A historical costumer's progress

It's not going to be an overview for beginners's education / advanced amusement type of post.

It's just a fun little thing I noticed which marks my own progress.

Back in 2011 (whoa), I wrote about watching the Czech TV series F.L. Věk. I wrote also - how could I not - about the costumes.

What I did not mention in the post was that I had looked at the picture I shared there, of the character Márinka in a printed dress, and that I had gone: "Points for trying but that's a roller print and this is too early for that." (Early 1790s, I believe.)

The aforementioned progress is like this:

In 2018, I look at the picture and go: "That's modrotisk!"

Traditional indigo resist print. It's not roller print; it's block print. Even those that look like roller prints.

I still think this particular pattern is probably anachronistic for early 1790s, but now I actually know the technique isn't. :D

Bonus: I can get very similar fabric (or is it really the same?) if I were inclined to recreate the costume and put that kind of money into it (which I'm not, but I do badly want to make a historical modrotisk dress one day). I think the one in the costume got more indigo bath dips than the one the Danzingers are selling now, so I'd probably go with the version from Strážnice... also, how come they have the same printing block?!

... unless, of course, Márinka's dress was a cheaper modern knockoff of the fabric style. Entirely plausible with a TV costume.

(Further bonus: I can show you part of how it's done. If I get my act together and finally finish the post on the workshop in Strážnice I started last August.)

#CoBloWriMo 10: Not in a Million Years - Changes to plans, and plans still underway

There's definitely costuming / dress-related things I'd class under that heading.

Very high heels, for example. My cutting-off mark is somewhere around 8 cm, which is what my tallest heels are, and I can only walk in those because the shoes have ankle straps.

They are a tad too small for me, but the open heel makes it okay. They also have leather soles, and were only 100 CZK in a thrift shop. Totally worth it for vintage-worthy shoes (possibly really vintage, definitely pre-1989)  for an occasional outing. I've last worn them with my Regency dress, actually... it was raining, and it was, in that case, rather nice not having to worry about dragging my long skirt in puddles.

Also not happening: actually buying crocs shoes. I've worn them, as house-footwear at a friend's place; but it's not something I would do of my own accord. And now with very good reason, too.

I have skin problems. I've had some sort of atopic ecsema on my hands since I was about ten. It disappeared after my stay in the USA in 2007 (probably due to longer-term exposure to sea air); since then, it occasionally reappeared, but it was quite manageable.

Not the sort of thing you can gaze upon from your front porch in the Czech Republic.

And then, last year, in my new job, it came back with a vengeance. I had skin problems, bad problems, elsewhere on my body, too.

It's part of the reason I dropped off the face of the blogosphere.

It got eventually tamed down with a combination of medical help and with switching positions in the company. I first worked with large amounts of dyed and not-yet-washed wool, which I think was the main problem. I now still deal with wool, including the super-awesome employer's discount on faulty pieces (*insert a costumer's squeel*), but it's now without the probably too harsh chemicals, so, yay, my hands are okay.

Wool twill in a sort of greyish-greenish robin-egg colour. That 1797 fashion plate is definitely happening sooner rather than later.

But sometime after the fact, this year, I realised - thanks to a discussion thread in a costuming group on Facebook, no less - that part of last year's problem was also heat rash. Part of the problem, I suspect, was the fact I am unaware of the term "heat rash" even existing in Czech - so I had lived all my life without knowing that was a thing.

And it definitely is a thing. I do have some form of atopic ecsema, there's no denying it; but I'm now convinced my problems last year got so bad because my atopic ecsema (and probably those dye chemicals, and the fact it also turned out I had iron deficiency) got combined with heat rashes. I did suspect sweat was a contributing factor, but because of my other problems, it got overlooked. It was a whole big combination of factors, a hundred times nothing killing the donkey, as the Czech saying goes - with regards to the heat rashes, a combination of changes in themselves not too significant, like a super-hot summer spent comuting in a city with plastic and pleather seats in buses (I could get away with walking a lot before this job), and safety-regulation shoes that were artificial fibre and padded. (That's no longer a requirement in my new position, either - I now just need closed heels and toes, so, phew.) Turns out a lot of the problems can be managed just with zinc cream. (And a lot of other precautions, and other medication when it really does get worse; but on an everyday basis, zinc cream and vaseline are a huge relief after the succession of not-entirely-successful treatments over the years.)


