Reinventing the collar.

Hello everyone, I hope you have been enjoying the May day bank holiday weekend!

Blogging activity has been reduced to once a month lately, which is not favourable to either me or you.  There is much going on in the making world of Colour and Cloth and over the next month I will be setting time aside to tell you all about it.

Today you find me on a peaceful journey over the Irish sea after a beautiful weekend in Scotland.  Enjoying the 2 hour ferry journey catching up on news, the latest magazines, text messages and of course blogging!

Here's a little project that had been put on the back burner for a while...

A buttery chocolate brown leather jacket by Irish designer Roisin Gartland. 

 

 

Im a real sucker for Irish designers.  I like to support local talent and industry, even though it was a charity shop find for £5 a few years ago.  I never really wore it and I have just realised why...it was the collar.  It had to come off!

Scissors in hand I started snipping. Now what to do with the now detached collar?

I love sheepskin, and had a very small skin than had never really found a lasting purpose.  Inspired by our costume making for the 'Wildlings' Season 2 Game of Thrones' I played about with some collar ideas on my mannequin.

 

Northern Ireland's very own Ciaran Hinds in the HBO series Game of Thrones wearing his Wildlings costume well.  Image by Helen Sloan.

I love designing accessories and garments that can be worn many ways and this was no exception.  Heres are at least 5 ways to wear. 

 

Option 1

 

 

Option 2

 

 

Option 3

 

 

Option 4

 

 

Option 5

 

 

Lets not forget about the leather jacket...heres how it looks now.  Much better I think, and more comfortable to wear.

 

 

Pity the weather is hotting up now...I will have to wait until winter to wear it! As they say in Game of Thrones 'Winter is Coming'.
I say lets have Spring, Summer and Autumn first!

                                                                       Until next time,

Enjoy creating
Christine x

From 1980's to 2013 LBD Transformation

Evening all, I hope that this week is being good to you.
 
Just a quick mid-week catch-up.  Its been a busy week, Easter holidays and a day trip to Manchester.  But there is always room for a quick customisation.  This one took 2 hours and gets the rating of EASY. 


 

Another Oxfam find.  £5.99 for a Japanese silk dress.  With potential.

 

 Beautiful shoulder drape detail with black glass buttons.

 

 

Getting to work with the stitch ripper and off come the arms!  I will save these for another project.

 

 

Different camera filter.  Arms completed, handstitched. 

 

 

Waisted and Belted

 

 

I think I'm turning Japanese :)

 

 

Close up of the front

 

 

Closeup of the back

 

 

Its my birthday next week so I think that this dress deserves a special night out!

 

I am off to catch-up on The Great British Sewing Bee!  Have you been watching it?

 

 

Till next time,

Christine x

 

G

 

 

 

 

 

 

D.I.Y ... Stacking shelves and shoes

Long time...but after a very relaxing seaweed bath I was inspired to do a little D.I.Y and put some shelves up in my bedroom. 


I am sure I am not alone when I admit to having over 30 pairs of shoes (not including boots) so a gal needs plenty of space to store them all.  We all know a girls best friend are Diamonds, but along with her daddy, her triple D is 'D.I.Y'.

Marilyn singing 'Diamonds are a girls best friend' from the film 'Gentlemen Prefer Blondes'.

I sometimes forget what shoes I actually own because they are hidden at the back of the closet in boxes.  If they are on display then they will be worn more often.  I had written on my 'To do list' - get some shelving for shoes.  In what will be another blog post I was given over 8 drawers from a linen factory that was closing down in Belfast, these were perfect to display and store my shoes.

Every girl should have one of these!

I have to be truthful here....

I called my dad :)

Heres me and my dad in the 70's at the caravan in Newcastle...great memories!

My dad is a D.I.Y wiz-kid.  He worked as a butcher all his life but I think DIY has always been one of his big hobbies.  My mum is very lucky...

The guy in the picture is NOT my dad!!

So with tools in hand: nails, hammer and a spirit level I found a wall in my bedroom with nothing on it!!  ... These things are pretty hard to come by these days after being in my house for 8 years!

Blank, but not for long.

Up go the drawers  note the handles on the side.  Dad made the dividers.  A lick of wood stain, and a few hours drying time and the shelves were ready to be anointed with shoes.

