Thailand & silk Ikat

It was only my first day in Bangkok but I sniffed out the fabric somehow.  I went into the Textile Museum, which is an exhibit off to the side of the Grand Palace.  The palace itself is hugely touristed and the ticket is for everything, but not everyone makes it into the museums.  In fact, it was hard to get to the textile museum - you had to go through the giftshop.  The result is that I saw all the silks before I read about them.

silks:

Thailand has a very interesting cultural history when it comes to ceremonial clothing.  Unlike other countries in the area, there is no traditional dress.  There was up to a certain point but it seems like when the country westernised in the 1900's, clothing didn't make the leap.  When the King and Queen were going to Europe in the 1960's, she commissioned Balmain, the Paris couturier, to design a wardrobe for her using elements that had been part of historical Thai dress, including accordioned skirts and draped half bodices.  The work was so successful that it sparked a number of events.

1. She kept wearing the outfits, and so now in the collective mind, they *are* Thai traditional dress.
2. Other people started wearing them too
3. In order to support textile production in the countryside, Queen Sirikit created a foundation, named SUPPORT, which does just that - it supports the processes of silk dyeing and weaving (along with other village crafts) according to traditional village methods.  Different areas have different techniques, but ikat is a traditional technique in Thailand and is still done in the villages, although by fewer young people.

I am hoping to go see some of these villages in a few weeks.  But in the meantime I couldn't resist the expensive Queen approved silks.  The prices were relatively high.  After seeing some of the stuff sold in Firenze I've redefined 'expensive fabric.'  But for the more lightweight Ikat it was 600-900 Baht (up to 25$/m) and for the heavierweights it was 1900 Baht ($60$/m.)

I got two pieces, and put one to use right away!

Opale dress from Grains de Couture

After luck put me in Delft during the weekend of the fabric market, I had sewing on the brain.  I lasted one week without sewing: )  I ended up with about 6 meters of lovely rayon jerseys and itchy fingers...

There is a 'werkstatt' in Munich with sewing machine time to rent, but it didn't match up with my free time.  However my friend in Munich had been considering buying a sewing machine and I managed to talk him into doing it now so I could show him the ropes.  And those hopeless pieces of Opale were conveniently in the luggage I am storing in his attic, and I was finally ready to look at them with a fresh outlook.

Upon assessment, what I had done wrong:
--no SA on the neckline.
--back facing without SA, although I did put it on the dress cutouts.

I didn't cut out the front pieces - the little collar or the additional parts on the sides, because I was so uncertain how to add the SA.  And now with the dress on the floor, I still couldn't figure out how they were supposed to go together.  I didn't have the book, and so I just went by photos on the internet of the final dress.  In the end I decided to skip those pieces altogether.  I must say, even without the cuteness factor of those additional bits, this dress is great.

The fabric: from 1000Stoff in Berlin, and although it is pretty ordinary navy linen with a huge amount of stretch, it was somehow my dream purchase and was hoarded for awhile.  I wanted to make the Merchant & Mills Trapeze dress with it, but didn't have quite enough fabric.  Now I wish I had just narrowed the trapeze skirt and gone ahead - my instinct that it would have been amazing is correct.  On this pattern I ended up crossing sizes at the waist, although I don't remember what size I cut, the french sizing goes very small at the waist.  I didn't need to do that - it has a lot of ease, plus the stretch factor.  I was even able to skip putting in a zip. Also, this dress is short - I didn't shorten it and I'm 5'4".

It came together easily once I skipped the decorative parts.  I got a bit distracted on the front darts, so they are pointy. (I was talking to my friend about the sewing machine as I sewed!)  I didn't quite know what I was supposed to do with the cutouts. The facing creates a nice finish but means then you have limited adjustability.  I didn't stay stitch and so I was stuck with a stretched out neckline and I didn't have a good idea of how to best use bias tape to fix things.  My friend was completely amazed to watch it come together over a few hours of work.  Unfortunately I was stumped and I left it in Munich...where it waited over 6 months for my sewing vacation!!