So. The lesson I've taken from this super-unpleasant experience is: plastic and artificial fibre sitting close to my body - not in a million years.

I now put a shawl over the seats in the bus if I'm wearing too short a skirt. And pick train carriages with wool seat covers if I can...

It is bad news for the Regency/early 1820s dress plans I had harboured for this probably polyester sari I bought years and years ago:

Layers of natural fibre underneath or no, the bodice would be close to my body and would not breathe at all; that's very bad news in my world now.

But it is, I think, good news for the Scroop Fantail, because a pleated skirt with judicious use of cotton underneath should be mostly okay. ;-)

The question is... modern, or historical length?

I cut off the borders for general use as trim; maybe a Regency dress can still happen with that.

And the ground fabric could still be used as pretty bag lining or something like that...

Really, all in all, it's actually a good thing I was forced to drop the original plan, because I found out that over the years, the colour has become too dull to wear in a large expanse next to my face.

By which I mean, over the years my colouring has changed to such an extent that I can get away with, even require, much bolder colour combinations:

Good!

In the photo, I wear: the fichu en marmotte, my chemise, the transitional warp-jumps bra-thingy (answer to question whether I can wear the dress over it: yes, but I have to take care to fit the wrap-jumps tightly), a sleeveless dress I never got around to blogging about, a sleeveless bodice I never got around to blogging about, white cotton over-the-knee socks that are my stand-in for historical stockings for the moment, and these shoes. I think there should actually be a shirt or something rather than just the chemise but, as I wrote earlier this month, I haven't figured out that part properly yet.

Also, I completely forgot that, for this photoshoot opportunity (I plan on posting more of the photos later, but by now I'm not promising anything), maybe I could wear some jewellery beyond the baptism-gift ring I wear all the time. Typical.

#CoBloWriMo 9: BIG project

The idea was to write about the Wallachian costume, a sort of "what it involves" post, but... today was taken up by other things, and the big project ended up being this:

Hauling things from my old home. Things like a bale of lining fabric. All my skirt slips. A set of IKEA bedlinen with an 18th century print - turned fabric. That sort of things. One full backpack and three full bags if things, not counting my regular "handbag" bag here (also full).

Hard time deciding what would go and what would stay behind. Concrete ideas won over vague ones, and I took the fabrics on the right in this photo.

The IKEA print will become a dress. So will the green sari (finally, I hope). The nude-coloured used to also be a sari - the idea was also for a dress. It's polyester, though, and for that and other reasons, there has been a change of plans. But plans there are.
The little bit of black you can see on the very right is remnants of fabric from my Little Black Dress. After several years of very occasional wearings, alas, the sleeves started unraveling, so I was thinking of repairing / replacing them.

The exhausting expedition (ugh, I've never hauled so many things at once, and I never want to do it again) was crowned and rewarded with a concert of Druhá Tráva, whom I've wanted to see live for a while now and kept not managing to; so in a way, it was also a big project.
I have no photos of that, although I could have taken some, easily - I sat in the first row! It just felt... disrespectful, somehow. I was there for the music, not to take photos.
They're the sort of musicians who just sort of hang about on the stage, and produce incredible sounds while doing that. Who make it look easy, except clearly it's not...

... and reflecting on them again, I forgot the time, and now it's no longer "today". So off with this post! More tomorrow - I mean today...

