samedi 31 décembre 2011

Happy new year!

Hello, so sorry I haven't posted in such a long time, I've been busy and have sewn so many things and all I have to show you is this one bag :( BUT let me say it's no ordinary bag since it's made of beautiful Japanese linen, I adore it and I wear it every single day! Have a very happy new year, big kisses and wishes to all of you!




See you!

vendredi 25 novembre 2011

The happy accident dress

I guess I must be a fully grown woman now since I have barely worn jeans in a loooong a** time and I live in dresses and other cute and sophisticated stuff. As a matter of fact I do have a dress to show you today, I call it the happy accident because at first I was to make it simply with black and white polka dot cotton but then I made the mistake to cut my facings in some fruity printed fabric remnants and tadaaa, revelation! Never mind I had to buy said fruity fabric again to make the skirt part when this project was supposed to help me bust my stash... Pics:




I bought and added the cherry red buttons in the afternoon because of course I didn't have any that matched in my tiny collection (heavy sarcasm). The bodice of the dress is the Disney Burda sleeveless shirt and the skirt is a dirndl, and I hope you like it as much as I do because there will be several more of this design :) Have a nice weekend, see you!

mercredi 23 novembre 2011

Short shorts

Hi there! Summer has totally come where I live, it's already 30° in the morning! In order to try and survive this heatwave I've sewn a couple of shorts but since I wasn't sold out on the designs I made them out of remnants from other projects. Well, they actually turned out quite nice!
The first pair was made using remaining toile de Jouy I used for a dress for my mum, the pattern comes from the French crafts mag Fait Main and even though I had already sewn it a few months ago this time I changed size and wasn' t sure about the result but they're really nice, look:


There is NO way I'm showing my morning face

That long-sleeved tee was only for photo purpose, you can't wear something that hot at the moment. I want to make a shocking pink loose, light top to go with the shorts, I need to find the correct fabric -and some time!
The second shorts are from Burda mag, still the May 2010 issue (it has so many excellent patterns!) and the fabric was a tiny piece of sateen cotton I had left, I like them too but even though I narrowed most seams they're still a bit big, but I didn't make a waistband as advised so this probably explains it. However they look really good worn with classy platforms or high heels and a simple white top :)


See you!

mercredi 16 novembre 2011

Is it a criiiiiiiime part I'm not even counting anymore

I had to do it, it had been at least one month since I had last made a garment out of childish fabric and I believe I have outdone myself in the loud department with this Disney fabric top:


I managed to set in a very decent handpicked zipper, ignore my armpit of doom however.


It's blue with polka dots, it's cotton, it has several members of the Duck family on it and 3 utterly vintage red buttons straight out of the sixties and I love it! The design comes from the May 2010 Burda mag, I cut a size 38 and had very minor adjustements to make, it's a good pattern with an easy fit and lovely results. Awww look at this cute peplum, I wonder why it took me so long to try this pattern! I just need to tack down the lapels with a few discreet hand stitches and it'll be perfect. And I'm so using the bodice for my big, flower dress project :) See you!

vendredi 14 octobre 2011

Update in blue and white

Hiya! At first I wanted to make two posts since I have two garments to show you but after looking at the ugly pictures -my mum and bf have failed me! They now suffer from my bad pic curse- of them I've realised they're both well, navy blue and white^^.
To start with, a shirt made using the latest Female magazine that almost turned into a sewing tragedy since I used an AWESOME double gauze kokka fabric for it and the final product sucked. Indeed the sleeves and back were too tight, the front buttoning was set too high and the general aspect was dreadful. Fortunately I managed to salvage it more or less and I can wear it even if it's far from perfect:



BTW I'm seriously disappointed in this latest Female issue, the patterns are smaller than usual and they don't look as good in reality as in the magazine, which is the first time this has ever happened. I hope the next one will go back to normal!
Now, let's have a look at a vintage project with this great pattern from this lovely etsy seller :


That dress is so adorable! Aww and look at their hairstyles! And those platform shoes, swoon! I have ended -for a moment- my two-tone dresses period with this pattern for which I used plain cotton, the bodice and sleeves in white and the skirt in navy:


It was a pleasure to sew, I'm in love with the pintuck pleats, the neat little collar, the flutter sleeves and the empire waist, plus it's a pull-over, the tie belt gives it its shape and I want another one :)
Have a nice weekend, see you!

dimanche 2 octobre 2011

My 40's dress -it's looooove!

