I know for most of us, 2021 was a bit of a dumpster fire. It can be a relief when that calendar flips to the next year, feeling as if we are shaking off all that’s happened and moving forward, refreshed into a new year’s renaissance. But, even as I took that step forward, I did so with some trepidation for what 2022 might bring. After all, they say you should stay with the devil you know…
There’s always that moment in the dead of winter where you start to see forward to Spring. Yet, there’s no actual benchmark for it. No physical moment you can point to. Slippers are very much a part of the daily routine, you still wake up to frost lining the windows, and coffee is as much a warming device as it is a caffeination mechanism. And yet it happens every year. You can feel the stirrings of a new season making its way up through frozen ground, pushing her arms upward, whispering that Spring will be here soon.
Every year, I often have grand sewing plans to coincide with various holidays. Always starting with good intentions, I keep a notebook to record my idea of the perfect skirt for Easter, to launch into Spring, or to commemorate Halloween. But, because of the craziness of life, it rarely ever happens that way. True to form, my annual Christmas skirt is about a month behind schedule. Well, you know what they say about making plans…
Some days (or years, really) can feel a bit like a house of cards. You know what I mean – where you are managing to keep everything together, stacking each day precariously on top of the next. But you know that one wrong move – one exhale in the wrong direction – and it will bring everything a tumbling down.
I’m sure we’ve all had the experience of seeing a piece that is just so perfect in its simplicity. One that stands tall and proud without all of the bells and whistles of print and sparkle. Now, as someone who is all about the extra, it takes a garment that is truly exquisite for all that it’s not to catch my eye. But such was the case when I spotted the most spectacular vintage Lanvin skirt….
That magical time of year is upon us, where you start to hear sleigh bells off in the distance and your streets are alive with twinkle lights and cheer. Is also means the semester is winding down (talk about cheer!) and we start to bid farewell to another year.
I’m sure we all have our favorite seasons – wrapping a scarf on your neck during snowy white winters or the feeling of an ice cold beer on a sweltering summers. But, mine has always been late autumn. That crisp in the air that brings out the light layers and inspires cuddling under down comforters at night. Hats and gloves are not out of place, but you still feel at home on an afternoon stroll, without Jack Frost beckoning you inside.
I’ve always had a thing for clothing that finds its way to nature. Floral border prints, necklaces of leaves snaking around my neck, and you are all by now pretty aware of my fruit-themed sartorial obsession. I wonder if it’s a way to help me feel more grounded. Where, despite the pavement I click my heels down or the car I zip to the lab in, I am always a little bit connected to nature.
I know we all have those photos saved to our Pinterest boards – the elusive collector’s items, the seemingly unattainable vintage. More often than not, I’ll have a photo saved of a vintage piece, and then will inevitably see it appear a few weeks later on some of my fellow vintage huntresses. And all I can do is hope that one day it will be released back into the wild…
Probably the most common question I’ve gotten since I started this blog (other than, “Are those your real clothes?”), is “How do you get your skirts so gloriously full?? I have my standard response, which is that I have always been a two-crinoline minimum kind of gal. But, much like every vintage huntress out there, I’m always in search of the next magical solution to the full-skirted glory I crave….