HSF #13: Under $10 - 1930s-40s-style trousers

Remember my almost favourite trousers?
I've wanted a new pair of wide-legged white summer trousers for quite a while now. Over time, it evolved into a pair of 1930s-40s-style wide-legged trousers. I looked at pictures, I looked at vintage patterns online, I compiled a Pinterest board for active wear / outdoors wear / hiking wear / whatever of the era, inspired by Swallows and Amazons (I love Arthur Ransome's books, as my Literary Heroine Party questionnaires attest to). After all that, I was on the lookout for white cotton twill to make my trousers. Sounds like a basic enough fabric, right?

A basic, classic look, right?

Well, that was probably the problem: the shops I visited were full of colourful prints and low on very basic fabric. And I didn't always have the money to spend on fabric, so I could not be on the lookout all the time. In the end, I found exactly the fabric I wanted this January, with my Christmas money. And it was in the remnant bin, so it was marked down. All great, and I bought it; the problem was, there was only about 1,2 m of it, so I wasn't at all sure it would be enough for my wide-legged trousers.

At the beginning of July, I finally mentally crossed my fingers and cut into it. I just so-so squeezed the trousers out of it, with the help of
a) the fact that I have short legs, so 1,2 m was long enough for both legs and waistband,
b) inside waistband of a different material,
and c) some creative seam allowances (and this is one of the two huge reasons why I love the continental Europe practice of patterns with no seam allowances and going by the sewing stitching line, thank you very much).

 See? Some very creative seam allowances there.

Oh, and d) forget about those folded-up cutting diagrams. Such a waste of fabric. I never use that sort of layout, I just make sure I have the grain right and cut wherever I can squeeze it.
It did help that I was going for the vintage style with a lapped zipper on the side: a fly would take more fabric. Somehow, I even managed to squeeze the visible part of the slant pockets and the belt loops out of it. And I still have some small scraps... well, more like tiny. (Probably not even enough for doll trousers. I'll probably still try. :D)

The pattern is based on the one taken from those trousers I found at home. I made the back darts a bit bigger in the process. I also altered the front crotch a tiny bit (the original is very L-shaped, I made the curve more gradual because it always felt a bit off). Made a waistband, of course. And following the example of the vintage patterns I've looked at, the legs are not tapered at all, just cut straight down from the crotch/hips.

It results in a bit of a baggy look, but that, I believe, is quite correct for the era.
As you can see on this photo, though, I may still have to line the top part - the navy stripes of my T-shirt and my pantyline (ugh!) are showing through.

The fabric got a bit off-grain in the wash, so the trousers are cut a bit off-grain, too. Here's hoping it won't play havoc on them over time.

As mentioned previously, there's a lapped zipper on the side - handpicked. Then there's hooks and thread bars in the waistband. The hem allowance is handstitched, too. Otherwise, it's straight stitch (+ flat-felled inseam), zig-zag and some pinked seam allowances (at the pockets and in the waistband).

I also made use of the selvedges wherever I could.

The most important thing, of course, is the fact that I finally have nice casual trousers I can squat in and do stuff in without exposing my back.

Okay, they're white, so it's probably not a good idea to do all kinds of stuff in them. But the point is, I have a pattern that works.

In the end, styled with a striped T-shirt and the matching Miss Barbora hat, in emulation of the beachwear of the time, it's definitely more Miss Barbora than Swallows and Amazons. I plan on using the same pattern to make shorts for the Outdoors challenge, though, and that will fill that Ransome doing-all-kinds-of-stuff slot. :-)
Thus the "Pattern - Nancy" tag.


