Dainties

I had a piece of soft, soft Lycra-filled jersey with some grosgrain ribbon that matched it to a moral, and some pretty lace fabric, and a hankering to use the eyelet setter I'd rediscovered when cleaning out a drawer last week. So instead of buying lingerie for a shower I was going to, I decided to throw out the intimidation that has always kept me from making intimates, and came up with this little nightie - and had so much fun doing so!

The top of a simple dress pattern gave some basic dimensions for the bodice, but I altered the front with a split in order to lace it up and made the back bodice one piece by cutting on the fold, taking up what would have otherwise have been the seam allowance with a few cute pintucks (I've been on a pintuck kick recently) at the center back. The Lycra stuff, which is incredibly stretchy - I think it is actually meant as a swimwear fabric, so it stretches in all directions - was a bit of a pain to work with, bunching and rippling instead of feeding through the machine correctly as I sewed it together with the lace, until I caved and started using Scotch tape to stabilize the fabric where I needed to put seams. That worked well, and it ripped neatly apart where the needle punched it, though I ended up with an inordinate number of little sticky strips stuck to my fingers and clothes by the time I was done. But I like that fabric well enough to make it worth it.

I cut out the skirt (a slightly modified rectangle that I eyeballed for size...you know how much of designing is just educated guesswork?) with a rotary cutter to keep the edges super-clean, and it's so fray-resistant that I didn't need to hem or finish the raw edges at all. I didn't even gather the skirt properly (secret: I hate gathering), but pinned it evenly around the bottom edge of the bodice and then fed the wrinkles in at regular intervals as I stitched the two together. Once that was done, I set my serger to a very short stitch length and trimmed and bound that skirt-bodice seam. The serging contains the edges of the lace well enough that they should be quite comfortable and not itchy.

And then all that was left was to bind the top of the bodice (I used a length of vintage acetate binding that I'd pulled from a grab-bag a friend had sent me from her grandmother's de-stashing) and set the eyelets and put in the ribbon for lacing and shoulder straps. Such a gratifying evening project! I don't think I'm going to switch focus off of the gowns anytime in the foreseeable future, but this was a great excursion into previously-unexplored design and sewing territory.

The antique gold eyelets were leftover from a corset order I filled a couple of years ago. I discovered that you can't actually use this kind of eyelet for real corsets; they're too flimsy to bear the stress for that, but they're perfectly suited for this kind of lacing. (I eventually had to go to a leather supply warehouse to get the strong eyelets and anvil set needed for the corset. That kind is not as fun and easy as this kind, which you do with this nifty special set of pliers.)

(P.S. - Making corsets might seem like it would be scarier than making negligees, but it's not. Making corsets is like building with Legos. They're sturdy, and you follow a diagram to put it together, and everything stays put. Working with lace and Lycra and ribbons, on the other hand...that's more like doing fancy French braids on a wiggly toddler with fine hair.)

Working on the NotWedding Dress(es), Part Two

Just sticking my head in here for a second to show you all some of the pretty pretty things sitting around my sewing area...and my living room...and...yeah, these projects have taken over the whole house by this point. It's a good thing that I love looking at lace, linen, and silk!

This is a bit of the dress for the Orlando NotWedding - a pewter dupioni sash (with handmade anemones) against a top of ivory lace overlaid on blush satin.

And this is some of the detail on the Atlanta NotWedding flower girl's dress - tiny pintucks on the bodice and a self-fabric applique on each little sleeve.

 I've been doing TONS of French seam work. It makes a lovely finish, but is rather time consuming to do. If you're not familiar with the technique, it basically involves sewing a seam with the raw edges facing OUT (so they show on the outside of the garment), and then trimming the edges very very close to the seam (as shown below), and then turning it inside-out and pressing the seam line and then sewing it again so that all those raw edges are enclosed. Capisce? Don't worry if it doesn't make any sense...it still makes my brain do somersaults every time I do it.

And then there is the fun of dyeing fabrics. This is for the pink sash belonging to the Atlanta dress. Unfortunately, I measured something incorrectly after the test piece, and the whole yardage of what I was going to use turned out rather brighter than I wanted it. I have a backup plan. This will be what I'm doing last minute before I head down to Atlanta on Wednesday.