So, updates are below:

 It was time to come to the rescue!  I stay stitched the neck (better late than never?) removed the weird bias tape I'd put on it, created a little tuck in the front, snipped about 1.5 cm out of the top back isthmus, and bias taped the neckline and the sleeves.  That created a fine finish at the back neck.  Probably because of my original missing SA, the armscye is a bit low and just about shows my bra.  In between the two cutouts I just sewed it down.  I know it should have something THERE but I still can't think of what - I don't want a bow as I reckon it would be annoying to lean on, but I did bring a piece of fabric with me to Ukraine in case I get bored and want to play with it.  I'm really happy with finally finishing this dress into wearability, even if I had to diverge from the nice details of the pattern quite a bit due to circumstances.

Good news: I'm learning French!  So maybe next time the pattern (hrm and the rest of the book) will go better when I can read the instructions.  I would consider sizing down a bit for another version but I reckon this one will get loads of use, as southern Ukraine is already hot! 

Grains de Couture Onyx, Renfrew, Cambie and an owl skirt!

This is a post full of the things I got roped into doing specifically for other people this summer.  I knew I was sewing for other people anyway so it wasn't much of a step to let a few of my favourites choose what they got...

First: Onyx from the book Grains de Couture.  I used this as a way of gaining some confidence on adding seam allowances to these patterns.  I messed up the Opale previously by not adding the correct seam allowances so it was nice to do something straightforward.

The Onyx here is with the neckline of Basalte - a simple sweatshirt neck.  I left the binding a bit loose because the neckhole ended up (it seemed to me) a bit small.  As most sweatshirts, this took less than an hour to sew.  The recipient seemed satisfied!

Second Emmeline-Polly top:
I had planned this for a friend from silk that she chose in Italy. We had a falling out but I decided to make it for her anyway. It is the same as my practice version in navy except that this time I rolled all the edges prior to sewing the seams.  I am not sure which way is better - when doing it this way you get discontinuity at the seams which is also not optimal.  Of course the quality on this version was better because I put more effort into it.

Renfrew from stretch silk: cut my usual size 4 without any shortening of the bodice, Sarah is smaller than me and the silk generally creates a tighter fit.  This is the stretch silk which I dyed last summer using various shibori techniques.  The colour of the dye has become a bit mixed with pink and purple along some edges.  I don't know how it will wash, and in the meantime I am waiting for model photos...

Cambie in red:
My friend G is very partial to red things and had already aquired a love for the Cambie last year. We spotted a fabric that she adored but when we bought it on etsy we accidentally got a more orange shade than initially planned...luckily she says she still likes it.  For my very slender friend I used a Cambie size 4, being a bit nervous because that is the same size as my Cambie, and while it is very formfitting, I would have expected her to need a smaller size.

The Cambie instructions are always amazing.  There were various small setbacks due to how very much I hate gathering and gathering hates me.  I was actually very surprised how normal the dress looked.  I have this weird perception that gathering makes everything puff out so much that it is terrible.  This was not so at all!  I might need to admit a tiny bit more gathering into my life...

I left the hemming and the shoulder insertion to do after seeing G - she has a sewing machine and I planned to let her finish everything, but she was too nervous to try.  I got about halfway through the finishing touches, but her ancient Pfaff was making threadnests so I took the dress home to hem.  In exchange she is knitting me amazing rainbow striped socks!!

And finally, although it was the first project planned, it is the last finished: an owl skirt.
My friend Meike and I browsed a fabric market in Berlin in February and I very stupidly offered to make her a skirt out of a meter of any fabric, despite the fact that I knew I didn't know anything about making skirts out of one meter of fabric without a pattern.  My anxiety over this lack of knowledge held things up...funny how that works.  I used the skirt piece from Lucie ("cut two rectangles 47x100cm"), french seamed the sides, hemmed, and then used what seems to my hazy brain to be a modification of the simplicity men's underwear elastic application.  I realised that I had to gather the skirt for it to fit the elastic.  I split it into quadrants, and basically it has to be gathered such that each quadrant is exactly the same length as the elastic at full extension.  Trying to sew this while holding onto everything was an adventure, meaning it's not quite even, but I am so completely shocked to have this beautiful, wearable result that I certainly don't care and I suspect Meike will be happy too.

And I am glad now to have had three recent bouts of gathering behind me as it appears I am gaining experience, if not expertise.  It ends up that it's not quite fair to hate an aspect of clothing sewing until you are proficient at it.  (ie I dislike gathering mostly because I suck at gathering and my gathers look retarded.) 