Just the facts, ma'am:

The Challenge: #13 Under $10
Fabric: cca 1,20 m of a white cotton twill remnant + a piece of an old tan cotton twill pinafore for the inside waistband. Oh, and I forgot about the old bedsheet for the pockets...
Pattern: my own, adapted from a pair I own
Year: cca 1930s-1940s
Notions: white cotton thread, metal zipper, hooks (+ thread bars, because I did not have enough overlap in the waistband for an eye)
How historically accurate is it? I think about 80-90%? I based the style on vintage pattern pictures, tried to only use techniques that would have been used then (straight stitch, zig-zag, some pinked seam allowances, some handsewing). But the slant pockets, placement/number of darts and details like that may not be quite accurate.
Hours to complete: I lost count; like usual, it took longer than I had expected, there was quite a lot of handsewing... maybe 10?
First worn: So far, just for some quick pictures (it was either too hot or too rainy for actual wearing). They’ll definitely get a lot of wear, though.
Total cost: Cca 160-170 CZK for the fabric (I've lost the receipt), 15 CZK for the zipper + the other odds and ends take it to about 200 CZK = Just about those 10 USD (yay for remnant bin!).

Also wearing:
the Miss Barbora hat - C&A, a gift 
striped T-shirt - Ellen Amber, thrifted
necklace - made by me
belt - unknown origins, found at home
shoes - Clarks, second-hand

And a tomcat who wasn't happy about becoming a fashion accessory at all. 

Oh, right, outside of being a Historical Sew Fortnightly item, it's also an #Oonapalooza item for the Sewcialists group. So I wanted to be a bit more creative with my photos, Oona-style, but no. My poses, it turns out, are limited to: front; back; maybe side; okay, squatting down not very creatively; looking off into a distance in a manner that makes me unwilling to share those photos; grabbing a cat and hoping for the best.

A new cover for my mobile phone (and a partial tutorial)

I sorely needed a new cover for my mobile phone. I made one about four years ago and it was no longer fit for polite company.

So, that's what I've just done. Made a new cover for my mobile phone. With felt inside to protect the phone.

It's not perfect - it's only the second one I've ever made, and the first I've done with felt and on machine, and there's some fiddly stitching around corners in very limited space that I really could have done better... among other things. But the first one lasted me for four years, so hey, not bad.

Although towards the end, the first one looked like this:

So yes, I definitely needed a new one.

I got very lucky with the fabric. Some time ago, Spoonflower did a promotion on a new fabric - it's called Silky Faille, which of course means there's no silk in it at all and it's all polyester. Anyway, you could get a free swatch of it, so I used that opportunity to finally get myself some of my favourite design.

I mean, my favourite design of mine. I have several up on Spoonflower, but never got around to ordering any, because money and international shipping and who knows what else. Which, of course, in Spoonflower's policy meant that no one else could order them either, so it was all just a mental excercise.

But thanks to this, there's now one up that you can order yourself! And now they offer the prints in wallpapers and gift wraps and decals as well, so if you're not into sewing, you can still get yourself, for example, a gift wrap with tic-tac-toe and some fish pictograms. I'm quite proud of this idea, and it turned out very well.

 

End of shameless self promotion.

That photo above is the swatch I received. The blue is a very nice deep, rich turquoise blue (almost teal), so I was very satisfied - I was afraid the colour of the printed fabric would be blander than on screen (as it apparently happens with some colours), but no, it's actually a bit more saturated than on my screen, so it should last well.
And as I looked at the swatch, I thought it was perfect size for the new mobile phone cover that I so desperately needed.

As it turned out, it was not only perfect size, the spacing of the pattern was more or less perfect, too!

This here is my very simple pattern. You need the width of your phone (in my case, I went with 4,5 cm), the height of it (I went with 10 cm, which was slightly more than the actual height), and the thickness (2,5 cm - I also store an additional Mini SD in its case in my cover, so the thickness is more than the actual thickness of the phone).

Cut the same from felt. You can leave very narrow seam allowances with felt if you're confident you'll manage them under your sewing machine foot. I did. I'm one for minimum seam allowances and minimum fabric waste.

Sew the bottom corners first.

Then the bottom seam.

And then the side seam.

And make it nice and smooth.

Very quick, very simple. Do the same with your outer fabric. The faille frayed a lot, so I stitched it with a zig-zag stitch to prevent the fraying.

What follows is the part that I think I could have done better. There must be a better way to do it. Anyway, what I did was put the felt into the outer shell, stretch it all to fit together - I put in the mobile phone and the SD case to make it fit together the way it should. And fold down and pin the seam allowances of the shell to the felt.