Clockwise from left: Big pot of dyeing fabric, bottle of Synthrapol, bag of dye activator (soda ash substitute), pot of fiber-reactive dye powder. This is so much fun to do, especially since you have to stir the dyeing fabric for about 45 minutes straight. I watched a lot of music videos. Taking suggestions for the next time I have a dye job.

...so...be on the lookout for the lovely professional photos of the lovely finished projects in just a few days! I'll keep you posted. Have a wonderful week, friends.

Headed to The NotWedding, 2012

On my plate for February - making two wedding gowns for actual brides, making plans for a third gown and wedding party-full of outfits for another bride, odds and ends of alterations for local customers, a couple of costumes for my alma mater's production of Aida, aaaaaaaaaaaand...making this.

Yep, I'm headed to The NotWedding (happening March 8 in Atlanta - would love to see you there!), and am so excited to be a part of the fun happenings with other fantastic vendors and once again provide the bridal gown (see last year's here.) The inspiration photo we were sent for the event showed a sleek, dark-haired woman on a deck chair in front of a gigantic, pale coral Asian parasol. She wore a light-colored swimsuit and a modified cloche/bathing cap - the whole scene was fairly minimal and quite early-1900s-influenced. I loved the parasol with its spokes, and the turn-of-the-last-century feel, and decided to incorporate some of that into this design, while keeping a bit of modernity with the low V back and a few details with the buttons and sash that I didn't put in the sketch.

The whole thing will be sewn of my favorite tissue linen (it's such gorgeous, soft, lightweight-but-crisp stuff!) with pintucks and fan-pleats galore. I decided to let you all in on the process this year - so I'll warn you, there may be some publicly expressed angst coming up as I get down to the actual pattern development and construction of the gown. Things might change along the way. I might have to dye the sash five times (oh mercy, I hope not.) I might have to enlist assistance finding the exact buttons I want (so far, the shopping list of attributes in my head includes "square", "fabulous", and "sparkly but muted".) But whatever - it's going to be fun!

...even if I get no sleep during the shortest month of the year in order to get it all done. 

Architect's Gown

Some of my favorite design influences are artists, architects, and furniture-makers of the late 19th/early 20th century. I'm no student of the Prairie School and I couldn't necessarily look at a given structure and tell you who created it; but there is something running through many of the designs from the era that makes my heart hum happily whenever I encounter it.

Now, I promised photos of this gown to you months ago but have run into multiple snags getting it actually ON A MODEL and professionally shot (can't have anything to do with the fact that I initially made it for a model who is 5'10" and a size negative 2!) The gown was displayed at my latest artisan-market-day and I took a couple of minutes during the beautiful sunlit afternoon to snap a pic or two.

click to enlarge

The body fabric is ivory silk dupioni, and the hand-pieced panel down the front is made of a dozen different fabrics from other gowns I've made. Silks, a satin, linens, hemps, bamboo, cotton; all in shades of ivory and white. Each tiny section is outlined with a heavy machine topstitch in ivory to mimic the leading in a stained glass window. This is perhaps the most fun I've yet had in creating a gown and I'm in love with it! One of the things that delights me about this gown design is that the "window" will necessarily vary from dress to dress, as it will be created to specifically complement the shape and scale of the custom-fit gown.

click to enlarge

Now, in related news, I am hard at work designing a completely new gown for the next NotWedding in Atlanta this March! The theme has a bit of a 1920s vibe to it, and my mind is swirling with ideas. I will, however, be taking an entire week off after Christmas to read, write, clean, and organize, and in general clear the slate to begin 2012 with an unobstructed view to the horizon.

Have a lovely last couple of weeks of the year, friends. Practice joy as you celebrate the holidays with people you love (and people you have to work on loving!) As you find yourself overflowing, may your abundance nourish others. As you find yourself empty, may you find that which was meant to fill you. To all of you - Merry Christmas!

Kids, Puppies, Dirt, and Glossy Catalogs

I often wonder if I'm doing the right thing by bringing more "stuff" into the world. While I see a lot of my sewing work as redemptive - helping people feel beautiful and valued and cared-for, helping rightfully honor and celebrate events like weddings and baptisms that have cosmic-level meaning - I have this current of guilt that sometimes runs through all the self-promotion I do for my work. Encouraging people to buy. Urging people to acquire something. And yes, my clientele are those that are looking to buy already - but that's beside the point.