A long story short: went to Singapore in July, walked by Paragon mall 4 times a day every day, couldn't avoid latest Miu Miu campaign, NEEDED a 40's dress without spending $4,105 and felt like adding my own touch:


Here we are with a genuine 1945 pattern, McCall's 6249 that I had already tried and loved, some plain black cotton for the top and awesome hawaiian polyester fabric for the skirt. Awww, is there anything I could not love about this pattern? It has lovely details on the bodice:


Keyhole front cut-out, rounded shoulder yokes, external darts and looooong, puffly sleeves with cuffs (plus I added some ties, omg cute!); the bottom is simple enough, a gathered A-line skirt-I prefer it this way. I'm wearing a purchased belt but I'm probably going to sew one from the skirt fabric and I can also wear the dress without one, of course :) Last but not least, thank you bf for the pictures!

mercredi 28 septembre 2011

Dresses galore

Let's get straight to the point: I haz pictures -finally!- of dresses I've recently made. First another trompe l'oeil dress, navy crepe for the top and white suiting tergal for the bottom:



Then my first two-coulour dress WORN (thanks to my Baby):


And two dresses I made for my mama, the R design from the latest SDB in white cotton veil and tropical blue rayon:


And an umpteenth version of her favourite dress, this time in cotton toile de jouy:


Last but not least you should have a look at this, so many beauties to see and so much inspiration! That's it, see you!

samedi 24 septembre 2011

A trip down memory lane

Growing up in the nineties my favourite designers were those who mixed florals with polka dots, bold colours and abstract prints, the Lacroix, Scherrer and Ungaro.




I was fascinated by the glamourous, joyful and self confident persona the models projected in their dreamy dresses and super cute cocktail suits and had sworn that I too would wear these as soon as I had escaped the torments of adolescence and the dress code of local schools. So these days when I'm a grumpy ageing b***h and I sneer at the younger girls' addiction to clothes and accessories I remind myself that fashion helped me throughout my teenage years and that looking forward to seeing the next collections in the magazines was the only thing that got me out of bed many mornings!
All this to tell you that I've made yet another rectangle skirt, this time with a most amazing polysilk that wouldn't have clashed in my designers' défilés :)



And this fabric screams nineties so much that I heard Supertramp's You win, I lose the second I spotted it:



See you!

vendredi 16 septembre 2011

I'm on a roll

All I can think of these days -apart from the usual- is DRESSES! I'm particularly happy with my latest creation because it's super cute and it helped me reduce my stash since it's made from remnants. Here's the thing:


The skirt is a basic dirndl in navy cotton with belt salvaged from two previously failed garments and the bodice is the SDB 4 N top (again!) in a remnant of printed cotton I used for this top.

I took a pic of the inside of the dress to show you I was able to get rid of some brown bias tape that just lay there and yellow bits of cotton to finish the armholes and neckline. Even the waist stay is old gros grain I had had in my stash for years, the only purchased thing is the zipper but I don't really mind :) Have a nice weekend and see you!

dimanche 4 septembre 2011

My little green dress

You know I'm so glad I haven't said in a previous post that I don't like wearing dresses made from one single colour/print because now I'd have a difficult time justifying the fact that I've been wearing this several days every week^^:




I LOVE this dress! I've modified the pattern to the SDB 4 N top to make it, I've gotten rid of the gathers and extended the bottom into an A-line skirt and added 5 rows of shirring at the waist and that was it. The fabric is medium weight polyester, it's easy to trace, cut and sew and it doesn't require ironing (!!!!!) but it is full of static electricity and clings to the body like crazy if I don't wear a half slip underneath. I like this fabric so much I bought some mustard, ruby red and peach for future projects :)
Actually I also had it in electric blue and made a quick dress for a date with baby using an old Burda magazine pattern, it doesn't look bad but I was a in a hurry when I sewed it and I think it shows:


See? The hem is uneven and the side zipper is wrinkly, so I will probably unpick them and do them again. I added a modesty panel to the original pattern because it's supposed to be a jumper and a side zip because I didn't use a stretch fabric as advised.
See you!

mercredi 31 août 2011

Two-colour dresses

Hey there, how are you? I've been experimenting with dresses recently, I'm trying to figure out a design that would allow me to wear them more often without feeling too dressed up. Indeed I've realised that I feel awkward wearing the same print or colour from head to toe, and so I had a revelation^^: how about using TWO different fabrics? I gave it a try using the bodice part of a Burda mag pattern (March 2011) and a simple gathered skirt with a sewn-on belt and remnants from my stash. I'm pretty satisfied with the result, the fit is great even though the armholes are a bit tight and the dress is actually cute:


I love the V shape at the back!