This was where it got very unscientific and messy. I could not figure out which side to pin from, and which side to sew from, and so on. And at the bottom corners of the flap, I had to clip the fabric so I could fold it, and now I have exposed clipped bits there.

Anyway, I took the phone out again and topstitched it together (from the inside). And that's how I made my felt-lined mobile phone cover. Feel free to steal the idea, and feel free to order the fabric and use it for yours. :-)

Oops. I slipped into shameless self-promotion again.

Look what I've got! - The tin and bulk of fabric edition

For some reason, I don't remember anymore what, I started scouring Aukro, the Czech version of eBay. And I splurged on some things.

The first thing was this tin box:

I'm always short on pretty storage options, and this fits so nicely with other things in our house:

(The colours are more true on this photo.)

It houses my fusible interfacings now. Well, those I've managed to unearth so far. That is enough of an explanation of why it houses them.


Another thing was - wait for it - 15 meters of lining fabric.

 
Well, I did not bother measuring it and trust the seller; it's quite the bulk. For about 26 CZK per metre. That's like a dollar per metre, I believe. Nice, sturdy, reversible lining fabric, most probably acetate (burn test proved it not to be a hideous melting kind of artificial, but the ash is dark, so it's probably not rayon) - certainly much better than those various odds and ends of dubious fibre content that made up my fabric stash up till now. You see, I was very short on lining fabrics as well. Very short. I think this purchase can be excused in my attempts to use up stash and not add to it, because I have fabrics in my stash that I could not use without lining. Like that burgundy red for a jacket.

The warp here is black or very dark blue and the weft is a gorgeous bronze colour, resulting in a changeable quality on both sides. Admittedly, the bronze colour is not exactly my colour, or my family's colour. But the other side has just that little tinge of gold that works for me (think overcast grey, grey skies with golden rays pouring through - those are my best colours) and will do very nicely.
And I have something else in mind for two special fabric remnants... but that's a vague idea that has to wait.

It's pretty enough to be tempting as a fashion fabric, but it does not behave properly for that (the frou-frou is somewhat wind-breaker-y, if you know what I mean). I know better now, and am looking forward to pretty insides.


Other news: Now that Flickr has made their free space much larger than it used to be, I'm gradually putting up those German pattern magazines - the first one is here. Rajče, the Czech site I'm using, is a fine one, but it resizes the pictures, and I don't want that.

The Secret Life of Bloggers: Summer begins

My second and last post in the series...

2013-06-04 Monday
Banana and chocolate; my sister "splurged" on a snack and each of us got a bowlful. ;-)

2013-06-25 Tuesday
Waxing (?) leather, including my beloved red belt and this no less beloved pair of shoes. I've had them since 2007; they already had their soles (and insoles) repaired once and they're in need of another repair at the heel. Which they will get, sooner or later. I think they were Slovakian in origin...
They started out as suede, but some parts are now nearly smooth, so I went ahead and waxed those parts - it improves the leather's flexibility considerably and is supposed to make it water-proof, too. I brushed them thoroughly afterwards to retain some of the original texture.

2013-06-26 Wednesday
"Joy."
I went back to Brno for just two days. I handed in my last essay, and my summer officially began... It was 12 Celsius in the evening and did not feel much like it.
A barbecue party with the English Evenings group (where my sister goes fairly regularly and I go very, very occasionally; but I was very glad to be there this time). Food and games. This was a creative game where the purpose was to create something out of food that would represent one of the themes discussed during the semester. I did not take part in this game, because I felt sleepy at first (which, I later realised, must have been because of my sister's Latvian-inspired garlic-and-dill dip). So I just took pictures.

2013-06-27 Thursday
We went to that Indian/Nepalese restaurant again, which was very nice as usual, and then went back home. After a week when it was about 24 Celsius in the house, the temperature dropped back to 20. It feels cold in comparison, but it's a nicer temperature to sleep in, I think...