I read a great blog this morning about the contrast between the joy of an impoverished child and her dog, and the sometimes disturbing marketing techniques of some of the magazines that many of us adore. It reinforced to me that the difference between consumerism and simply valuing quality in moderation has an awful lot to do with what's in our hearts. It reminded me and encouraged me in what I really want to do, whether it's with my hands and scissors and fabric, or with my smile, or with my prayers. I want to live as a conduit of the grace and joy that has been given to me. I want the choices I make to be derived directly from this way of living. If my craft were taken away from me this afternoon - if I lost my arms, or eyes, or words - I want to know that the primary ways that I help create beauty in this world would still be open to me.

And now - back to the sewing machine. I have a quilt for a precious little man that I need to finish up.

Alaska and clothing I've never seen before

This, friends, is a kuspuk.

Like "cuss-puck." Yep.

Apparently, they were made to wear on top of furry parkas - like so.




I'm with my dad and sister in Nome, Alaska (population 3,500 or so - it's a tiny little place. But Wyatt Earp's old run-down summer house, aka shack, is here - we went inside, even though it's about to fall over) and at the church service on Sunday we saw probably 1 out of every 5 women/girls wearing kuspuks, in lightweight cotton prints, over their t-shirts. It's not really cold here yet, only about 29 degrees in the morning, getting so balmy in the afternoon that I can wear my down vest without my polarfleece jacket on top of it. The garment baffled me a little, since it didn't seem to contribute much in the way of warmth. They do have great big pockets and look a little bit like aprons that cover your arms and your back.

But I can understand the desire to cover up your cold-weather-wear with bright colors. Up here, it makes sense. Most of the houses are painted bright colors...red, deep turquoise, lots of bright sky blue, with contrasting sills and frames on the windows, doors, and eaves. You've got to have some way of relieving the monotony of the snow for the months and months of winter. Especially when it gets to February and the sun comes up at eleven a.m. and goes back down again at three o'clock in the afternoon. Making the most of the daylight with the brightest, happiest colors you can probably augments the effect of the tiny amount of vitamin D one can absorb on the tip of your poor little blue nose as it sticks out of your furry hood!

When I return, I will tell the tale of my latest wedding-gown-turned-party dress, and soon, my latest new gown design will be up in the shop - think silk. Think sleek lines. Think mission-style furniture. I'll see you all when I am back from the Arctic circle!

-Bekah

Postcards from a Scattered Month

Well folks,

I'm doing the last little bit of writing and photo-uploading that we need to do to get the new site launched. It's been a crazy August - here's a little of what I've been up to!

- Getting ready to head to Oregon and Alaska...tomorrow...which I'm STOKED about. I love OR and have a billion friends and family up there that I am eager to see, and the Alaska leg of the trip will be with my sister, my dad, an uncle, and a few people I haven't yet met. I am thrilled to see a completely new-to-me part of the country - and wear winter clothes even though it's still summertime in Tennessee - and spend two weeks reading and looking at mountains and talking and playing card games and whatever else we'll be up to. I promise pictures when we return!

- Juggling what has felt like three thousand small projects - cotton vacation clothing on its way to Hawaii...another delicate baptismal gown for a special little boy...a wedding gown transformed into an almost unrecognizable new party dress...little "lovie" blankets in silky charmeuse and soft minky for another dear new baby in the world...designing a couple of spandy-new wedding gown styles...sourcessnatching moments here and there to edit photos...getting together the official Laurel & Fife mailing list...

- Helping a friend move to Vermont (and missing her terribly), seeing a roommate off on a crazy 8-week wilderness adventure (and missing her too), having an old friend visit (and making up for lost hugs), hosting a fabulous Greek Food Night with the usual girls (and attempting the most ambitious pastry crust I've ever tackled...and having it turn out quite edibly!)

There's an awful lot of "-ing" words up there. However, there has been time for a little reading, resting, chilling, and just being this month, too - even if snatched over cups of tea and coffee just here and there. But my peace this morning was shaken up; not by anything bad, but by the exciting mention of my work over on the Wedding Chicks Blog - so fun! I also have a couple of secret projects up my sleeve that you'll be hearing more about in coming months. 

