Vintage Trenchcoat March 16, 2008

My dear daughter’s high school is holding another fashion show this year. The kids are big fans of Project Runway. This is the 3rd year they are putting it on, and fundraising with the proceeds. Since DD was away at Oxbow in the Fall, she didn’t get started until January. She was told that there had to be minimum 8 outfits to participate, not 3 like she did last year. Panicked, we decided that the only way to get thru the project was to use commercial patterns, as last year all of her patterns were created for each of her 3 garments. Since her sewing skills are limited I promised to be her samplemaker when I could. I promised myself not to influence. It’s her designs and fabric choices, I have just been expediting. It’s been crazy since January as we try to move forward on her 8 ensembles.
We combed the pattern boxes to try to match her sketches to existing patterns, and shopped the stash for 97% of the fabrics she picked. Other than buying a few buttons and trims, she managed to find everything in the studio here. That’s the advantage of having a stash the size of Rhode Island. As she told her designing friends at school “My mom collects fabric like other people collect action figures”.
The show is next week, but I thought you might like a preview of one of the styles. It’s based on this pattern from 1935.

Check out the back We didnt use the exact pattern, as the center of the back pattern had been cut away. The fabric is older than DD, an ignoble poly taffeta that loves to pucker. I have to say that I have never attempted to make anything like it. A high peaked double breasted lapel? Never! But it did come out OK, and I credit the excellent though sparse instruction included in the pattern.
I will post pics from the show after next week. We are all excited to see how it all comes together, with elbow gloves and a big hat off of eBay and belts and jewelry from local thrift shops. Here’s the envelope back for your delectation.

What to do with the scraps? November 9, 2007

In a recent raid on Barnes and Noble I found a new publication called “Sew Somerset” - found in with the sewing, quilting, and craft magazines. It was like a window on a whole new world…The cover tag line says ‘the art of creative sewing with mixed-media’. There is a whole slew of ways of mixing paper and fabric and bits of stuff into art, which I have really never explored. It definitely got me thinking, as you can probably guess I do have lots of bits and pieces of cloth, buttons, lace, and trinkets. It closely resembles collage, but goes beyond that into book making, Artist Trading Cards, etc…

I have done a bit of patchwork and appliqué over the years, like this top with the front pieced together with stretch velvet swatches…

Or this patchworked cardigan made from printed stretch velvet swatches…

I have even embellished cardigans with bits of lace and ribbon like this piece.

But nothing like the sewn bits of memory and fancy I found in this magazine. There is a Somerset Studio website, mainly geared towards selling their main product: rubber stamps (there’s a reason the parent company is called Stampington) They produce the magazine Belle Armoire and have a new publication called Altered Couture coming out this month, with lots of tips and tricks for re-fashioning already made garments. Their web page with rules for art submission gives the background on all of their publications for those interested. I am looking forward to seeing what Altered Couture looks like.

I particularly loved the “Sewing Book” on pg 30 of the Sew Somerset magazine: an altered book by Caterina Giglio. She started with an Eddie Bauer catalog and glued and gessoed the pages to make a book. She then proceeded to sew and glue images, buttons, lace, fabric scraps, pattern pieces to make a highly evocative and personal piece of art to express her relationship to sewing and to honor her grandmothers who taught her so much. She is part of a group called Creative Underground in Ft. Collins CO. I found their website and see they have many books and useful products for sale. Well worth a visit!

I made a covered folder a few years ago that reminds me of this kind of sewn mixed media. Covered in stretch lace and embellished with ribbons and scraps of stretch velvet, I felt like I should transfer the technique to a jacket or some other garment. This sewn mixed media magazine got me to thinking that maybe I could play with the scraps and bits for its own sake, and it never need be applied to a garment at all. Hmmm

Silk Organza Saves the Day October 20, 2007

HOW I GOT FROM THERE TO HERE
I fell hard for the EmmaOneSock silk tweed with all-over embroidery from Nanette Lepore. It was ruinously expensive - so much so, that I have blocked out the price in my mind. Since I had once managed to make a jacket in 1 ½ yards of fabric, that’s what I bought, with no real idea of what I would make.

The fabric worked on my mind, and I decided that what I really wanted to make was a jeans style jacket, but with an hourglass shape. This fitted denim silhouette was popular some years ago, made best by Jean Paul Gaultier, who has perfected the corset silhouette over many different types of garments, from ball gowns, to bustiers, to jackets.

The thought of drafting such a pattern from scratch was daunting though, as fitting such an item on oneself is no picnic. I set out to find a pattern I could adapt to my needs, something that had a good structure to begin with. I had never worked with a Marfy pattern before, but from all reports it was a good place to begin. Every other jeans style jacket I had looked at was too boxy, or worse, a wedge shape that was narrower at the bottom. Definitely not MY shape!

