise the balance I have been making and selling Frida and Mary jacket patches. Frida outsells Mary by about 10 to one but that's to be expected!
It's actually really satisfying to be able to raise money by making things myself. And with these sales, sales of false drag lashes and performance fees I've raised enough to get by without having to rely on my credit card too much!
Other than that, I'm doing some free lance work, sewing for myself and others, and dealing with three massive things going totally wrong in my life all at once.  Two of them could be sorted by me getting a full time job or a longer term contract, and the third will probably come right faster if I did as well, because the stress of the situation would diminish a lot.
I don't want to go into details about any of them here, sorry to be vague but I'm in that weird place where pretending everything is OK is just not possible because it isn't, yet sharing the details is not a thing I can do right now either. Suffice to say that corporate greed and earthquakes are behind the troubles. One day I'll tell all.
In the meantime, I am blown away by the kindness of people!!! Friends and family who through small and huge acts of kindness just keep reminding me that life is worth persisting with.
On my to-do list is Fabricabrac this Saturday. The bi annual huge destash market that started in Wellington and is now happening all over NZ. I decided to use it as  chance to clear out my ridiculous stash of fabric in the shop store room and today Penny and I hauled out boxes and bins full of it!

This is a FRACTION of what we unearthed. It was crazy. I found stuff I forgot I had, had bought again, and generally realised that I am a HOARDER.
Anyway it's sorted more or less, scraps in colour themed bags, size and value sorted, everything. And I tell you I am not bringing stuff back. I kept back about a binful at most, the rest if it doesn't sell is going to a charity. But I think I'll be seeing lots of happy people walk out with it.
And thus will I make just a little bit more for my trip. :) In full knowledge of the money wasted on buying it in the first place. But to be honest I've not really added to my hoards much in the past few years, I've just dragged the stuff around after me. So by getting rid of it, it is an end of yet another era!
If you are in Wellington and love fabric, come to Fabricabrac - at St Anne's Hall, Emmett Street, Newtown 10am-2pm this Saturday 13 October. There's a huge car park and the church collects a gold coin donation for it. You can do your fruit and vege shopping next door too! https://fabricabrac.wordpress.com/wgtn/
Update after Fabricabrac: I went with five boxes and came back with one small box! WIN!

Random Make Friday!

This new gimmick of mine is the perfect excuse to go back and cover projects I didn't do justice to the first time.
A perfect example is The Laurel dress, originally made in 1909 for Lady Maude Warrender, and the inspiration for thousands of costumiers since, thanks to Janet Arnold.

 

Arnold's meticulous pencil drawings were our inspiration.

Leimomi The Dreamstress actually made the dress, I just did the leafwork, which I covered here and here. But I never showed you the outcome, just linked to it. The Dreamstress has a whole fab page of pictures, but here are a few that really show off the detailing, which I filched from the page linked to:

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 This photo shoot is in the old Dominion Museum Building, now a part of Massey University's Wellington Campus. It was the museum of my childhood and I can still remember the smell, the awe inspiring grandeur, the crazy kiwi banisters and the Egyptian Hall. All very old hat by today's museum's standards, but it was a magical place to me.

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Our detailing worked out very delicate, like the original pencil sketches. It was such a surprise to me to see and handle the original at the Museum of London, which is loaded with sparkly gunmetal sequins and is very dark and dramatic.

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 A good close up view of the corded applique,and velvet trim, all couched in metallic embroidery threads. Source

Source

Our version is closer to the original than many around, but what fascinates me is how the inclusion of this one dress in Arnold's Patterns of Fashion book has made it the default inspiration for probably most of the "Titanic era" ballgowns and tea gowns since. It is a testament to her work that her books are the go-to texts for so many historic recreationists and costumiers. I wonder what other dress she may have decided to cover instead? This one was settled in a cosy archive box with a beautiful wedding dress from the same era, for example.
I thoroughly enjoyed developing the techniques to embellish this gown and I hope one day to take on somethig even more challenging to work on in collaboration with another talented seamstress like the divine Dreamstress!