See you soon - with stories from the Northwest. =)

Bekah

New Friends

Lovely peoples,

The new site is still in the works, but I've left you far too long here without an update. I promise that soon I will do a little sketch-to-reality post on my newest creation - probably as my first blog post on the new site! - but for now, some lovely, lovely photos by several of the new friends I made last week in Atlanta at The NotWedding.

First, a stunning little teaser from (once like a spark) photography (click the photo for full article)-

Second, the beautifully evocative portraiture of the long farewell (I was privileged to attend this shoot, and it was truly delightful to see the team in action!) -

This is Caroline, y'all - such a gorgeous, happy, lovely, hard-working, beautiful gal!

The custom veil, belt, and floral hairpiece are by my new friend Jessica at Fine & Fleurie. Major crush going on between me and her work.

Hair and makeup design by the sweet and ridiculously talented and laid-back Claudia Mejerle.

And this is why they call it Hotlanta.

Meet my new friends:
Claudia Mejerle - www.claudiamejerle.com
Fine & Fleurie {Jessica} - www.fineandfleurie.com
the long farewell {Chad & Tina} - www.thelongfarewell.com
(once like a spark) - www.oncelikeaspark.com

Shifting

Friends,

Things are being moved and shifted all around me, and while I still know which end is up, it's all a leetle disorienting. A recap:

• I've dropped the Clever Fingers shop and name. It served me well, but for several reasons, it was time to move on. You'll notice that it's still in the banner heading of the blog here - I'll get to that in a second.

• I have a new website being built around my new brand, Laurel & Fife. I'm very excited about this - besides getting away from the unreliable-ness that *ahem* has plagued my current blog, the new website will be much more functional and sleek. (I'll still have a blog because, let's face it, it's not enough for me to post photos and information - I have to gush over how much fun I get to have doing this stuff, and love showing y'all inside looks at how it's done in the hopes that several of you will take the plunge into making your own clothing, too!) Anyway, the site will be going live within a month, so I'm just leaving everything around here as-is until we make the move. I won't just delete this blog without warning, but if you want to know when the new site goes up, you can sign up to be notified at www.laurelandfife.com.

• I think I can say this again now without squealing and jumping around the living room...I am participating in Atlanta's The NotWedding in a week and a half. "Participating" in this case means "providing the sole wedding gown for the occasion and having a blast at the awesome party that is The NotWedding."
  
  (....yeah, nope, there were some undignified noises and bouncing in my seat.)
  
  So - I'm not making the design public yet, but here's a little look at the pattern-making stage of it. 

(Can I just say that water-disappearing fabric markers are my BEST FRIEND at the moment? I mean, apart from my superfantastic Gingher shears you see there, that a friend gave me, that make me giggle when I think about them. Cutting with those things is like buttah.)

So, yes, things are moving and about to move more, but I will keep you all in the loop!

Some links of interest -

My new Laurel & Fife Etsy Shop

Laurel & Fife on Facebook

Laurel & Fife on Twitter

My re-stocked Triggi Designs Etsy Shop

Triggi Designs on Facebook
Triggi Designs on Twitter

White-Horned K'nutson

After waking up abruptly and groggily from my accidental Sunday afternoon nap, I remembered a project that I've been meaning to do for several weeks. A little explanation - a friend, Wes Murrell, does this hilarious little running comic, Scottish & Farfray, about a knight and a fox who get into all kinds of trouble together. I don't follow a ton of comics, but it's always a good day when there's a new post on the comic's Facebook wall. One recurring character is the White-Horned K'nutson - well, actually, there are several White-Horned K'nutsons, they're a lovely cuddly little kind of creature who keep getting entangled in Scottish's terrible ideas. Here's an example.

And here's what one of the little fellas - Hoover, to be specific - looks like up close -

D'awwwww.

I couldn't resist making my own White-Horned K'nutson! He still needs a little white highlight in his eye but I was out of white acrylic paint, so I'll add that later.

His handsome little profile.

Avoiding peril on an adventure.

How A Dress Happens

 It has been a month of hard work. I don't have the official photos yet of this recent custom wedding dress job, but I promised the bride a little mini-documentary on how the process went, so here it is for all of you!