The green fabric is a remnant from another dress project which turned out perfect, I have yet to take pics of it but it's really cool, a simple gathered sundress with an early 80's feel, I hope I can show it to you soon! Back to the 2-tone dress, I got carried away and thought I had found the best project for some striped silk I had been hoarding for a looooong time: bad idea. The silk was far too thin and the bodice rippled and just didn't work well. Sigh, I took a photograph before ripping it:


I tell you this dress is doomed, I spent my free time sewing another bodice out of white cotton, this time with sleeves because I wanted to add a little something and the damn thing turned out too small -I suspect that it shrinked when I washed it even though I had steamed it beforehand :( I'm going to rip this one too and leave the skirt to rest a little while, maybe I'll have an idea and finish it eventually. That's it, have a nice week people, see you!

lundi 22 août 2011

Miaou

Hello! A quick post to show you a top I made this weekend still using the latest SDB:


In the book design N has two layers -a cotton shell and an organza outer top- but I only needed one, so I chose to trace the shell part since it has much less gathers than the other part. I'm not even going to comment on the fabric, those who follow this blog regularly must know by now that I cannot resist a Japanese kitty print and the collar part is made of plain black cotton. The design is quite loose, which I adore, but strangely I felt like wearing it with a belt today.



Lol and yes I heard a song when I finished it, it was Sade's "Is it a criiiiiime?" that I completed with "... that a grown a** woman wears a top with kittens in bathing suits on iiiiiiiit"! See ya!

mercredi 17 août 2011

Lucky chance top

Hiya! I've recently bought this book and it has such sweet designs that I was eager to try them all. My favourite however was this one, the R dress:


I love the sweetheart detail, contrast upper bodice and the slightly loose fit which make the dress feminine yet easy to wear and accessorise. I wanted to make sure my usual alterations on the size and position of the bust darts (they are often too high for us westerners) were correct so I decided to cut a short version out of leftovers, but when tracing the changes I felt like no gathers would work better on a top. Moreover I have enough gathered tops to last me a lifetime! So, a few modifications later I ended with this:

Edit:

A somewhat decent picture of the top worn!

The pinkish/apricot fabric is a remnant from some very soft polysomething found in the dollar bin and with which I had tried to make trousers that ended the worst garment on earth and the upper part is plain white cotton. The neckline and armholes are bound with bias tape and even though I forgot the back slit I can pull it over my head without any problems.
On a side note and trying not to sound too creepy^^, I've noticed that when I'm satisfied with something I've sewn I often think about a song that matches the garment. For example when I finished this one I thought about an old French song by Sacha Distel called "La belle vie" -Tony Bennett sang it in English with "The good life". It's such a lovely song!



Have a nice week, see you!

mardi 9 août 2011

Kitty fabric Burda top

Hello there! Today's garment is my second version of this Burda top, I just narrowed the shoulders by 1.5 cm because they seemed a bit boxy and reduced the length and width of the original ties because I didn't have enough fabric. Talking about the fabric, if I tell you that it's Japanese, cotton and that it has tiny kitties on it can you guess how much I love it or what^^? Look:


Cuuuuute!!!! Now for the top (I've given up taking pics myself so this one is courtesy of my mum):

So maybe my only complaint would be that the fabric is a bit stiff for this design; since it has no darts and therefore no definition whatsoever the crepe I used the first time is probably better suited. I do love my top though and I even had compliments from two little ladies about it, it had never happened with my other garments so imagine how glad I was!
Also one last thing I want to show you, the biggest tomato I've ever found in my garden:

It weighed about 150 gr and it was yummy! That's it, see you soon!

jeudi 4 août 2011

It's me again^^

Hello friends, how are you?! I'm so sorry I went MIA for a few weeks but I had a big case of laziness and I couldn't be bothered with taking pictures of what I had done, editing them -I'm so bad at taking photographs so this is something I always have to do- trying to find stuff to write that won't sound too boring or silly etc. Plus I had loads of work, my baby came back after his 9 months in France :) and finally I went on holiday. Anyway I want to apologize to the amazing Zoe for stopping Me-Made-June so suddenly and dear Hillary -my sewing idol!- and Ophelia thanks for your kind concern, it meant a lot to me!
I overcame my aversion to taking pics today and therefore have a garment to show you:

This is a shirt I made back in May, I used a slightly modified version of the knock-off shirt and black baby gingham. I was obsessed with daisy chains back then but couldn't find the correct embellishment so I bought white flower trim and coloured the center with a yellow fabric felt tip:

Lol to finish here's the only pic I could salvage of me in the shirt:

I have a lot of blog reading to catch up with, some new fabrics to wash and iron and plenty of new sewing books so I'm not sure when I can post again, until then see you!

jeudi 9 juin 2011

Me-Made-June Days eight and nine

Hiya! I didn't take pics of my outfit yesterday but I wore this already much blogged Japanese top:


It's design V from the first Stylish Dress Book, made of chambray. And today I wore the umpteenth version of the May 2010 Burda top:


Except that this one was made using a most amazing cotton bought in Japan and hoarded with love and devotion^^ Look how pretty:


See you!