Right Up My Street

Monique Lhuillier, you have a new fan. 

I have this new passion for print. I'm drawn to any form of it and immediately want to know the processes behind each piece I see. 

I'm assuming these are digitally printed, and they're gorgeous. The copper and gold pieces caught my eye but then I clicked through the collection and found the electric blues. Wow.

WWD hint at the collection being inspired by the cosmos, with glittering silver embellishments, if this is true then I think the prints stem from there too. Long exposure photography of the night sky shows similar patterns which look incredible. Having said that, my first thought when I saw the collection images, was of long exposure traffic shots. 

Talking of print, I have been experimenting with vinyl for my current project, which I will reveal more of at a later date.

Images from: WWD,com, petapixel.com and fretnoise,com

Two things to share this evening:

My first module results are in at college. I achieved a 1st!

Also, I took some photos of this railway bridge tonight in a very wet and miserable Newcastle. I love the shapes it creates at different angles. Plus, the colours look bright and cheery in any weather.

I am by no means a photographer, and I was really just testing out the camera on my new, Samsung Galaxy Note II yet I hope they prove to be interesting anyway.

Goodnight!

Its Christmas party season which can only mean one thing- the dreaded Morning After. Luckily, Warehouse have made light of such shameful situations in a video advertising their astounding 90 minute delivery service. 

Selected items only, but there are a wide range of destinations including my city of Newcastle. I wonder if they can quickly deliver wellies or a big winter coat to help me deal with all the snow that has fallen here. Brrrr

Garment make up- Day 15

I began my day by finishing the arm holes as I mentioned. Dorothy noticed the machine wasn’t stitching right and when we looked at what I had done so far it looked like the tension was off. I un-picked and re-sewed the top stitching to make sure everything looked just right. After this it was just the hem to sew, I thought about binding the bottom with black to match the collar and false pocket but I stuck with my original design and simply turned it under. I then marked where I wanted the button holes on the shirt and the back of the skirt. Lynn put them in and I hand sewed the buttons on to finish my collection completely. Before bagging the garments I made sure they were clean and used a lint roller to get any threads and fluff off them which had built up in the production process. Nearer the deadline for the garments I will give them another final press.

My shirt! 

I talked with Jill about hats today as she is offering a workshop for any of us who want to add to our collections with head pieces. I showed her some of my final illustrations which I have drawn with large turban like pieces on their heads.  She said it would be possible to construct something with hat wire so I might give it a go as I have a lot of time left and would like to do something interesting in my college hours.

Garment make up- Day 14

My aim for today was to get my shirt finished. I began by sewing on the false welt pocket to the left side of the shirt. In comparison with my toile, the piece that I had cut for the pocket ended up being a little too short once I had over locked it. I re cut it and asked Dorothy to check whether I was going about this stage in the right way. She suggested a different way to how I had made it on the toile but it turned out to be neater and more professional looking. I then added all of the fusing to the placket pieces and stitched the parts that were grown on. The printed placket piece was to be laid on top of the others but when I came to it the printed piece started to twist. I had to unpick it and re-sew while pulling and easing the layers. The next step was to do the shoulder and side seams which I then pressed. I usually have trouble with attaching collars but this one went on fine. I needed a little help reducing the bulk at the ends before folding the collar over to finish.  We discussed how the arm holes would be finished and came up with the solution to bind them in white cotton. Once I had done this I thought about folding the binding over and top stitching to make a better finish.

My little recycling project

Some pendants I have been working on, hopefully I'll be selling them soon!

All made with recycled belts and buckles, even my packaging will be made from recycled materials.

Angel of the North Shoot

My photographer from the last shoot wanted to use my dress in another location for his portfolio. I went along for the day to play photographers assistant for the day. It was a bit windy so holding the reflector was a difficult, but I had so much fun. Here's some photos I took on my phone while I wasn't needed.

My good friend Lilly was the model and did a lovely job. She also has a blog you should check out!

Garment make up- Day 13

I wanted to get my dress finished today so I went ahead with getting the zip in this morning. Normally this is the part Dorothy does but she let me have a go today and kept telling me the different steps and which foot to use etc. Having a lining makes the process a little more difficult and when attaching the lining to the zip I must have pulled too much on one side as there ended up with excess fabric near the bottom. I noticed this error myself and asked Dorothy how I should correct it. This set me back some time as I had to unpick quite a bit of that stitching and re-do it again. Once this was in I had to bag out the armholes which was the most tricky part, there is a lot of twisting and pulling involved and it seemed at times that the dress was becoming one large knot. The last part to do was the hem and Janice suggested hand sewing it to give a more professional finish, this also means I don’t have to keep switching threads on a machine. I pressed the hem of the lining in place and Dorothy bagged out the split up the back. 