First I gathered supplies - fabrics (silk, lace, lining, interlining, interfacing), pins (several hundred of them), and my design drawing and customer's measurements for reference.

More photos and full description ~>

At the Fire Hall

My "booth" from last Saturday's Spring Market, just before opening. I had a great day, lots of fun talking with people, including the other vendors - no two had the same kind of wares. Looks like it's going to become a regular happening every month or two!

Beautiful Age

My great-grandmother Jean Olive passed away in 2002. She was one hundred and two years old, and had battled cancer (skin and colon) for decades. Even with a body so ravaged, she had a humorous glint in her eyes and was tall and beautiful. I remember asking her a couple of years before she died if she felt as though she were the whole world's big sister - older than almost everyone, still in possession of a very good mind and pretty good senses - and she just laughed at my question. "No," she answered, "But I really am enjoying seeing my great-grandchildren as adults. Not everyone gets to see that."

The dress, before I began dismantling it. A strong breath could reduce sections
of it to powder, but the lace border is still quite strong.

I've been cutting up and framing pieces of an ancient wedding gown that was given to me, and from what I can deduce, it was likely made before my great-grandmother was born. I keep wondering about the woman - or women - who wore it, and what their lives were before and after the day that they lived in this gown.

Lovely stuff. It's heavy and rich still.

Thinking about age and use and what it does to beauty - how it can deepen it even as it erases it - always reminds me of one little moment in the middle of Orwell's 1984.

Julia had come across to his side; together they gazed down with a sort of fascination at the sturdy figure below. As he looked at the woman in her characteristic attitude, her thick arms reaching up for the line, her powerful mare-like buttocks protruded, it struck him for the first time that she was beautiful. It had never before occurred to him that the body of a woman of fifty, blown up to monstrous dimensions by childbearing, then hardened, roughened by work till it was coarse in the grain like an over-ripe turnip, could be beautiful. But it was so, and after all, he thought, why not? The solid, contourless body, like a block of granite, and the rasping red skin, bore the same relation to the body of a girl as the rose-hip to the rose. Why should the fruit be held inferior to the flower?

'She's beautiful,' he murmured.

'She's a metre across the hips, easily,' said Julia.

'That is her style of beauty,' said Winston.

He held Julia's supple waist easily encircled by his arm. From the hip to the knee her flank was against his. Out of their bodies no child would ever come. That was the one thing they could never do. Only by word of mouth, from mind to mind, could they pass on the secret. The woman down there had no mind, she had only strong arms, a warm heart, and a fertile belly. He wondered how many children she had given birth to. It might easily be fifteen. She had had her momentary flowering, a year, perhaps, of wild-rose beauty and then she had suddenly swollen like a fertilized fruit and grown hard and red and coarse, and then her life had been laundering, scrubbing, darning, cooking, sweeping, polishing, mending, scrubbing, laundering, first for children, then for grandchildren, over thirty unbroken years. At the end of it she was still singing. 

I have nothing more to add to that, only, that at the end of whatever I am used for in this life, I want to be still singing.

Drawing

The past several weeks have seen very little finished, and quite a bit in process. It can be royally discouraging when supplier after supplier has none of the particular fabric you need, or the button you've been searching for; when prospective wedding-gown clients decide they'd rather go with a mass-produced dress; when, for all the work you're doing, there's nothing fresh to photograph and nothing new to go up in the shop. Weeks of alterations and hemming.

But these weeks are also necessary; ideas take time to grow, and just being in fabric, fixing old zippers, adjusting straps, and making buttonholes gives the time and space for new thoughts to form while my hands do familiar work.

I stretched out in a chum's yard a couple of days ago, while she planted herbs in long boxes. New, dark spring grass dampened my shirt and chilled my tummy as I listened to my dear friends talking. Pen and notebook in hand, I began drawing ideas out of the ground.

photography by photolodico

H is for Hedgehog, or, How Many Links I Can Fit Into One Post

I'm finishing up a nifty business planning course and have the opportunity to join in the alumni showcase event held tonight at Chattanooga's Camphouse. I promised a one-of-a-kind pillow and a certificate for custom sewing work to the silent auction, and rather than using one of the many unique pillows in my Clever Fingers shop, I used the leftover bits from my Oscar party dress to make a new one.

