I make no secret of the fact that I love to create. More and more lately, I’ve released myself of any mental shackles that might feel a bit intimidated by a project, and have adopted a, “why not just try it?” approach to my sewing. Given we have had months of isolation behind us and what looks to be many miles of isolated road stretching in front of us, no time like the present to just give things a shot. Segue to my latest sewing project….
There are some dresses that are befitting a love story. Those who you spot across a crowded internet and fall in breathless, immediate love with. This dress, appropriately named the “Embroidery Dress: Summer Love 1951” captured my heart the moment I clapped eyes on her and is likely to be a love story for the ages…
In a discussion awhile back with my fellow vintage maven Mimosa, we came to realize that we immediately associate certain prints or design details with certain people in our community. Almost as if they don’t have a name. Cat prints = Blue Wren Vintage. Floral = Jamie. Cactus prints = Rose. And (no shocker here), I am synonymous with trompe l’oeil. I’m not sure I even need to justify that one, as my heart literally faints when I see prints that trick the eye into thinking they’re actually leaping off the fabric…
Truth be told, I hate the rain. Now, don’t get me wrong – I know we need it. Without rain, life as we know it would pretty much not exist. But, I still can’t help but sigh when I wake up and see grey and gloom outside my window. Rain is not a friend to a suede shoe or an appliqué prone to color bleed. So, in the middle of a two week bought of nothing but grey skies and soggy sidewalks, I decided to turn the weather into inspiration.
Despite the fact that it’s 90 degrees outside, the minute the fall semester starts, my brain immediately clicks into autumn mode, and my wardrobe quickly follows suit. I think it’s been this way since childhood – whether the crisp temperatures have caught up or not, there is just a feeling that comes with a new school year. Without fail, late August always brought with it shiny new trapper keepers and as-yet-unused pens. Fresh fears and new possibilities. You can practically clock the smell of the academic anxiety as clearly as a you can identify the smell of new box of…
This past week was a pretty big one in the Dressed household – Mr. D and I celebrated our 10-year wedding anniversary. This level of togetherness usually involves a fair degree of extra (especially because the Mister and I are no strangers to going ALL out). However, circumstances being what they are, we had to scale the celebrations down several (thousand) notches. But, perhaps that’s the measure of true love – when you’re just as happy with a quiet night in as you are with fireworks and fanfare.
When I was a teenager, one of my favorite movies to watch with friends was Rocky Horror Picture Show – it was silly and weird and just on the right side of scandalous. Huge fans of musical theatre, my best friends and I knew all the words by heart and would unabashedly belt them out while zipping to the mall to wander around and buy literally nothing. Our favorite song was the Time Warp (no originality there. But we were 15…).
You know the old cliche, the Grass is Always Greener? Well, never is this more true than when peeping at another vintage lover’s wardrobe. No matter how much you love your closet, your eye can’t help but wander to the next wardrobe over and start gawping at the covetable, lush contents within…
There are a lot of funny ideas you get in your head as a kid – things you absorb that you don’t realize you’ve carried into adulthood. We all have them – we follow a certain family code, abide by rules of our social group, and accept certain ideas as fact (until we become old enough to question them). We also randomly assign certain aspirational characters that make perfect sense to an 11-year-old brain, but certainly bears re-examination years later…
There are some sewing projects I feel I can do on auto-pilot – I barely have to think about drafting a circle skirt or creating a complex vignette out of felt pieces. But, while I love my comfort zone, I’m always itching to try new techniques. Even if they fail spectacularly, the scientist in me has a relentless need to find something new to learn.