This time from the Spring/Summer 2012 collection from Duro Olowu (remember him?)
Isn’t it gorgeous? I love those bright candy stripes and that bottom ruffle. I’ve been thinking hard about skirt ruffles for a while now, but haven’t been able to figure out how not to make them look all “swing your partner by the hand.”
There’s an all-red version, too — with a better picture on the designer’s website.
I am looking for some of this fabric — I think it’s called “corded cotton,” but does anyone know another name for it? Because all my normal fabric searches are coming up empty.
It’s not quite seersucker — it’s that slightly raised corded cotton. I can’t find it anywhere. Did J.Crew buy it all?
Any help gratefully appreciated … I really need a Simplicity 1577 in this fabric, while it’s still summer …
No matter what Miss Henderson tried, she could NOT get her newest Synchronized Flouncing Team recruits to master the Mixo-Lydian Elbow Maneuver. Dorothy almost had it (although the angle of her right hand was ALL WRONG) but Jen was just hopeless.
Today’s pattern from Michelle at Patterns from the Past.
I know this is a terrible picture, but here it is anyway:
Note to self: ambushing sleepy twelve-year-old son on first day of summer vacation, saying “hey will you take a picture of me?” does not result in quality photoblogism.
But, this is a new Simplicity 1577, made in a few hours over the weekend. It’s blue chambray purchased at Fabric Outlet in the Mission *last* weekend, which is probably one of my fastest fabric-purchase-to-garment-sewn turnaround times in years. It’s really, really nice fabric — not terribly wrinkly and super-comfortable, especially since it seems to have no stretch to it.
Anyway, you’re seeing a picture of me in it since I have been really lazy about wrasslin’ my dresses onto the dressform for Proper Photos. By the time I get one made, I just want to WEAR it, and then I have to remember to go back and take the pictures, and that means waiting for good light, which means the weekend, and … with one thing and another, it just becomes TOO MUCH. So I figured I could either get over my laziness when it comes to new-dress dressformage, or I could get over my apprehension that posting pictures of myself leaves me open to “helpful” feedback on my weight and general appearance in the comments. (Which has actually never happened that I can remember, so … bad pictures of myself it is!)
Accessories here are a pair of Liberty Bensimons and one of my favorite Swatch watches (it has a really difficult clasp and the face is hard to read, but other than that it’s a very nice watch). I was going to wear this with a pink sweater, to match the shoes, but I ended up taking it off — the weather was gorgeous here today. The pockets are lined in a different Liberty fabric — when I do get this one onto the dress form, I’ll show you.
Stripe-lovers rejoice! Two vision scientists at the University of York, Peter Thompson and Kyriaki Mikellidou, have scientifically determined that horizontal stripes will not, after all, make your rear look like the broad side of a barn:
Abstract:
A square composed of horizontal lines appears taller and narrower than an identical square made up of vertical lines. Reporting this illusion, Hermann von Helmholtz noted that such illusions, in which filled space seems to be larger than unfilled space, were common in everyday life, adding the observation that ladies’ frocks with horizontal stripes make the figure look taller. As this assertion runs counter to modern popular belief, we have investigated whether vertical or horizontal stripes on clothing should make the wearer appear taller or fatter. We find that a rectangle of vertical stripes needs to be extended by 7.1% vertically to match the height of a square of horizontal stripes and that a rectangle of horizontal stripes must be made 4.5% wider than a square of vertical stripes to match its perceived width. This illusion holds when the horizontal or vertical lines are on the dress of a line drawing of a woman. We have examined the claim that these effects apply only for 2-dimensional figures in an experiment with 3-D cylinders and find no support for the notion that horizontal lines would be ‘fattening’ on clothes. Significantly, the illusion persists when the horizontal or vertical lines are on pictures of a real half-body mannequin viewed stereoscopically. All the evidence supports Helmholtz’s original assertion.
(full text available here)
I love science. I also love stripes! (Okay, I didn’t love these, but I did love these.) How nice that one is enabling the other! (Although, truth be told, I never really worry about how big my rear looks in something: once it’s over a certain critical mass, there’s really no point …)
I expect to see a flotilla of horizontally-striped dresses in the coming months. That’s how this science stuff works, right?
I got asked my favorite color the other day and, purely through knee-jerk reaction, I said “green!”
But lately I’ve been mysteriously attracted to gray … like this blue-gray dress from LuciteBox:
Or this gorgeous dress (from MAKVintage4U on Etsy):
or this shiny utilitarian dress (from NightofJoy Vintage on Etsy):
And of course, gray and collars is an unbeatable pair (this is from littleveggievintage on Etsy):
Gray just goes so well with all the colors I like best … pink, yellow, pale blue, red … even green, and isn’t as harsh as black, I think. Gray spans the elegance continuum so well, doing both casual/utilitarian and dressy/elegant (something that one of my other favorite colors, yellow, just doesn’t do so well).
