Lately I have been dissatisfied with my underwear. Well, actually, just with the slips. They have been uncooperative, to say the least, and occasionally downright recalcitrant. Not the gorgeous vintage full slips (like this one, click on the pic to visit the eBay auction), the ones I found a whole mint new-with-tags lot of a couple years ago — those are fine, content to be used as nightgowns and to occasionally have a day out under a dress. It's the half slips that are giving me trouble. Well, the half slips and the tights, who together are having a little static electricity festival that Must Be Stopped. Not to mention that the half slips are deciding, en masse, either to revolt against the tyranny of elastic or to join the low-rise movement, and so their waistbands are getting saggier and saggier.

I keep hunting around online for nice heavy nylon slips, but they seem to have gone the way of the dodo — there are only a few specimens left, and they're all very expensive, or fugly, or both. (I should have paid more attention when The Sewist did her poll on slips.)

So I think I'm going to make some half slips. Heavy silk (from Thai Silks and Dharma Trading Company) are surprisingly cheap, especially in the quantities you'd need for a slip. I can find some nice lace trim, too, that will help weight down the bottom of the slip, and, not incidentally, look nice.

In fact, I think (since I have more than a month before I have to travel again) that I will spend this next little bit of sewing time making a few slips, and also sorting through the Large Plastic Bin of Tights to separate the holey goats from the whole sheep, and also arranging them by color, so that I don't spend the night before my next departure turning things upside down looking for the one pair of thick lycra tights that I *know* I had in teal …

Anyone have any slip-sewing tips, or sources for really nice lingerie elastic? I will make a followup sources and tips from the comments … and, with any luck, a picture of the slips I've made!

Every time I think I've seen every damn pattern ever made between 1948 and 1963, I'm surprised by another one — and this one is quite surprising. I love the collar that wraps around like a tentacle — of COURSE it must be buttoned down, else it would throttle the wearer without the slightest provocation. In fact, you can see that there's just a faux button closure (with no buttonhole) to prevent any kind of escape plot.

This one is on eBay (as always, click the pic to hit the link) and B30. Bidding starts at $9.99. I was thinking of buying it (just to keep it out of circulation and you all safe, you understand, as it's not my size), but the more I look at this one the more it (no pun intended) grows on me. I'd love to see someone (someone ELSE) figure a way to sew it in stripes. Bias stripes. Anyone up for the challenge? Send pictures and/or cries for help to the address on the right.

We have Welmoed to thank for today's post … or to shake our tiny fists at. Why? Because those guys up there? They're from Adaptive Textiles, and they're printing CUSTOM FABRIC. But they only do it for "the trade". Aaaaaaah!

Now, I did actually incorporate A Dress A Day, Inc. (so just in case if someone sued me for saying their dress was fugly, I wouldn't necessarily lose the farm) so I have a Tax ID number, and I'm not afraid to use it. So perhaps I can convince them blogs are "trade"? And then I can get fabric with little pink robots on it, like so?

Or gingko leaves? Or yesterday's turnips? Or any of the dozens of things I want to find as fabric but never, ever have?

I think I might call them next week. Then we'll see. So, thanks, Welmoed! I think.

Okay, so the backstory on this fabric is fairly complicated. First, I noticed in checking the referrals that A Dress A Day was found by someone searching on "I love turnips". Which I thought was hysterically funny (A Dress A Day: Your Home for Turnip-Loving), and which motivated me to try to find some turnip fabric. Which I did not, in fact, find. (Anyone have some? With just big turnips? I don't want to clutter up the turnip dress with other vegetables, root or no.)

But I did find the fabric above, at Harts Fabrics, which I've never (afaik) browsed before. Cute, isn't it? I love those gray/slate/yellow combinations.

I also found this — I'm a sucker for bias patterns. All the glory of the diagonal, with none of the heartache and stretchiness!

As Lydia remarked in the comments a couple of days ago (I hope you all read the comments, they're usually better than the content, frankly) I am also so over winter fabrics already. I made one crepe dress, and I have some luscious turquoise wool flannel that will become a circle skirt (and I think I will do some crewel on it, nothing too fancy as I cannot actually embroider; a pickstitch of some kind) and that's it. Then I start thinking of lightweight cottons for endless summer dresses … like this one:

This is some Liberty of London fabric from eBay seller Little Shop of Treasures (whom I've purchased from all too many times before).

This is actually Liberty twill, which is what I recommend for folks just starting to sew with Liberty. The drape of the lawn can be tricky (it's very lightweight), and the wool can ravel fast, so start with the twill to avoid tears. Liberty twill makes GREAT skirts. And so does the babycord:

If you don't want to order from the UK, Purl in Soho has some of the lawns …

This one above is sooooooo 1930s, to me. Right?

I've actually worn dresses or skirts made with Liberty four days of the past five. That's how much I love their fabric! Which reminds me, I really need to post some more Duro pictures next week. Nag me if I don't, okay?

One of the great side benefits of declaring a Fabric Week here at A Dress A Day is that I had an excuse — nay, a mandate! — to trawl through eQuilter.com. And this is what I found. Lotus blossoms! (Or, if you're feeling especially Tennysonian, Lotos-Blossoms!) This combination of green and teal and rust evokes a feeling of deep fondness in me; I have a sneaking suspicion that perhaps there was a wallpaper with this design in one of the dozen or so houses I lived in as a child … I don't care, wallpaper or no, it would still make a kickass shirtdress — with rust-colored piping, yes?

