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FUZZY GALORE |
Hellish summer over here in the South of France... We basically fled the city, camping here and there and everywhere in a vain attempt to get cool. I'm happy to report that the new swimsuit already got more of a workout than the old one in its entire decades-long career. It turns a really good deep color when wet, a nice surprise. For once that was a project that was completed in the nick of time.
Rose's big project, the one that's been in the back of her
mind for months now, has been to get to the stash of aging t-shirts
and perk them up somehow.
She started up by embroidering this one. She likes Japanese sashiko,
so getting that look was the idea. However, she found that a plain running
stitch isn't good for stretch fabric. And this isn't just a
t-shirt but a ribbed one, so it has even more stretch.
She used a backward kind of loop instead, spaced out, and that worked
well enough to get the right stretch while still looking
enough like a running stitch. She used a regular DMC embroidery
thread too - is it true what we heard about how they might
be running out of business? That'd be really awful, because
they have made good thread for eons, and there are so many kits
half-finished out there in the whole world, with their color numbering system..
Anyway, I was already happy with the project when she finished adding running stitches to the neck and arm bands. Then she got into big-time doodles. She likes to doodle with a pen, it seemed natural to her to doodle with a needle as well, and I have to say this really looks like one of her long-boring-meeting doodles :-). Only more interesting. I like how she got it to bloop onto the back, so there's something interesting going on back there. I loathe clothes that are made for the photographer, not the wearer, and where you get an ornate front and perfectly blank back, don't you? This is now looking totally custom. And it was free too, since the thread was somewhat aged, and the t-shirt was bought used at least 5 years ago :-).
We've been lying around the house with our tongues hanging out
like old dogs, barely able to drag ourselves to a bit of grocery
shopping here and there. I should make more sleeveless tops
but I just don't have the energy. By noon it's over 95o indoors, and
we have a very cool appartment... Ah, for a bit of
San Francisco fog!...
So it's imperative that we manage to accept some of those
invitations we've been getting lately "come see us in the country,
we have a pool". Words that are music to anyone's ears :-).
Except that my swimsuit has hugely floppy legs, and I don't mean that
in a nice way. The elastic, clear polyurethane, is not only
stretched out, it's brittle, there might as well not be
any. And this suit was made when I was
I'd already bought some good heavy swimsuit fabric at Far Out Fabrics before leaving the US, and found a KwikSew pattern which seemed very Esther Williams. Since Esther is of the big-girl vintage, I figured that'd look better on me that the contemporary suits meant for sandwiches (here, have a sandwich..), and it'd look more interesting to boot. I had thought to work some boy-cut legs in there, not feeling like doing a proper 50s skirtlet. But neither this pattern nor the boy-cut Jalie had waist markings, and I had last-minute pattern-making breakdown. So you're seeing the unadulterated legs, just a bit more butt fabric per my previous suit because Stretch & Sew fits better than KwikSew.
I had some more elastic trouble. This time I used a special chlorine-resistant version in cotton and real rubber, perhaps a bit too heavy. I'm not entirely happy with the end result, specially around the top. You can see all the gory technical details at patternreview But on the whole I'm very happy it's done. Those legs don't flop. I'm ready for a summer of watery, cool fun. After 8pm or so, when the sun loses a bit of intensity.
Oops. Too bad about the world cup.. Ah well, you win some and you lose some. Fortunately, winning is what I ended up doing with the Miyake pattern (Vogue 2814) that I'd been thinking about for a long while. I love Miyake in general, I really liked the looks of this one, and I was particularly inspired by makeitall's version, nicely punked-out. So I brought it out, and stared myself cross-eyed for 2 days. I made the muslin in a heinous piece of thin knit bought specifically for the purpose. I had already experienced an unexpected side-effect of big moves: you get to prune through the fabric, but when you arrive you have no scraps for trims, and you have nothing to make muslins out of.. On the other hand, it's good to have something really ugly for a muslin, beside the 25c/yd: you aren't tempted to wear something ill-fitting because you like the color, you can throw it right out without a qualm.
To get back to the point, making a muslin for this one was a really good idea. The main/only pattern piece is shaped like a cross, with backs and fronts zooming off from a virtual central neck. To save yourself fabric, notice that if you flip the pattern (over and 180o) and match the central addition line you can just cut two half-pieces, which makes things a bit more manageable. The new seam ends up right across your chest, so you shouldn't do that for the finished product, but it's fine for a muslin. Or what the hell, do it with your expensive fabric too, just embellish the seam or something because it'll show a lot on both sides. I knew right away that I couldn't just use the pattern as is, the regular Vogue sloper is just deformed on me and I could see at a glance that nothing there would remotely fit my body.
I plonked down the back of my sloper and copied it pretty much exactly,
matching the center back seam to what was there.
Then I tried to get the front closer to my sloper's, but that seemed
impossible. I finally brought out
the pattern I had recently worked out with all the front darts
moved to the center front, which was a much better starting point.