Of course, it’s not all that auspicious, according to folklore, but I’m willing to ignore all this:
Except for the “matured judgment” part … I’ll accept that!
It may be hard to see in this semi-fuzzy picture, but there are little tabs here at the neckline. I am such a sucker for little tabs, which I think I have actually sewn only once.
I think this would be cute sewn up in a silk print, because of the drapey neckline and the panel-y skirt, although maybe it would also work in Liberty cotton (easier to put pockets in the panels in cotton) … I bought this awesome orange silk a while back and it keeps whispering to me. Or actually, shouting: “Make me … NOW!” It’s getting hard to ignore, and to explain to my family why I’m having calm and reasoned discussions (“You need more attention than I can give you right now, you’ll just have to be patient …”) with pieces of fabric.
The expression on the face of Blue Dress tickles me, too; it’s something like “I’m going to just rest my unfocused eyes somewhere up there until Daisy there stops doing whatever embarrassing thing she’s doing right now.”
Thanks to @PeterSokolowski, here’s a photo of another Simplicity 5723 — this one was taken at a lovely event for the Dictionary of American Regional English earlier this month in Madison, Wisconsin. The two spiffy gents in the photo are Simon Winchester and Jesse Sheidlower — so you get some bonus wordsmith-candy in your (ir)regularly-scheduled dress post today.
The dress is in this fabric:
I’ve had this fabric since November, 2008, or at least, that’s the datestamp on the file on my hard drive. Could have been earlier, but this looks suspiciously like a saved-it-from-the-eBay-listing photo. It’s a nice heavy linen-y fabric, without actually (I think) being linen, which is my favorite way for fabric to be linen-y.
When I have a minute and the dress is not in the wash (I’ve worn it every week since I’ve made it, I’m pretty sure) I will take a picture of it on the dressform, so you can see how nicely I matched the (broken, which makes it easier) plaid across the skirt panels. Until then, you will have to take my word for it.
My only problem with this dress is that I don’t (yet) have a cardigan to match it. It’s not any of the various pinks and maroons I have in my Cardiganary (that’s my new word for “cardigan library”), and I haven’t started my ambitious new project of carrying around a swatchbook of all the fabrics of dresses I have made so that I can match cardigans anytime, anywhere. (My current process is to just say “eh, maybe it matches?” and buy the cardigan. Which has not yet ended happily, especially in the very tricky “teal” family of colors.)
You also can’t see in the photo that this dress looks nice with a very skinny black patent belt. Belts are my new cardigans, I’m now trying to amass them in every color. (This can only end in tears.)
I have a couple more Simplicity 5723 exemplars to post — here’s one, in a dim and fuzzy photo:
The pockets on this one are lined in camouflage:
Ignore the unclipped threads, if you please. They’re gone now …
That’s more what the color looks like — it’s green denim from my trusty friends at FabricMart Fabrics.
I’ve been wearing this one with a bright orange sweater and belt — that’s my idea of fun. This dress in denim is a dream to wear, very comfortable yet stiff enough to hold its shape. I have some maroon denim that will soon find an incarnation in this pattern, and I’m really, really toying with the idea of a white denim dress. I don’t think I’ve had an all-white dress since high school graduation. I’m completely sure that after ten minutes on my person, it would no longer be an all-white dress, yet still I persist in this fantasy of a white denim dress. Talk me out of it?
Here are some recent additions to my stash:
More dotted swiss! Remember the pink dress of last year? Well, it will soon have a cousin (oh, and here’s me wearing it). I also bought some bright green, but it’s sold out now … I love dotted swiss. Not sure why — part of it is that I love the texture, but that can’t explain this level of devotion. Perhaps because I didn’t get enough party dresses as a child? I’m making up for lost time now, in any case.
On a completely different tack is this chambray (which also comes in brown, click any image to go to the store page at Fabric Mart)
I love this fabric so much I’ve been dreaming about it. I’m pretty sure this is going to be my favorite dress of this summer, if I can just decide what pattern it wants to be! It is so lovely and crisp, but it’s also lightweight. It may have to be a shirtdress like this one … maybe with a deep, topstitched hem to weigh it down? Still thinking.
This next fabric was a total splurge. Way more expensive than I usually am comfortable with (although it’s plenty wide, so that’s a plus).
It’s a linen-cotten blend from Marc Jacobs, pretty heavy, I think. This is going to be a horizontally-striped dress, with the fullest skirt I can manage with the yardage I bought. Really. I saw it and thought YES THAT’S WHAT IT WILL BE. YES. I cannot wait.
I’m trying to remember to add fabric that I buy (or just like) to Pinterest, if you keep a fabric board too, let me know!
A Dress A Day 