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Thoughts on Buying Secondhand Patterns

12/5/2019

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Patterns are expensive... around $20, sometimes, for the Big Four ones.  I understand why they cost a lot: a ton of work goes into making a decent sewing pattern!  But I am glad of that work and want to support the people who do it. 

I also like to scrounge through the second- or third-hand patterns at a thrift store and find cool patterns to try!  I find patterns I might not spend $20 on (because I would save that amount for a truly unique or special pattern), but patterns that nonetheless are fun to sew and often become favorites.  My thrift store experience is broad: I grew up with the Salvation Army thrift store and local church and charity shops, and as an adult, I now frequent Goodwill thrift stores, which are plentiful in my area.  So if you want to buy second-hand patterns, here are a few tips.

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Feastwine and Penge!

11/3/2019

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In October 2017, my musician friend Tyler Burns asked me to make him a costume for the cover art of his album Penge, which he was working on.  I made him first a pair of pieced leather trousers, then a modified motorcycle jacket, then a stenciled cape.  He took the costume and continued working on the album with another friend, Alec Eagon.  Now, two years later, they've completed a music video and released the album! 

It is very gratifying to see my friends' hard work and creativity come to fruition.  Read on for links to their art! 
Picture
Album Cover for Penge (2019)

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Girly Gorget Idea

3/21/2019

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I have long felt that--for me, at least--clothing is a kind of armor.  Of course, it can also be a diary, a poem, an invitation, or a window... but some days, it's the armor I need. 

Recently, I encountered the word "gorget", realized I didn't know how the pronounce it*, and looked it up.  A gorget is a piece of medieval armor that covers the neck.  That lead me to do a Google image search, which led me to this interesting bit of machine embroidery.  So much to love: the concept of a purely decorative fabric gorget, the way it's a variation on the idea of a tie, the tesselated bird pattern...

Now, obviously, a wee little gorget like that wouldn't protect anyone's neck in battle, even if it were made of metal, but gorgets have evolved with modern warfare into badges of authority rather than actual armor:
Picture
Archives of Pearson Scott Foresman, donated to the Wikimedia Foundation.
Picture
Gorget of Nicolas Gabriel Marie Maheu, 1st Lieutenant, 22nd Regt. Infantry, "Armee de la Loire" under Napoleon Bonaparte. Between 1805 and 1813

You can see how the Napoleonic gorget is smaller, and wouldn't cover much of the neck at all.  It might be tied on with ribbons, as a decorative element to a uniform. 
This is more of an idea-post than a project-post... but wouldn't it be cool to make a similar embroidered gorget, to wear with collared shirts?  It's a neat idea! 
* It's pronounced with a hard-G: "GORE-jit".  "gor-ZHAY" is a common alternative pronunciation, as people think it's a French word and they make the -et sound like -ay by analogy with "ballet" and "valet".  However, it's not a French word; it's an English word with a French root.  It comes from the Old French word "gorgete", but the modern French word is "gorgerin".  I'll say "GORE-jit" but not correct people who say "gor-ZHAY".
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Back After a Gap...

3/7/2019

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For various personal reasons I have not been blogging lately, but several people (I'm looking at you, Rosanne!) have told me they miiiiiisss meeeee!  So here are some random updates to tide you over until the next scheduled post (a long research-y one will go live on March 25th) or the next time I write one (not sure when that'll be). 

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All the dresses I haven't sewn...!

12/3/2018

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When I was a kid, I used to drape curtains and sheets and such on my sister, using every safety pin I could get my hands on to get her "dressed".  The best materials always got used first, on her, and as an afterthought I'd drape myself with the leftovers.  So when people at work ask me if my draping is a skill or a talent, I think it's both.  It's a skill because I've acquired techniques through practice, but it's a talent because the practice comes naturally to me. 

My lovely co-worker likes to take pictures of my "drapes", and I love it when she does, because I'm super proud of them!  It's nice to have a fan, and nice to have a record of my work!  Manikin-draping is otherwise a very Dadaist art... fabric pinned into a simulacrum of clothing, then taken down and sold with no hint of its past pretending! 
Picture
This soft sweep of charmeuse and ombre-dyed chiffon is a "dress" right now. Someday it will be something else. Sic transit gloria mundi.