Departure and a Sewaholic Renfrew in stripes

Sewing sometimes feels like a sticky net I have caught myself in - once you start, there is never an escape.  I have been sewing, and blogging about it, for just over two years.  (That's it!!) All of a sudden the sewing machine is gone, the final projects have been angsted over, stressed over, sewn in a wild rush, and one or two have been packed away; after weeks of sewing instead of doing anything else, and yet moments of surprised success as some of these last projects forced me out of my comfort zone, now I sit on a bed in a quiet room devoid of fabric fluff, and it feels...so...peaceful.

Where is the balance between frenetic sewing...and the thrill and joy and enthusiasm for an amazing new project?  I have lived a peripatetic lifestyle these two years and dragging sewing (ie pieces of fabric and half done projects) around with me has been a pain.  But sewing at times has kept my sanity intact.

I started out sewing with a few goals in mind:
-make my boyfriend his underwear out of my fabric scraps
-be able to buy things from the op shops, Goodwill, Oxfam, etc, and turn them into masterpieces.
-and under it all: shop with intent, buy less, and care more.

I have done all of those things, although I wouldn't count most of the results as masterpieces.  But it has come at a pretty high educational cost.  Fabric cost, failed-projects cost, social cost, maybe, and occasionally, although not usually, outdoortime-cost.  I don't think I have arrived at a well-thought out wardrobe, or a wardrobe which is environmentally neutral.  Do we spend our entire lives devoted to this goal?

It is with something approaching relief that I depart, knowing I probably won't be able to sew for about a year.  (Yeah right, I already know I will find unsuspecting sewing-machine-owners and befriend them...) but the hunger to create isn't gone.  I even have a list of what I would be sewing this fall...if I were sewing.

Here it is, if you are in a sewing-voyeur mood:

Knit Kielo, this would totally fix that weird chest problem!
Lourdes jacket (because I can't stop trying jackets)
Deer and Doe Arum dress  and possibly the entire new collection.
Itch to Stitch Davina dress
Waffle Monaca
Archer, at least one
Deer and Doe Bruyere (Fröbelina convinced me with her sleeveless version.)
Deer and Doe Aubepine
Francoise in a stable knit
Camber set until it fits!
Named Geneva Raglan tee
Named Augusta hoody
Scouts with variations until it fits!
More bras: another Watson, another Marlborough, and maybe another effort with foam, which I didn't like at first.
and another Saiph tunic because I loved loved loved mine and stupidly gave it away when I moved (last time) and my friend got rid of it.

Here is one last project to show you: a Renfrew I cut out awhile ago out of the leftovers from the second Deer & Doe Ondee sweater.

Where from here?
I'm not sure.
I started to blog about my sewing in the hopes that it would create a learning environment for me to improve in.  It didn't do that, (although sewing all the time did) and I have sewn a lot from the desire to see the results and show the results, rather than to wear the results.  I considered stopping blogging this winter, but I like the catalogue of my results, so I deleted the non-sewing posts (as I will probably delete this one.) Very slowly, my blog is starting to feel more interactive, as I had hoped.

One goal I do have is to make projects more than once.  Making a project just once doesn't allow for fit corrections, pattern adjustments, or even technique improvements.  However I don't find muslins helpful because I don't take them seriously.  (They invariably convince me never to sew the project at all.)  I want to try making things from cute, unserious quilting cottons or other low-risk fabrics in order to step into each project, and then deepen my experience with it from there.

I will post anything I sew!
However, that may be infrequent over the next months.
If you want to follow my antics/travel nonetheless, I instagram at @soelimano

Sorry for the introspection.  Thanks for reading, thanks for following, and thanks to those of you who have commented on, supported and at times received my sewing : ) 

Colette Chantilly & Liberty silk chiffon

The seed of this project was some Anna Sui chiffon plus bemberg lining.  6 meters of all this stuff, collected while I was in New Zealand.  I was rightfully scared of the project.  Which led to me dithering over it, and thus moving all six meters of fabric with me to the States...to Switzerland...and finally slowly collecting supplies, like extra fine silk pins (which are amazing.  Now I have nice pins, but still own no pincushion.  Ah, the vagrant life.) 

I just did not know whether I would like this dress.  But what I did finally admit is that I hated the chiffon.  So I got rid of it on some terrible muslins and thought I would mix and match using this super expensive Liberty chiffon (georgette?)  which, don't laugh, is my favourite Liberty of all time but I bought the wrong silk because I didn't know better when I was in New Zealand and now I can't think of anything else I would ever do with such light silk, plus a matching striped Liberty lawn for the skirt.