My quick dip into eQuilter (man! you could spend ALL NIGHT click-click-clicking around over there!) also brought me this:

About which I am also thinking "shirtdress!" I love the muted stripes; so very fall and jewel-tony. The best part of making this fabric into a shirtdress would be the pleasure of coordinating the cardigan and tights; one day the chocolate brown cardigan with green or blue tights, the next time the pale blue cardigan with the brown or the orange tights … I don't think I'd ever get tired of spinning the color wheel for a dress in this fabric.

I have purchased dozens of yards from eQuilter over the years … never a problem.

In addition to giant polka dots, I'm also (slightly) obsessed with alphabet-print fabrics. This is one of my favorites, from Michael Miller. I'm really tempted to buy some more of this (I already have a GIANT circle skirt made from this fabric) but I fear I would then gradually buy more and more until ultimately I would never wear anything but black and white letters.

What do folks think of a Duro made with the above as the body and this Alexander Henry fabric below as the banding?

I'd be worried that I'd have to redraft the bands to make them exactly as wide as the numbers, but it might be worth it …

Click on the images to buy yardage from the eBay seller, Fabric Connection. (If you want more than one yard read her description for instructions as to how to go about it.)

Everyone okay with me just declaring this Fabric Week at A Dress A Day? Sarah sent me the link to this company, Harmony Art; they were a nominee for Co-op America's People's Choice award for the greenest companies — and that's green as in "ecological", not the color — and, well, I like this fabric. I like it a great deal. And it's intended for home furnishings (I have no fear of looking like a well-upholstered sofa, obviously) so it's 90" wide. Oooooh! So nice not to have to wiggle with the cutting layouts for a REALLY big skirt!

I'm not entirely sure what the scale of this pattern is, but, frankly, I don't care. If the flowers are as big as my head? Fine. Size of a quarter? Fine. Just sign me up when it becomes available …

I also like this pattern:

Although I'm not a huge fan of purple. In fact, I'm not even a casual fan of purple. In fact, when purple comes on the radio, I change the station. (And yes, yes, I know about the "when I am an old lady" poem, and frankly, when I am an old lady I will still be wearing huge polka dots. I hope.)

Come back tomorrow for more fabric here during FABRIC WEEK! (See, doesn't it look more official in all-caps?)

I just bought some of this (from Thai Silks). Was it on sale? Yes. Do I know what I'm going to do with it? No. Will it probably involve a midriff band? Yes.

Sometimes a piece of fabric will say "BUY ME" (in a kind of James Earl Jones, stentorian voice) and when I say "For what, pray tell?" it answers "That's for me to know and you to find out!", and then it giggles (while still sounding like James Earl Jones). And I have to say, when I ignore that fabric-voice, I always regret it. Because sometime soon after I run across the pattern that fabric was destined to be, and when I go back to find the fabric it's GONE. Whoosh! Vanished without a trace. Occasionally the store clerk will even deny all knowledge of said fabric. ("No, honey, we've never had that pattern here." [rolls eyes])

What does this fabric say to you? (Thai Silks also has it in "almond," too:

The almond didn't demand to be bought, though, so I left it on the (virtual) shelf.

Have I mentioned just how much I love Google Book Search? I love GBS. A lot. Like, bake-them-all-cupcakes, write-them-mash-notes a lot. Not just because (or in spite of) I find about a book a week through them that I just *must* own, or because they're now letting you download PDFs of the older, out-of-copyright stuff (including old home sewing books, check it out!), but mostly because of serendipitous finds like this one.

Here's what Elizabeth Otis Williams has to say about shopping in Paris, before the Great War:

There are many good dressmakers in Paris, besides the large houses that all the world knows. The chief thing in ordering dresses at these places is to refuse to have them too much trimmed. They make such delightful elaborations with hand-made tucks, etc., and give such original and unexpected touches that one is tempted to let them err in making the trimmings and details too elaborate.

In the Reference List is given … dressmakers who we know are satisfactory both as to fit and finish. All the addresses given are places we know personally or through friends. Some are cheap, some are moderate in price, and others are expensive, but all are reliable, and make things that are good for their price. We know of other dressmakers who make lovely things but fail to keep their engagements, or who are unsatisfactory in their dealings, making bills larger than the customer has been led to expect, or using poor materials for linings. We have avoided giving addresses of this class. At places which are not reliable the model shown is often charming, but the dress that is sent home is very badly finished, and lined with inferior material.

…

French hats are not all made for young people. They make very chic and dignified hats for older women. In England or in America a hat made for a middle-aged woman is often quite too "old ladyish," or else it has no character, and its appropriateness consists solely in the fact that it is not noticeable! In Paris a middle-aged lady can get a hat that is suited to her years and yet handsome and stylish; and as for hats for young people, they are bewildering in their variety and beauty.

Isn't this marvelous! And yet it's something that I'd probably never have run across if not for GBS. (I checked Bookfinder.com — there are about five or six copies and they are in the $50 range, so this is not something I'd be likely to find anywhere, much less buy. According to WorldCat, twenty-six libraries have the 1907 editions, and two have the edition of 1911.)

Anyway, if you have a moment (or are stuck in an airport, as I am at the moment) go browse a bit. I was also fascinated by the (very short) list of restaurants where a woman could dine alone … not to mention this bit: "The marriage regulations are very strict, and foreigners contracting a marriage in France often think that they have done all that is necessary, and find afterwards that they have not." There's a novel in that sentence, all right!