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Purging MORE Stash Stuff

11/29/2018

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Stuff is never just stuff.  Stuff is, as my brother put it, ideas.  Every item I own is an idea I've had, about who I am or want to be, what I want to do, what I value, fear, or need.  No wonder I've found that getting rid of items clears my head marvelously!  My room is slowly but surely becoming an oasis of Karen in a world of not-Karen, which is a relief.  My true desires and priorities are coming into focus, and my to-do list is shorter and more imperative.  I hope to have this process done by the end of the year so I can start 2019 with a clean slate! 

Today I'll post about two harder, sewing-related purges: my pattern collection and my historical costumes. 

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If You Can't Be Productive...

11/5/2018

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. . . at least be purgative! 

You may recall my sew-from-stash resolution at the beginning of this year.  You may also recall that I did a bit of stash busting since then, but not early as much as I wanted.  And all year I've held off on buying new fabrics (with one exception) because I still had stash to bust!  Then, midway through October, my pile of fabric (as well as mental clutter, disorganization, and personal stuff) reached paralyzing point: I could neither move forward nor back until I cleared something out.  I felt overwhelmed by my to-do list, the guilt-trips attached to my things, a feeling of paralysis and creative inertia, et cetera. 

Talking with a counselor helped bring me to this point.  Until I started looking at and naming my emotions instead of avoiding them, I didn't realize how much I was motivated by guilt, and usually needless guilt.  (This isn't fabric-related... the fabric was just a symptom.)  Even my perfectionism breeds guilt: when my imagined standard is perfection, then I can hardly start working, and un-finished projects lie around the place, reminding me of "failure".  Thankfully, I have wonderful friends who mustered to support me with prayer, phone calls, and ideas.

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Brief Hiatus

10/14/2018

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When I am avoiding a task, I'll often procrastinate by doing other, easier tasks, to give myself a false sense of accomplishment.  It doesn't work, as I still know I'm avoiding the thing that needs to get done.  Recently, I sat down and wrote two lists of sewing projects, my "Hafta List" and my "Wanna List".  My Hafta List is neither long nor difficult, yet it's been keeping me from my Wanna List for too long, and in the meantime, I've been blogging, because writing a blog post is a pleasant distraction and an easy "accomplishment".  (This was, in fact, one of the reasons I resisted the idea of blogging for many years... I knew I could become addicted to doing it, and use it to avoid my life instead of living it.) 

I desire to break this pattern of procrastination, and to be able to blog again as a pleasant side project.  So I'm taking the month of October to power through my Hafta list, and in the meantime am not allowing myself to blog.  I'm also barring myself from other time-wasting activities that I use in the same way.  When I'm done my Hafta List, I can do my Wanna List, and that'll give me fresh things to blog about! 

So for the next little while, there will be no posts here.  You can expect a post to go live on October 22nd, but I wrote that ages ago and it's simply in the queue.  I'll be back to posting regularly sometime in November! 
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Draping for Display

9/3/2018

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Picture
When I was designing the 1919 dress, I explained the difference between draping to work up a pattern (which is what I've done before on live people) and draping merely to give the illusion of clothing in order to display fabric.  Today's post highlights the latter definition. 

I work at a fabric store, and one of my job duties is to drape displays to better sell fabrics.  I enjoy this part of my job very much! The task starts with picking some fabric or color scheme.  Then I cut yardage... there needs to be at least a yard, but often more, because when the display is dismantled, we need to be able to sell that yardage.  For a dress, I start with at least two yards, and can go up to three if the dress is long and detailed. 

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Still Sewing from Stash

6/21/2018

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Saints have been canonized for less forbearance and dedication than I have shown in keeping my New Years Resolution to sew from stash!  Every day I see desirable fabric (and imagine projects I'd make with it), and every day I leave said fabric uncut at the store.  At Fabric Depot, I put on blinders and get only the notions or interfacing I need.  At the Mill End Store, I marshal myself like a woman and a Roy and remind myself that if I want any of their delicious wool, or printed cottons, or textured silks, I will simply have to whittle my stash down to size!  At Goodwill, I don't even walk by the section next to curtains and linens that has their fabrics. 
Picture
Fabric Merchant of Samarkand. The Library of Congress [No restrictions], via Wikimedia Commons

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    Karen Roy

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