But then you know, I was playing on the floor and realised I had enough chiffon to make the whole thing.  It's very crinkly and doesn't look like enough, but it was.  So then on with the hesitating, the gelatining, and after much procrastination, the cutting.  And more procrastination.

An aside: the mauve silk twill (silk twill is my favourite fabric of all time seriously.) has been a favourite in my pile - I got it in Frankfurt last September and was planning to make the Vogue 1395 with it, which would have been stunning, but anyway I was worried about whether I would mess up the Vogue too much so I didn't use it.  

Change of scenery: I had already given my ironing board back to the hospital so I had to make due with a different corner of my flat.  Which actually provoked me to heights of creativity usually not seen in front of the camera. 

I completed the lining dress in one day and realised a discrepancy.  When you are using sheer chiffon, you need the lining outside to also be the outside (I mean you aren't putting wrong sides together, in this case wrong faces right.)  What that means is that you end up with a bunch of gathering on the inside of the dress, hanging out bothering you, plus there is a set of gathering in between the two layers which is annoying.  I really got irritated by this fact.  I wondered if I should have sewn the two layers together instead of keeping the lining and dress separate.  This discrepancy was also present around the zipper.  I guess it ends up not mattering because I zigzagged and topstitched the lining innards into submission, and between the two layers not much is actually visible even though the silk is transparent.

In the meantime, I carried on. I made a size 4 and I french seamed everything that I could.  The final dress construction was like the holy grail of moving: I started cutting this project out in August...and it is the last thing I sewed prior to dusting off and boxing up the borrowed Singer.  Yes indeed, I started it on the Pfaff and thought very seriously that I ought to finish it there too, but I ran out of time and had to see how the cheap machine would gobble up my silk.  The truth?  I don't think it did any worse.  I pinned a bit more but the slippiness of the machine was made up for by other little things that I HATED about the Pfaff like how it would slide off the side of zippers or how it was always gobbling up the starts and finishes of things. 

And after so very much tribulation, I have a wearable dress.  A bit silly in the chest area (looking down at it is worse than in photos) but I could reasonably wear it to like, picnics, weddings, the like.  The chiffon actually makes it feel sumptuous despite what I consider rather imprecise sewing.  After all this suffering I certainly WILL wear it to such events.  Let's not even talk about the zipper side and how it's not matched up by 2 inches because the first half of the zipper was accidentally put in a bit too high.  Let's just skip that bit.  It's in my armpit anyway, no one cares.  

Francoise x2 by Tilly and the Buttons

So I do love simple A line dresses and french darts.  I was eyeing the Francoise since it came out, but not totally sure, when a friend who wanted me to make her a dress tipped the balance (she bought me the pdf.)

I am not sure why I felt the need for a muslin version of this dress. I had doubts about the fit, about how it would come together, about how to line it for version 2?  All of these things.  Reasonably so.  I cut myself a size 3, although I noted that my friend's measurements according to the size chart would also afford her a size 3, and she is smaller than I am. 

It actually required a bit of thought to get all the shoulder bits together (and I didn't have enough fabric and substituted some birds, which I don't like). The fabric is nubbly silk and very drapey.  It is not the desired silhouette for this pattern but is one that I am preferential to.  To my surprise there is no pooling over my butt - hurrah for fisheye darts!!  The front darts are a bit prominent but I found them adequately placed and I didn't have any trouble with the french dart.  The dress is a bit long - I cut about 2 inches off prior to hemming it.  However, it was too big.  I took away 1cm off the back center on each side prior to adding the zip and this fixed THAT, although then it made evident that there is excess fabric across the top back (NEVER happens to me, wtf!).  I would need to remove a wedge.  I decided to ignore this and just added the facings to see what would happen.  The gaping is evident.  I think I do mostly like this dress but I would probably also make a size 2 for myself when a next time presents. 

Version 2 in this Marc Jacobs stuff, with a Bemberg lining.
I really didn't want to make this.
It is a lot more fun to just randomly decide today to make X and then make X.
But I have promised this to my friend R since January and she loves this fabric, which is itself a small miracle.  So, it had to happen, and fast, before the sheddy fabric shedded all over my flat.