2013-06-28 Friday
I finally started sewing with that bedding from the beginnings of this blog. It took cutting and sewing a thin slippery silk to finally gather up the courage to measure out and sew a large rectangle of this... I think it's a good thing I took my time, though. This damask stretches out unexpectedly (probably due to its irregular twill weave), and I think I would have freaked out about it and messed it up back when I found the fabric. Now I just steam-pressed it into better submission, without much further thought. One duvet cover down, minus buttonholes, one more to go.
Also, I got a regular plain heavy-duty leather belt from mom. Heavy-duty is rather guaranteed: she said she had got it in an army shop. :D The thin red belt had gotten much wear since I found it, so I'm glad to have another one for casual wear. I got spoiled by the leather and could not warm up to other belts I've run into... (Well, with one exception, but that's not very casual.)


And, after the end of the blog party, this:

 

This is my Christmas gift from my sister, finally arrived! I went all wide-eyed, to finally hold it in my hands. More stashbusting in my future: I have not used that blue-grey knit yet, busy as I was with many other projects (and generally lazy, too). I'm glad it has sat unused till now, because now I'm (hopefully) going to have the perfect dress.
My sister (other) wants one, too - she fell in love with Tiramisu around the same time I did, in Steph's samples stage. My sister wants a maxi version, though. I'm very gratefull that Cation Designs has made one, because now I can envision it better. But I don't have the fabric for her version. :-/

I've always wanted to take one of these

These.

Yesterday, I found myself in Prague again (that's a good beginning). More importantly, I found a free Metro newspaper in the metro, with one of those elusive (so far, to me) fabric coupons for a certain fabric shop.

So I thought, if I have enough time let's go and see if I can find something that I actually need (that's the important part) and get it with a discount.

So I went, in the end; and could not find anything I needed. I wanted nice white lightweight cotton for the 1848 skirt. No luck there; I only found brown lightweight cotton, which was very nice, but not what I needed. I wanted cotton shirting, with the idea of maybe making my father a shirt for Christmas. No luck there at all.

So I thought, I don't have enough lining in my stash, let's take a look at the linings. While searching for linings (the shop was rather crowded, probably because more people have found their coupons in the Metro newspaper), I found a remnants rack with satins and the like; mostly the evil polyester stuff. I went through them, just in case. I noticed a burgundy red that could go as a lining with a fabric in my stash...

I touched it, and fell in love. I looked at the label. It was 100% silk.

Not very surprisingly, it went home with me.

Now, the question is, do I really turn it into a lining for that fabric? I'm not quite sure there's enough of the silk. And: It's not so apparent in the photo, but in real life, the colours are not quite the same. The fabric in my stash is a little bit more yellowish than the silk. And it's a mystery fabric (I got it from my friend's mother) and putting a luxurious silk lining into it feels somewhat incongruous with it; I haven't put it through the burn test yet, but my bet is it's not natural fibre.

I want to make a very classic blazer out of it; something like this:

(That's from Mrs Style Book 2006/11)

Silk lining would go well with that, admittedly.

But holding the silk fabric, I also became convinced that it had to become a gift for my mom. I had promised her a blouse... something like this, though worn sepearately:

(The same book. I suspect it's actually a pattern for a stretchy fabric, though.)

But I'm not quite sure if it's my mom's colour, either. The problem with gifts is, you can't check without telling them... I could, alternatelly, turn it into a camisole for her (she deserves a silk camisole; I already have one; it's featured among my "Remake the RTW" plans, though, and maybe I could squeeze two out of the fabric anyway), but then, isn't this fabric too beautiful to be restricted to underwear?

Oh, the troubles a lucky seamstress goes through! If I become convinced enough it's mom's colour, I'll go with the blouse. I promised, and it looks like the sort of style this fabric would shine as. Now, aren't I glad I found a shop that carries silk thread? Oh yes, I am.

Off to read about stylistics. That's a linguistic term, not a fashion one.