Garment make up- Day 12

Day 12

I showed some of my suede applique to Lynn this morning to see if she thought it needed to be done again to neaten up. She decided to just trim a few millimeters off the edges of the suede so that it looked better. I cut one piece again and sewed it on more accurately, and then I was ready to attach the panels. I had to make sure that the suede would meet up on the corresponding seams which it did but I was worried that to get it right the seam allowance was a little over 1cm. To match the style of the skirt I topstitched down the seams that had suede. I also over locked and stitched up the lining for the dress today. I think I’m getting better at pressing the seams which are curved as I found these difficult to begin with. The trick is to lay the dress right over the round edge of the ironing board as it will not lie flat across it. 

Pic from last week but it shows how the design will look when I've finished it:

Garment make up- Day 11

As I now have the waistband fabric I could finish my skirt today. I also had an invisible zip with me so Dorothy helped me put that in first. I then attached the waistband myself, leaving a button wrap. As the fabric of the skirt is denser than the waistband the zip would probably stick at the seam so I have changed the design to a zip and button.

Doing the hem was more difficult as I had to keep changing between black and white threads. Once I was finished Dorothy noticed the machine wasn’t stitching right and you could tell from looking at the hem there was something wrong. I had to unpick it all and start again from scratch, but once this was done the skirt was just about finished. I’ve had some lovely comments about it and a few people have told me how well the colours work together so I am pleased with this garment.

In the afternoon I began appliqueing the suede to the dress panels. It didn't go as smoothly as I had hoped because the pieces were longer than the one I did as a sample piece. Some of my edge stitching was a little off so I think I might revisit some areas and do it again to neaten up. 

Garment make up- Day 10

I finally got my skirt lining made up today. I cut it from the same patterns as the skirt pieces as Jill said it would support the shape of the garment, and high fashion garments are made like that. I even edge stitched around the curve of the hip to hold down the seam on the other side. When I came to fit the waist band it was too short. This was unusual because it happened to the toile waistband too; and I had added a couple of centimeters onto the pattern piece for the proper skirt. Jill checked my patterns and said the only thing that could have happened is that I have been sewing with the seam allowance just under 1cm at each seam on the panels therefore it has all added to the waist and caused the band to be too short. I had used the rest of the fabric that the waistband is from so I couldn’t cut another one there and then; it will have to wait till next week.

Garment make up- Day 9

Today I began sewing up my skirt in the real fabrics; I started by over-locking all of the black and white pieces. Jill suggested edge stitching the suede to make it look finished and professional but after talking with Lynn she said I was best off leaving it as it was in case it got scratched on the machine. We agreed on just one layer of suede to start with and to see if it stood out enough on its own.  Sewing it all together was pretty easy as I made sure to put notches in to indicate front and back pieces which could have gotten confusing because they were all similar shapes. 

I edge stitched around the underside of the suede to make it stand up a little more and also to hold down the seam on the inside of the skirt.

Photoshooooot

On the morning of the shoot I got to college nice and early to set up. I used a lint roller on my dress and hung it up ready, I also had makeup inspiration images out for the makeup artist to see. I wasn’t sure if Marta would have a coral lipstick so I bought one on the way to college. When Lauren got to college I talked her through what I wanted as far as poses and facial expressions. She tried on the shoes which were difficult to zip up but they gave her the extra height I wanted. We went down to the photography studio, while we waited for Marta to arrive, and I introduced her to Gary who was setting up.

Marta arrived and she got started on Lauren first which I was pleased about as Gary’s area of the studio was ready and we were already behind on time. Once we were ready it took a while to get the lighting right so that the front of the dress showed up. We tried putting gels in front of the light too to give a pink/red glow, this looked great and gave the sixties feel we were going for. I liked experimenting with the circular props and creating boxy shapes with the poses.

The atmosphere in the photography studio is very different to our fashion studio, there is a lot more noise and movement which makes the pace of work seem unusually quicker. I enjoyed the busy feel of the room and how everybody jelled together and gave advice and opinions on each other’s work.

Lauren worked really well and had the confidence to be bold with poses we were asking her to do. It would have been a hard morning if she was shy or unsure but for her first time modeling she was great. Gary came up with lots of different shots which have given me a variety of photos to choose from to edit.

Photographer -Gary Barret

Model- Lauren Fairley

Dress- Heather Smith

Makeup Artist- Marta at Costa Chic

Check out my new fave blogger Daisy

I know Daisy as she was a model for the BBC Blast fashion show, she looked fab in my final dress (best photo from the show!). Her blog Ihearttreasure has been going a while now and she has a page on Facebook too.