Kinda-Alabama Mittens

I am obsessed by things that keep hands warm, people. It's because it is so freakin' cold here!
Anyway, I have lost my purple merino mittens. I'm not too worried as I wasn't really happy with them. So, I've had another go. And I LOVE the new ones.
Boiled wool in my favourite warm red forms the body.  I was going to do some felt applique, but then I remembered my unfulfilled curiosity about the reverse applique techniques used by Alabama Chanin. If you've not heard of it, Google it, it is amazing. I bought one of the books and every now and then I dip into it.
It was a cold day on Sunday, we were nestled on the couch watching Midsomer Murders in DVD, and so I decided to entirely hand sew them. I used a grape purple ponte as the underlying fabric in my negative applique. Purple and Red, mmmm...:)
The Chanin method involves stencilling and dyeing but meh, I wasn't going to muck about with messy stuff. I drew around my hand, added some width to allow for 3D ness, cut them out, then just drew a design on one piece. I cut it out with little sharp scissors, then pinned a piece of ponte behind, and sewed it on with a running stitch in embroidery floss around each cut out. The assembly was just overlapping the pieces and stitching them, with a blanket stitch finishing the thumb to finger seam, for a change of pace.

They took about 2 hours from start to wearing and I LOVE them. And as I have loverly nails now, it's a nice chance to show them off! They are different as I freehanded each design - I prefer the first one - and very warm. No need to hem as the boiled wool won't fray.
I have more boiled wool and ponte in black and grey, and I may have to run a class in this as it is lots of fun and is a non-threatening start to hand sewing, applique and Chanin work.
For a far more ambitious and impressive Chanin project, check out Zara's new blog! She is a local and VERY stylish!

Warm fingers!

Brr it's getting parky down under. My poor hands, or puddies as MrC calls them, have been really feeling the cold. And so my mind has gone to class ideas for making warm mittens. Because that's how I think of things to make and teach!
I decided to go for a lined merino approach, and after faffing around thinking of complex ways to add the thumb in, I just decided to try it flat, like this:

Folded in half, this is the lining. I have big hands and wrists so these would probably swim on someone else! But, I am happy with the basic pattern, as it is easy to draft from the measurements of lower arm, wrist and palm.
I wanted to use the class as an intro to machine embellishment. So, I got stuck in doing a flower, because I love flowers.

These took forever!

A rather pretty but boring little flower. It took FOREVER. I did the outline with perle thread in the bobbin, sewing from the back, but the amount of work it took doesn't give a payoff at all. The in fill is rayon thread, which I like a lot more. I shall have to rethink this in terms of the techniques we will do as adjusting the bobbin tension every time we go from heavy to normal bobbin threads for a whole class of students makes me shudder.
I backed my fabric with a fab knit interfacing, but of course it was stretchy so in this case, not so fab. It worked out OK but not for beginners. I had the stitching area in a 5"/125mm embroidery hoop (working on the opposite side than with hand embroidery) to keep it taut, which helped, but would work much better with a more stable interfacing.
So, after all that, I nearly created mitten moebii trying to bag in the thumb end as well as the top and bottom, and in the end I only bagged in the top edge, zigzagged the thumb edges together, and added a band at the bottom. By now I realised these were not going to be my class sample so they only had to suit me.

And here they are. The flowers needed to be a little further around, but otherwise they are nice and warm, and keep my fingers free. The tops I can fold down or leave up, depending on how much I need my fingers.
So, 5 hours on, this is all I got done. Admittedly I got interrupted a lot, but all in all I need to find a simpler way.
I think we'll go with one layer of boiled wool instead!

Finished Project - Embellished Anne Harvey Jacket

While I was in the UK last year, I discovered Anne Harvey. What a fabulous shop! the standard, variety and fit of clothes was so much more than we get ready made in New Zealand and the prices were pretty reasonable too.
I found a linen neru jacket, unlined,that fitted me like a dream, and I really wanted to get it, but I am just not a natural/porridgey coloured jacket kind of gal. Tired of black, yes, but not ready for neutrals. But then I thought, hey, this is a blank canvas garment. Its unlined construction means that embellishing it will be a doddle.
And so a few months after we got back, I embellished it. And here is the finished object:

I used the same fabric as for the wide brim hat, and a similar technique for the applique. I also changed the buttons.

I adore these painterly roses so much!

Close up of the front. I didn't want it to be symmetrical but I did want it to look balanced. I think we got there in the end!

Super close up. This has been washed and the roses are fraying a little, which is what I wanted. I made sure the steam a seam didn't go to the absolute edges, so the raw edges of the fabric would start to fray. The leaves are a soft gold net - double layered since one wasn't enough, and machine embroidered only along the veinlines. They flop a bit but I love the effect.

The inside shows the stitching on the rose. Because it is big, and pretty, I've drawn over it quite a bit with the machine, so to speak, in a variegated thread. This is more visible in the live item than in the photos 

So there it is, looks a treat with my red linen skirt and a white top.  