I had already sold the Pfaff and I am learning something the hard way - I think the cheap, 50 frank Singer sewing machine that I previously had (Thanks for lending it back to me, Ilenia!)  is a lot more fun than the computer monster.  And I think I couldn't have convinced myself of this if I hadn't lived through 8 months of the latter.  The cheap Singer is way easier and more fun to sew with.  Yeah, it doesn't make quite as even stitches and it's a bit harder to get the perfect tension, but I put more effort into trying (I think I expected the other machine to do everything for me.)  I thought I needed a better machine in order to become a better sewist.  Now I understand that I need a reliable machine, but I personally don't want a machine with a lot going on, because I won't bother to take the time to understand it. 

Anyway the dress.  I cut the size 2. Bemberg lining, dress, check.  It is pretty easy to put together although for some reason those shoulder pieces always look like they are lined up wrong.  Making a dress with a lining is soooo much more fun than facings.  I for some reason had really psyched myself out for this lining!  I just sewed the neck and armholes, then slid the dress through the shoulder tunnels, voila.  After that, I sewed up the sides, then installed the zip and did a Cambie finish to get the lining also attached to the zip.

And the result, I must say, is a masterpiece.  It's a tiny bit small for me, thus perfect for R, and I will in future definitely take a small wedge out from each side of the back neck.  The weight of the fabric and the lining make this dress feel really nice and substantial.  I think I would still make a size 2 for me, but use a fabric with a bit of stretch.  And a lining!  

On the bandwagon with Xerea by Pauline Alice

I completely decided to do this because I couldn't resist a 60s style dress when I saw it on Sonja's blog.  She's like, my name twin, right, I have to follow her lead...

This version was a muslin for a few reasons: I am packing and don't have much fabric to choose from (every scrap I wanted to use was too small.)  Also, I wanted to try to mix up knits and wovens.  I've realised that is what I choose to wear and so if I want to make my wardrobe I need to start branching out a bit.  And the final reason - I am completely putting off making two dresses for friends and two dresses for me that seem overwhelming in the time left. So, with limited time and resources, naturally I decided to avoid everything and make another different dress.  (sigh.)

I cut a size 36.  The 38 matched me better on the size chart but the generous final garment size convinced me to go down. Size was ok but I need a shoulder widening, even on the knit it looks absurd.  So I should do a 38 in the shoulders. Also I cut it right below the pockets so it is much shorter than it's supposed to be, I think I didn't have enough fabric.

I found the pockets difficult to put together.  Sonja noted that the instructions were fleshed out for this part, but I think it does require doing it a few times to get because you create a kind of triangle and need to understand where the seam meets up.  I used the thick jersey for the pockets and that made everything worse because it was so thick, and the teal fabric is a poly blend (unusual for me, I know, but it was planned as just a decorative element for a dress that morphed into something else entirely.)  The teal fabric also has some stretch but is very drapey and relatively thin.  So the fabric discrepancy also made the pockets more difficult.

Overall I don't like this with the sleeves, possibly due to fit.
I did manage to also make view B. Still size 36.
I had the same problem with the pockets, realised why. The instuctions seem to have a discrepancy because they tell you to sew the pocket right side against the dress right side, and there is a corresponding picture. Then it says to sew the side piece to the pocket and front, right side to right, but the picture shows the back side of the dress. That is technically correct!  It just looks really strange.  You have an almost folded over seam allowance once you fold the pocket to the inside and that's why it works.

Version B, well, it had one other unexpected problem.  The center front piece?  Somehow I cut it about 2 inches too short at the top...I wondered why the side bits were longer.  I sewed it together like that to see how the pleat would look, at least, and then realised this dress had too much potential to waste.  I have no excess sewing supplies lying around, no bias tape, and the stress of getting these last projects done has half fried my brain, but I still soldiered on by cutting those side pieces even with the errant front, sewed it together with the yoke, and then nipped a bit out of the armpits.  I zigzagged all the raw edges, folded them over, and zigzagged again.  I am not sure how I could eventally salvage that as a finish (Just cover it with velvet tape and leave all the zigzags on the outside?), but for now it holds ok.  And it is very nice to have an unexpected last dress for me (the last two have been for friends).

I like this pattern, view B, quite a lot.  I am not sure how I feel about it's tenty characteristics, but I would make it in a drapier fabric like wool suiting. It definitely fits my work uniform of dress, tights, and a sweater.  (Oh, too bad I won't be working for the next three months!! So too bad!)