I've loved hedgehogs ever since reading The Tale Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle! And this one is all wooly (the gray stuff is from a winter cloak I'm making for a friend.)

Anatomy of an Inspiration

I have a dear friend who puts on an Oscars party every single year, even if it's only her and her husband - they dress in their best, make a feast, and watch and comment on the show. This year I happened to be visiting them on the right weekend to join in...so, of course, I needed a dress - and I needed it fast. Here's how it all went down.

Monday, 2/21 - What fabrics do I have? Um...mostly tapestries. Hmmm. What patterns do I have? Geesh. None of these seem right.

Tuesday, 2/22 - Oooh. What about that dress I wore to Catie's wedding last summer?

Yes, it was sky blue acetate, but it was vintage, and it fit really rather well. I've been planning on ripping it apart and using it as the basis for a pattern for a new dress. Now seems the time.

Wednesday, 2/23. I'd better get a move on. How about that tapestry left on that roll someone gave me? I think it was leftover from some couch cushions, but hey, I like the colors. Okay. Let's do it.

First we say goodbye to the ancient (well - sixty isn't young for a fabric) acetate-with-fused-on-lace. (This had to have originally been a bridesmaid dress. I lowered the neckline and shortened the sleeves when I wore it.) Then we start cutting it apart. Then we realize that this dress was made from a pattern which Simplicity has re-released as a retro 1960s reproduction, a pattern that I already own but never looked super-closely at...but why try to alter that one when I already have the dress half-dismantled, and know that it fits me perfectly? I'll continue as I began.

Ew. See the stains? I can't believe I wore this.

Then distribute the pieces on the suddenly very small piece (whose idea was it to make a dress out of a mere yard???) of tapestry fabric. Play around with it for a bit. Consider giving up before realizing you'll want the skirt a little less flared anyway. Remember in the nick of time that you need to make sure the one shoulder is on the same side front and back, and that it would really be nice if the pattern matched itself at the seams. Consider giving up again, say some choice words under your breath, and ease everything into place before FEARLESSLY, IRREVOCABLY CUTTING THE STUFF.

There! That wasn't so bad.

Zip it together (love a serger for the inside seams of unlined dresses! No way I was going to line this one on a time crunch - and with a fabric this thick, it didn't need it, anyway.) Panic a bit over how the diagonal cut neckline stretches - fix it by stay-stitching and very slightly gathering it before making facings out of some poly blend linen-look stuff - and, hey, that would make a nice big bow for the shoulder, too, wouldn't it?

Thursday, 2/24 - Take pictures in my cluttertastic sewing room.

The dress fastens under the right arm with an invisible zipper embedded in the side seam. I happened to have one on hand that matched the fabric. (Seamstresses! Are you afraid of invisible zippers? Don't be! They are ever so much easier to put in than other kinds of zippers, once you do a few of them. Contact me if you want some tips or step-by-step instructions. You DO need a good invisible zipper foot for your machine, but once you've got that - easy-peasy.)

Friday, 2/25 - Drive to Charlotte.

Saturday, 2/26 - Help out with a photoshoot of preemie twins (oh my word. Most precious beings. Hard to believe we all were that size at one point.)

Sunday, 2/27 - We had such a good time at the party!

All photos with people in them (except the one of me in the blue) are courtesy of Emily at Red Leaf Photography. Emily is the very cute lady who is great with child in that top photo in this post. The photo of me in the sky-blue acetate Dress of Ancient Magnificence was taken by Natalie at Photolodico, whom we missed greatly and wished were there with us to pile on the snark regarding Oscar fashions.

Look at that stuff! Isn't it neat?

I spent most of the day yesterday on the couch with my laptop, hydrating and trying to beat a bad bug that I've been exposed to repeatedly. I think it worked - I'm feeling fantastic today - and I have a new wish list of awesome items for which I am saving up. All for my shop, of course!

A-MAZ-ING hand-felted slippers from another Etsy seller, to keep my feet warm but still sensitive to the machine power pedal. I drool over these. That's okay, because natural wool insulates even when wet! They even have a thin latex coating on the bottom so I won't slip and fall down my beautiful wooden Stairs Of Death when I go to the kitchen to refresh my coffee.

(More awesome stuff after the jump.)

More photos and full description ~>