I had a lot of difficulty with the front armhole, which is
split down the addition line, and very strange on the original, practically
circular (no wonder it boings like that even on the anorexic model!).
It seemed that there was a definite wedge effect to the shoulder
angle for both pieces, which might make some sense if you figure
you have to accomodate all that pulling and twisting.
I decided the extra length and ease for the bust had to go in that middle part,
the one that would become the twist. I added an inch of ease
to the length easily, but the only way I could make the rest fit was to add
an inch to the width as well.
That rev had a huge wad of fabric on the chest,
so the first thing I had to do was to take that inch
of extra width in the twist right out. And the front still ended up much wider
than it should be, from the extra length of the twist, which wasn't too good.
The center front was also a lot shorter than it should be,
I had to tug it down several inches for it to look normal.
I tried to throw the draping up, and was
told that the visual effect on the breasts was unfortunate :-).
So all I could do was to add room to the top somehow.
Also, small point, there's a notch in the front to allow you to
turn under the drape's hem - if you don't hem, it makes a hole,
so just skip it.
After another day (and night) of hand-wringing,
I managed to get the armhole to human proportions while keeping the angle
of the body pretty much to the original. My front piece then was
actually 2 inches longer than the original pattern's, which was
startling. But I liked the point where the twist had started on my body in
the muslin, so I brought it down a couple inches along that seam too.
This gave me a slightly different
angle to the twist, even a bit more length in a diagonal sort of way.
Then, to be consistent with the rest of the process, I figured out the fabric
I intended for this was too short, and had to go root around in
the attic for something else. Fortunately I had some thin black jersey
on hand, drapey enough.
Wonder of wonders, it actually worked! I needed that extra length in
the front seam, the cross starts from a very good point still.
The armholes are perfectly fine (I brought them up
½" from the slopers' to cover more bra), no boings at all.
I have enough length not to do an
unconscious (and unfortunate) Britney Spears, the back fits beautifully
especially with its shaped center seam.
There is a bit more bulk in the twist than the first time around,
but nothing major. The bust is definitely
there, but it's not pulling or tight or weird-looking.
Since I liked that punked-out effect, I didn't worry about how
my fabric had 2 different sides, and I serged the seams to the
outside and didn't finish the edges (apart from working in the ends
of the seams so they wouldn't unravel). I like the result, I really like
how easy it was to do :-).
In fact, after all that pattern agony the actual sewing was a piece
of cake, barely over half an hour. You can be sure I'll be making
more of these!
The only thing is I already want another for Fall, with long sleeves. This sleeveless version already took all the topology I was capable of :-), I'm not sure my poor brain can take much more of this rigamarole, It's tempting to sneak in a regular sleeve, set-in the regular way. Except I know Issey would be so disappointed in me...
Yeah! Summer's starting well.. France is in the final of the world cup. I'm thoroughly enjoying Zidane, and his restrained but hugely effective anti-racism organizing. May his influence stave off the election of the Evil Sarkozy next year. Should I make a celebratory hat? I was thinking of crocheted granny hexagons, in blue and white. Somebody might be caught dead wearing it :-). But I don't have time to finish it before Sunday, so I think I'll leave it at the idea stage.
Meanwhile, the new knitty came out, with our
Klein
bottle hat pattern. Isn't it a beauty :-)? I always
feel so dis-proportionally proud of these silly things...
You should know however that we do suffer for our art... Amy had called for more interesting pictures. So we thought of a few places... then forgot the camera when we made a special trip to one of them. In a deadline panic, we ended up at the closest interesting spot: the very 19th-century cemetary a couple blocks away. The front of it is pure faux-Egyptian kitsch, and unfortunately we were tempted by the neo-Luxor columns right at the front gate. Alas! This brought us to the attention of the guard, who started shooing us away. He then proceeded to chase us all over the cemetary. We'd settle in front of a good enamel rose wreath (I love those delicate pinks), and he'd come stomping up the alley, shouting threats as if we were spray-painting swastikas or something. Fortunately, he also felt obligated to keep an eye on the gate, so we managed to elude him, and only had to sneak back home via the unpleasant avenue along the outside wall.
To add to everything we'd already had to throw out a perfectly good photo shoot a couple years ago when knitty decided that hats are for winter and that California Fall, complete with flowering bushes and t-shirts, didn't look cold enough to be realistic. Can you say 'envy'?. So this time, even though it was 27oC (80oF) we armed ourselves not only with the double-thickness hat, but with a black winter jacket, hoping the fur collar would distract from any emerging vegetation that'd stray into the shots. We ran (!!) uphill ahead of the guard while arguing about whose turn it was to pose and suffocate. If you look close enough, you can probably see the strands of hair matted down with sweat. But hey, we did get some good shots, I'm pretty sure nothing like this has appeared in any knitting magazine so far. I'm particularly fond of the decapitated angel that didn't make it in the official version, it seemed so fitting :-)...
Spring 06 <-- ||
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