Being a keen photographer, and having a great sense of style, sets this blog apart from others I have seen. It has a truly English feel yet is still very current. With regular posts about key high-street pieces and hidden gems online too, I'm sure Ihearttreasure will gain further success with fashionistas world wide.

See it for yourself here.

Garment make up- Day 8

I started my morning by cutting out the suede pieces to insert into the skirt seams. I have decided to curve them slightly to make the outer edge longer as I noticed it bending downwards on the toile.

 I also cut out the rest of my fabrics for the shirt and dress. The white cotton drill I have for the dress wasn’t big enough to cut it on the grain line so Lynn said it would be better to cut it across the grain as there was no difference in the stretch either way. I had tried buying more, as what I have was left over from another project, but Dainty’s don’t stock it anymore and they don’t know if they can order any in. 

Garment make up- Day 1

Garment make up- Day 7

In order to create the print for the front of my skirt I needed to make copies of the sample print I did on the computer. I then began cutting and laying them on a piece of paper I had cut to fit the skirt pattern piece, repeatedly holding it up to the toile to see if the placement of the print was suitable. Once I had the print example ready I took it to Steve in the textiles room and asked the best way to get it onto my fabric. He suggested digital printing but when I mentioned the heat press sample I have he agreed it would be quicker and cheaper. I did some more samples with the fabric I am using for the final garment. They have slight marks on because of the nature of the transfer paper when it is photocopied but for the final print I have used a scalpel to remove some of the marks. I also cut the rest of the fabric for my skirt, but I still need to do the pattern for my linings.

Probably the best advert I've ever seen..

For a moment I thought I was watching the beginning of a film, its amazing. I love the way it all looks so crisp, luxurious and romantic. It follows a leopard prowling around a rich, surreal world that is dripping in jewels and gold. You can see the full version in all its glory on the Cartier website. There are also behind the scenes videos with comments by the producer Bruno Aveillan. Very interesting and worth a look..

Absolutely Love!

Dries Van Noten show in Paris.

I adore the colours, silhouette and prints. All of these combine to make an atmospheric and luxurious collection. I don't think I've seen much from this design house but I will definitely be looking out for them in the future.

I like the placement of the block colours and print on this dress it is contemporary yet simple.

 

                                 I've done a little colour palette to show how the colour story unfolds...

Absolutely Love!

Garment make up- Day 6

I’ve found that my skirt will only fit on the size 10 mannequin so Jill thinks I should fit it to that size. The area around the bum looks a bit too tight still so I’ve altered the pattern adding 0.5 cm to the hip and taking it down to the hem to give some extra room. I thought about the dress which was tight in the same place, and decided to add the same 0.5cm to that pattern too. I still needed a waistband on the skirt so I measured the top of the skirt and made the pattern for a straight band. Even though I took the measurements off the skirt pattern, it was slightly smaller than the top of the skirt; so I will need to double check the measurement before I make the real garment.  The shirt looks great and I only need to take 2cm off the shoulder to make it look more like my design.

  

Garment make up- Day 5

I got a lot done today, finished off my patterns for the skirt and shirt and cut the calico pieces, all before dinner. 

In the afternoon I managed to make up the skirt and got the shirt just about finished too. Making the smaller version of the skirt definitely helped in the construction of this toile, and I remembered to add notches to help me identify front and back pieces. 

There was a slight problem with the shirt as I have a concealed placket and the way I had cut the pieces wasn't the simplest way. I re-cut the right side to have a grown on placket and will lay the printed placket piece on top. I also had some difficulty getting the collar to fit even though it is the right size. Thinking back to the Steampunk shirt, I had trouble with that collar too so I think they are a weakness with me, and I will need some practice. Tomorrow I’m going to ask Jill to help me fit them, from there I can alter the patterns and I’ll be ready to start on the final garments in my chosen fabrics.

Maximum Minimalism

 Yesterday was the final show for Jil Sander by Raf Simons. After six years as Creative Director he took to the catwalk for the last time to an emotional standing ovation. I looked back at his first season on style.com, its slightly different to the look he has developed since then; which is more feminine and elegant while still being minimal.

Some looks chosen from yesterdays show:

His first collection for the brand in A/W 2006:

Garment make up- Day 4

To start my day I cut out the dress pieces in calico and made up the toile. It went together quickly but the side seams were quite difficult to press flat because of the curving hips. I could tell it was going to be baggier than I wanted so I put it on a stand and began fitting. 

I would normally have asked for help but I want to push myself with this project so I gave it a go by myself. Jill helped me take out some excess fabric at the bust which I have made into a dart on the toile but on the pattern I will simply add it into the centre panel seam.

To make the fit of the dress correspond with the skirt, I have traced off the bottom part of the dress and will use this to construct the skirt from.  This will also save me some time as I won’t have to fit and alter the skirt.