Marfy F9468

I found the Marfy pattern after much digging, it is an older pattern and not easy to find on the Vogue website. I am not sure if it is still in print. I bought it in March of 07, I believe it is from Fall 06. As it comes out of the envelope it is a shirt, but it has a shaped side seam, and the all important 3 panel front with a shoulder yoke..

THE PATTERN CHANGES
Here are the changes I made to the pattern to get to my jacket:
>Make a straight hem instead of a curve hem, added to the sleeve length for full length sleeve.
>Cut the center front straight up to the neck, with a 1/2″ extension for buttons instead of a curved placket open neck shirt collar.
> No pockets used for this fabric.
>Reduce the collar point to be less of a Boeing 747 spread.
>Change from a set-on placket to fold back facing. I did this only because I had the nightmare silk tweed fabric to deal with. I couldn’t imagine trying to make a straight narrow placket in this fabric, especially with the thickness of the fabric with the embroidery. In fact, it was still tough to wrestle with the yoke seam and the turn back, but since my button fell below the yoke seam and the turn back of the lapel with the collar open was OK, I got off easy. For other fabrics I will make a set-on placket as you usually find on this type of jacket.

Let me just say that the fitting alterations were minimal. I was amazed at how well the pattern went together and fit me right out of the envelope. I did pinch out a bit more bust dart shape in the side panel, which effectively lowered my armhole, but I was able to re-draw it with minimal hassle back on the table after the fitting.

THE CONSTRUCTION DETAILS

The amount of seaming and topstitching required in this jacket made me choose to underline my fabric with silk organza. This kind of tweed just sort of falls apart when you look at it, it ravels away at the slightest excuse. By adding the layer of silk organza, I was able to do all of the seaming and topstitching without worrying. I had a denim jacket to refer to, to see how the seaming was done. This helped a lot, as Marfy provides no seam allowances and no instuctions. I had traced off their pattern, and then made a muslin to test the fit before I cut into my [ridiculously expensive] EOS fabric… no second chance with this!

Of course, with 1 ½ yards of fabric, I had to squeeze the pattern pieces into the layout. I needed to cut the undercollar, a hem and cuff facing from another fabric, as there was no way to fit it in. Actually this was a good thing, since my silk/wool blend was much smoother, thinner, and easier to work with than the silk tweed. It did cut down on the bulk.

SEWING NOTES:
All of my pieces were underlined. I basted my silk organza from Thai Silks to the fashion fabric, and basted at the seam line as well. I sewed the body seams front and back, then serged the seam allowances together (something I learned from my denim jacket that I followed.) Once the panels were together, I did my double needle topstitch. (Used heavy topstitch thread – nothing else showed up). I applied the yoke and seamed the same way. I had to use a 1/4″ grosgrain ribbon at the inside back neck, as it was impossible ot turn the seam allowance and topstitch. This eliminated a whole bunch of thickness, and gave a nice clean finish.

For the side seams, the armholes and sleeves, the seams were serged separately before sewing the seams together, as there is no double needle on these seams.

I confess, I took the jacket to a tailor for the buttonholes – my machine, and my nerves were not up to it.

I just want to say that this is now a TNT pattern, and I will be using it again and again, probably for the rest of my life. It’s a classic and stands the test of time.

The Hostess Cupcake Dress August 31, 2007

Some of you may recognize this dress, published in Threads as an illustration for my article on snoop shopping. What you probably don’t know is that this dress was a joint Sewing Divas effort. I made the pattern, Diva Emeritus Ann sewed it, and Phyllis did the embellishing. All of this was done by phone and e-mail, a great collaborative dress!

I started with a sketch based on a top purchased at retail. There was to be no embellishing around the neck, just some lace trim and an organza rosette at the center front waist.

However, in the way that sketches have of changing as they begin to take shape in RL (Real Life), the original concept had to shift with the requirements of the situation. What happened? First of all, I had to get the sample made FAST - I could not send off to China to get the sample made. Second, BB (Big Boss) wanted the sample to be in chocolate brown silk chiffon. No chance of dyed to match trim….so I went to the trim stash to see what I could come up with, and purchased a couple of other things to toss in there. I sent all of the disparate elements to Phyllis and she made it into a lyrical cohesive embellishment that added enormously to the final allure of the dress. Here’s what I sent her, and just see how she put it together in the final dress above! The tea-dying of all the elements took away some of the white icing on the cupcake look that we struggled with (hence the dress’ nickname).

Phyllis’ hand made silk rose at the waistband was the real icing though, with her strands of beads cascading down, far better than the tacky ivory flower pin I sent her, or the organza roses with the trailing ends seen in the photo from the shop in Hong Kong. Phyllis’ embellishment is what made this cupcake dress so yummy!