sewnblog

Sometimes You need to know when to hold'em...

Wed, 25 May 2011 18:02:29 +0100

Sorry, but the Funky French Sailor dress called for the lyrics to a bad Kenny Rogers song. In this case I am folding. The dress is interesting and I like it much better after significant re-styling but I can't get past the STATEMENT-ness of it. I tried, I really did. It is almost finished and I would use it as a pool cover up, if we went to the pool. Time to toss it on the pile of misfit clothes and send it on to someone that will love it.

In other news, I got an email from Elieen Fisher (the company, not the woman herself -though I have had that too!) and it had the makings of a nice Summer 6PAC.

I'd do a pair of pants instead of the shorts (not a good look on me!) and do a T shirt instead of one of the jacket-y things but I think I am going to do this up! I've got some Tencel and plenty of linen and jerseys. I think it is time to draft some patterns!

Sidetrack...Ooh, a penny!

Mon, 23 May 2011 16:20:29 +0100

I am highly distractible. As in, most of my family couldn't believe I managed to get a driver's license, distractible. It is not ADD but it is something close. I have been distracted from finishing the FFSD by Mrs. Stylebook, but that ends today! I will get that dress done, I will... what were we talking about?

Funky French sailor dress Part Deux

Mon, 09 May 2011 13:53:17 +0100

Not sure what I think yet. The sleeves aren't on which will help stabilize it both structurally and visually but at this point it is a very "drippy" dress. I am putting the sleeves on tonight and then I may just whack it off at the knees. Or bring it to the ASG meeting and get opinions, if I can be both brave and patient -yeah, right!

Oh, you can see a bit of my fabric reorganization behind the dress -more on that another time!

The [ ]

Sun, 08 May 2011 15:27:34 +0100

Confused? Evidently one of the largest basics clothing companies is also. GAP has tossed Patrick Robinson (formerly of Perry Ellis and Paco Rabanne) in to the cast off pile. He has been with the company for 3 years (or 12 cycles in designer's time) I have always liked not loved his stuff. It has relatively clean lines but his GAP stuff tends to get muddled with their cheesy attempts at the J. Crew aesthetic. So getting rid of their designer after the whole madness of their very short lived logo change makes you wonder if no one is really minding the store. Actually this line goes all the way back to the shuttering of their short lived Forth and Towne project, which represented a real direction from a company that hasn't had one in a long time.

There was a Style.com bit about the children's like having more oomph and if you include the Stella McCartney collaboration I'd agree, however, without that, the kids stuff was just rehashed adult clothes which looked edgy because those colors and motifs were new for kids clothes. Yes, the economy well, in a word, sucks! but I worked for GAP during the last economic disaster ('87 -stock market crash, housing crisis, destruction of unions, general nastiness) but under Micky Drexler, it weathered the storm and came out stronger. Mr. Drexler is now at J. Crew, hmm...

Maybe, GAP needs, not a new designer, but new management, or at the very least a kick in the pants toward getting back to what they do best. What was that? Reinterpreting the basics, giving them the twist that took something from grandpa's to Ooh, I have always wanted one of those! Why do I care about any of this? Because I tend to get my knitwear at GAP because I am not sewing that. They are one of the few places where I can take my "tweener with the body of a woman" daughter to get clothes where they will fit and still be appropriate for school. Their stuff will never be avant garde but revolutionaries always end up in khaki.

Ooh, Shout Out!

Fri, 06 May 2011 01:55:52 +0100

Okay, I am a total fan girl of Ann! She has the ability to make wild, avant garde patterns or fabrics look... so perfectly normal. Not just normal but "of course you'd take that fabric and put it with that pattern" and women that think wearing a print is just too much (me!) suddenly want her wildest creation. Oh, does that dress look at all familiar? Yep! it is the Funky Sailor dress in an even wilder stripe. I am so making this as soon as I finish my daughter's dress for the Spring concert.
You can read Ann's review of the pattern here

Where do you do your best work...?