Laurel Dress sash and Cording tutorial Part 1.

Today I've got my head down to get started on the laurel dress embellishments, since The Dreamstress has been a-visiting with black velvet for the sash. Two things I know about velvet - 1. It don't like irons and 2. It don't like sewing machines much either. Because of this I've decided to make the motifs and hand sew them on afterwards.
This is how I have done it:
I sketched a pattern for the two sash ends, which are different sizes. Today I've worked on the smaller one.
I traced the leaf motif onto the paper side of the visoflex in a row - saves materials that way. Then I cut the centre out of each one, and pressed it onto the net, which you can just about see in the photo. After that, I cut out each leaf and peeled off the paper.
You can see the shine of the glue around the edge of the cut out leaf. It's not much but it keeps those babies in place!
I'm using a gold organza as a base fabric for the sash motifs as they are the only ones on the dress that are going onto opaque black, and it will help them to show up better. So, pattern at the bottom, then organza, then I arranged the leaves, and made a light pencil marking to show where the stems were to go.
Using silicon baking paper to protect the fabrics and my iron, I pressed and pressed and pressed. I found out that I'd put a couple of leaves up the wrong way, so I peeled them off and tried again. We got there eventually. Iron was set to Wool.
Using my No. 6 Bernina cording foot, I threaded the embroidery thread through the hole, set the machine to a long, narrow zigzag in a matching thread, and started. The idea is to go around the edge of each shape and to the next one, then back down again to give the stem some width.
I tried taking progress shots but they came out too blurry so here it is at half way.
Here it is with both sides done. The original was more symmetrical but I prefer one side to come up a bit more, it's more "art nouveauish"
Sightly blurry pic of me trimming the excess fabric away carefully, leaving a mm or so for strength.
And here it is so far, on its destination velvet. I'll be hand sewing it on and possibly adding some beads, not sure but if I do I promise to share!
PS Now the discerning among you are probably wondering why I didn't just cord the pattern onto two layers instead of all that fiddling about cutting leaves. It would have been much quicker. But I did it this way because I wanted to see how the visoflex around the edge thing would work out when it comes to doing the skirt overlay. :)

Earlier sewing projects

To keep the attention of the wonderful sewing geekettes out there (I use the term endearingly and identify with it) I thought I would show a few pics of other things I've made. This is me in my 'thobe', which is a loose fitting kaftan-like garment worn in the arab gulf. It is made from a sari, but the front panel showing up all swirly is a piece of embroidered silk organza. It is bugle beaded around the neckline, which is also trimmed with a heavily beaded trim. It was so heavy I had to notch it to make it curve then glue it!

This my Mum the Embroidenator in her wedding suit - the jacket is a quilted silk organza and the skirt is silk chiffon. I only had one chance to fit it during construction as we lived in different cities at the time, but it just goes to show that knowing someone makes sewing for them easier.

This is a close up of one of my favourite wedding dresses I ever made. Sam wanted something essentially beachy, but in burgundy, so all the usual 'paua' colours were out. I discovered though that when you look at real paua, it is often burgundy and grey/green and pink, so we picked up on that palette. The embroidery and applique represents the eddying of water, but as Sam is also a wordsmith, the comma and apostrophe shapes in the pattern have that little extra significance :) As well as silk and cording work, the bodice is beaded with a range of glass beads, and hung with paua drops. The dress had a full skirt with random hitches up the back.
Little sis' on her wedding day. She got married way before me, and our dresses are 'sisters' also, as different and similar as we are(see mine in this post). I still love this dress. It is hand painted on front panel and train, with soft sculptured flowers, leaves, berries and buds around the shoulders.
I have heaps more but I am going to be mean and eke them out over several posts. :)

I'm in love with a pretty little hen...

...I asked her once, and I asked her again

"Oh won't you be my bride?"

"Buck buck buck buck buck!" she replied,

"I'll be yours and I'll be true, and I'll lay lots of eggs for you,

I'll be yours for the rest of my life..."


I loved that song when I was a kid. Looking at it now it's a bit suss! hehehe. Anyway I am off on a quilting retreat on Friday afternoon, and the retreat block is a real laugh!

What a pair of cuties!! The brief was the pattern and having to use plaids. I don't want a big ol' pile of these blocks but my sister likes it so I'm hoping one of us will win so she can have them!

Now, poached, scrambled, or fried? :)