Vintage shoes, fabric shop and Lebanese and other music

This was meant to be another I love Thursday post, but it got delayed, so now it's an "I love on Tuesday what I fell in love with on Friday" post... and the linky is closed. Also, the length of the post title reflects the length of this post. I somehow need to cram everything that's been haunting my mind recently into one post.

Last time, it was vintage-style shoes perfection. This time, it's vintage shoe perfection.
I saw these in a thrift shop window:

Just by that look in the thrift shop window - a closer look I took - I knew these were special. Not many shoes carry on them the name of a local shoemaker! And they were obviously well-made, and in a vintage style.
So I went in and had an even closer look.

Definitely vintage. For one thing, due to our 40 years of communist rule, the times of local shoemakers in this country were probably somewhat limited. That, together with the style, places these somewhere in the 1930s or 1940s, I think.

Cuban heels.

Honest-to-goodness knock-on Cuban heels. I mean, these shoes are not the cheap plastic glued stuff you'd find today; they're honest-to-goodness leather and cobbled together, which in this case is a good thing.

They are waaaay too small for me. No chance I could wear these. No chance anyone in my family could wear these. No way I could afford a private collection of historical shoes. So at least I took photos, for myself, and for you.
(I was so excited about this shoe perfection that I would have just snapped pictures, wherever; thankfully, the lady at the cash desk - who joined me in praises of this treasure - was of sounder mind at the moment and suggested using the stool as a pedestal of sorts. I still had to use flash due to lack of light, and it's still got the somewhat shabby thrift shop background, but the photos are more civilised. :-)



The street number on the label is not so well seen, but I think the shoemaker resided here. It's the same street where a large fabrics and haberdashery shop, Kalců, is situated nowadays, a bit further down that street. I visited for the first time that same Friday; their fabric selection is somewhat seasonal, something this slow seamstress is not exactly happy about, but they carry 100% wool fabrics - yay! I even saw a 100% cashmere. Of course, the fabrics are priced accordingly, which this student seamstress is not so happy about either; but then, it's good to know I can find quality fabrics when I want to. (And lovers of prints would go crazy over their selection of knits and rayons.)
Moreover, the staff is knowledgeable, something that sadly does not always occur these days. Now I know where to go when I'm not quite sure what I want. Or, alternately, when I'm 100% insistent on what I want...
I was particularly pleased with their selection of interfacing and brought home a piece of nude-coloured slightly one-way-stretch woven fusible that should be perfect for underwear, and invisible zippers for my sister's kathak costume, the one thing that was setting back its creation. And they carry silk thread. One more yay!


Speaking of yay...

I fell in love with two Lebanese pop songs some time ago. I don't understand a word, which is somehow refereshing. :-) I'm not sure what the video above is all about and must admit I do not like the clothes she wears very much, but I love the old lady makeover. :D This is, to me, a bit of a sister-bond song, seeing as I found this song thanks to her and she's the one I can vent my crush on Peter Wingfield and the like on; it's mutual. ;D

And I have no idea why this clip features Prague and Czech folk dancers. Prague is not normally so romantic; it's full of tourists in the tourist zones and the hustle and bustle of a capital city outside of them. The outskirts can be more romantic than the centre. But it's interesting to see it through the eyes of 1999 Lebanese pop. And I love. the. song. very. much.


But not more than I love Mark Knopfler's music. I keep coming back to it. I love Mark Knopfler's music so much that, listening to a song, I keep thinking "best song ever", and then the next song comes, and I'm thinking "best song ever"...

The best song ever is currently the mind-blowing "Planet of New Orleans". It actually makes me want to visit New Orleans. Well done, Geordie boy. :D

I've sewed, too

I finished part of the blouse part of my sister's dancing costume (which, it turned out, she really wanted to be the tunic part of a salwar kameez, for increased universality, so that's what it became); but I don't have photographic evidence, which is waiting for when it's all finished. I still have to make the vest part to fulfill my birthday gift promise to her, but since she left the tunic in Brno and I cannot muslin over it now, it will happen later.