Mon, 02 May 2011 20:18:22 +0100

This thought occurred to me as I was spending the better part of 1/2 an hour looking for the package of elastic I had just bought. You see, my sewing room looked like this:

It doesn't anymore, but I felt the need to out myself. If you do a lot of sewing, mess happens. If you are creative and interested in things you tend to collect pieces of "inspiration". They need somewhere to go. I am not complaining, I am lucky as hell to have the space I do. I have sewn in dirt floor basements and 120 degree attics and there is no good reason for this! Like I said it doesn't look like this anymore. I have about another 1/2 day's worth of stash cataloging and it will be done and I can show you the big reveal. Actually there isn't all that much wrong here except rampant chaos -get that under control and I'm good to go!

Funky French sailor dress

Mon, 25 Apr 2011 20:56:58 +0100

Could this dress actually go with anything else? I have all of these fabrics. I am in the process of getting some dark Navy Tencel denim to make wide legged pants according to my own design. I am thinking about a short somewhat boxy jacket out of the Tencel too, also my own design. Then what? I have some (10 yards) white Pique wicking knit. A tunic? With some ruching or a vertical fillip, ooh, maybe a longish white skirt too! I really only ever wear skirts in the summer.

The REAL reason French women wear red lipstick...

Tue, 19 Apr 2011 17:26:04 +0100

So, I have been on this "I will live like a French girl -if it kills me!" thing for a couple of weeks now and have started wearing red lipstick. Not red gloss, Not a deep mauve or rose or some thing close to red but full on, no holes barred, fire engine red. As a side note, when I was in the Air Force we were actually prohibited from wearing red lipstick as it was considered too seductive. (??? even my husband won't kiss me with this stuff on!) Anyway, I picked up a tube of Sephora's Cream Lip Stain in 01 (because red is so basic it must be first!) recently. Now, Lip Stain sounds nice and sheer and this is not -at all! It is matte and opaque and frankly, fabulously old school glamourous. Even the DD thinks it looks great. It takes more time to put on than a gloss and this is not something you want to do without a mirror (and possibly a magnifying glass!) But the best reason to wear it and the reason I suspect the French love their red lips is that it makes it almost impossible to eat anything with your hands, save for the tiniest bites of food. Even these you have to eat like the French do in movies, slowly, really thinking about what you are doing, like you are trying to turn someone on. There is no just jamming a handful of popcorn in your mouth. Maybe I should write a book -The Red Lipstick Diet! In the maintenance phase you switch to a nice dark plum!

In my dreams this is what I look like...

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 18:34:06 +0100

I had heard about this line of cosmetics years ago and promptly forgot about them. This tutorial is wonderful, using colors that, odds are, are already in your kit. I will definitely be playing with this look soon.

click the picture for the tutorial

True Confession time...

Wed, 13 Apr 2011 16:06:31 +0100

I can't stand Gwyneth Paltrow. One of the biggest fights of my marriage had to do with my DH's insistence that GP was English. She's not, she grew up on the upper Westside in NYC, went to Brearley, a tony private school. The fake British-ness just makes my teeth grind. Her speaking flawless Spanish just makes it worse. So it is with much angst that I occasionally (very!) check her site GooP (even the name is irritating!) She does have tons of money and doesn't appear to be completely stupid (this does not mean I am going to be running out to get her cookbook) so I am willing to swallow my pride and check out what she says about clothes. One of her first news letters had this wonderful (grumbles, damn it!) piece on her uniform at the time. Look for yourself: http://goop.com/newsletter/3/en/ Admittedly, I am not going to be dropping that kind of money on those pieces, but the pieces themselves are so do-able. It is very Eileen Fisher like but with a little more structure, we rounder girls love structure (not Gwyneth, I am rounder, she is a freakin' workout queen!) Anyway, there is a good idea there even if I can't stand to listen to her speak!