The "photographic evidence" part will be a bit impaired now, because Autumn means rain and clouds and dark comes early, and that means less photographing opportunities - it's nearly impossible to take good photographs in our house, even more so when it's cloudy and dark outside, and impossible to take photographs outside when it's raining, so the only place left is the flat in Brno.

Now, I'm remaking RTW - in the completely-rip-apart-and-sew-into-something-else sense: a 75% wool - 25% nylon skirt that I got for 10 CZK in a thrift shop and wore only once because it soon became too tight for me. Re-sewing it into a (modern-day) spencer, which does not exactly go with the spirit of the challenge; it's frosting in Marmotaland. (And of course it's grande-assietted.) But since Marmota's idea of frosting is a bit closer to someone else's idea of cake, I don't feel too ashamed about it; I'm using up stash, too. I'll probably have to piece like mad in some places to squeeze it out of the fabric I have (the main reason why it's frosting and not cake: a spencer and not a full-blown jacket). But it's still a very lucky project, which will hopefully hold until it's finished.

Lucky as in, I got wonderful mostly wool fabric for the very, very ridiculous price of 10 CZK, lining plus spare invisible zipper included, and already have the perfect buttons in my stash (and should already have violet buttonhole silk, too, though I cannot locate it right now).

Lucky as in, rather flu-dazed Marmota pieced without thinking and still managed to match the plaid.

Lucky as in, this fabric is an absolute delight to sew with, and makes me wonder what an even greater delight it would be to sew with a 100% wool fabric of a similar kind.

My almost favourite summer dress

This outfit's nothing special, mostly utilitarian (that sounds funny). Other than showing my new hat in action with the matching tote... The hat does not look so particularly good with the bun in some of my photos. Nor do the colours match. That's the utilitarian part. Monday was the hottest day since recording started in Czechia. (I kind of ruined my feet. And I woke up with a splitting headache the next day. Half a Paralen and about 3 liters of liquids later, I feel better, though.)

This dress is one of my few green pieces of clothing. I LOVE this *exact* shade of green. I love it on this dress. It's such a subversive pop of colour. ("Look, what a bright colour!" - "But it's only green!" - Um, does that make any sense at all?)

I also love the cut of it. Almost; I think a slightly fuller skirt (at the bottom) might be better. But: surplice bodice + tulip sleeves? And the yoke with the gathers in the back? Yum.

I love the fabric. It's a loose weave cotton with a slight crease; light and airy for summer, yet crisp enough for the style.

I do not love the unwashable dark spots on the skirt (small, so not seen on the photos, but noticable enough in real life).

I do not love the fit on me. It's too tight in the bust, which leads to two unfortunate results: a) the neckline is wobbly, b) the fit is uneven: it sits higher in the front than in the back.

Therein lie my problems. I'd love to recreate the dress, with a better fit. But I want to recreate it in the exact. same. fabric. The exact. same. colour. And where am I going to get that? I have no idea where the dress came from or how old it is. Fairly old. (The style is something like 70s meets 40s, but the notions used - plastic zipper of the tiny kind and fusible interfacing - probably place it in later times than 40s; who knows, maybe it's just early 90s.) It seems to be homesewn; but it was not sewn in this household.

I rather like the way it is empire-line in the front and sits on my waist in the back. But I do not like the way the skirt hangs in the back. The way the skirt hem is uneven on me.

Oh, and if I ever make it, I want it to be better finished inside. The interfaced waistband is not lined/underlined, and the interfacing is pretty worn-out. Eugh.

So that's it. One of those - not really RTW, but almost - pieces I want to recreate and replace (see the new blog button on the right). But I do not know how to do that and fulfill my wishes for it. This piece cannot simply be recreated for function; I also want it to be recreated for style. And vice versa. I want those two to be in harmony: the dress as it is comes near, but unfortunately not quite on me.