First shelf filled.  Thats 3 pairs and counting.

4, 5, 6, 7...

8, 9 , 10, 11...

12,13,14...

15,16,17 (the bottom pair have already been counted)

18,19

and 20!  These lace up Gladiator style stilettos are strung up through the drawer handle.

The finished shoe shelving.  I can still spot a place for a very low shoe...can you?!

I don't often get the chance to wear heels, but I am going to make sure that these superstars get a night out on the town very soon.

This DIY project took me 30 minutes to put up.  My dad took a good few hours making me the inner shelves, thanks Dad!  Many thanks also to Peter of 'Copeland Linens' Belfast for the drawer donations.

Until again, happy DIY-ing

Christine x

From Country to Catwalk: Re-styling the Aran cardigan

A spring time Saturday morning has sprung and I am enjoying a welcomed visit to Scotland, and a day trip to Edinburgh. 

Ireland and Scotland have many things in common, landscape, weather, humour and of course...lots of sheep.  Both countries are famous for their tweeds, Harris in Scotland, and Donegal in Ireland to name the most famous ones. 

We have just literally stepped out of winter and into spring, but the winter woolies are still our wardrobe staple for the next few weeks.  The arrival of spring brings the new lambs who will over their lifetime provide the fleece to be spun and knitted into our woolies.  And so the circle of life spins round and round.

I love wool, but I can see this blog going off in a tangent already so I am bringing myself back to the Aran knit.  This link brings you over the the West coast of Ireland, the Aran Islands to explore the History of Aran knitting.  I will blog a dedicated post to the Aran knit at a later date.

This is one I found unloved in a charity shop for £5.  They are priceless to me.

This picture is after I had removed a worn zip.  I don't have a fondness for zips on aran cardigans so it had to go.  The cardigan needed updating.  Heres what happened next....

The ribbed collar was cut off and again, inspired by Chanel I made it into a corsage.  Binding it in a  salmon coloured soft leather.

Adding a centrepiece pearl button.  I also bound the front and neckline with leather.

Wrapped a plaited pink suede belt around the waist to complete the transformation!

What happened next....

I spotted this fabulously frilly skin toned dress in our local Oxfam and knew that it would work great with my new cardi / Chanel style soft jacket.

Not forgetting the shoes of course!

I added a pair of clip-on pearl earrings to the front of my shoes.  I had bought these when I dressed up as Marilyn in the Seven Year Itch.  (another blog post perhaps!!)

The finished look, ready for summertime to come.

Now off to get the bus to Edinburgh and enjoy the cobbled streets, vintage shops and pottering about!!  Happy weekend everyone. 

Christine xx

Little Black Dress transformation

Monday morning has passed through from afternoon to evening and I treat myself to T&T...an abbreviation of tea and toast, a daily essential either for morning, evening or both.

An essential wardrobe ingredient has to be the Little Black Dress affectionately christened the LBD.  I shall refer to it as the latter in this post so I can keep the space for photographs!

The iconic Audrey Hepburn in 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' wearing her LBD designed by Hubert Givenchy. 

I have to admit to having more than 1 LBD, which gives me a great idea for sharing them all with you in another post.  I have 3 from the 1950's which were given to me, but I must stop there and save these stories for another day. 

This evening I would like to share the story of the ugly duckling dress from flat to fab...

I came across this dress at at vintage fair in the Red Barn Gallery in Belfast.  It was £10, 2 sizes too big and a left over from the late 1980's.  My mind immediately began to tick with the possibility of a complete 're-vamp' as the phrase would have been back then.  Today it is re-fashioning, customising, up-cycling.  I like to call it 'Crafted Couture'. Time and patience.

 

The taffeta puffed skirt lacked 'oooph!'

 

 

Off with its head!

The halter style neck band gets the chop.  The new bodice shaping gets marked with pins.

 

Handstitching in the new lining. 

The original dress was not lined at the back as it was stretchy. I made it non stretchy by adding a fused interfacing.  Boning was added to the front panels.

 

 

All dressed up with somewhere to go!

 

Modern but still a true classic.

 

 

Till next time...xxx

 

Crafted Couture: Bias Binding with TLC, patience and time

Friday has arrived and that means I am already enjoying a long weekend and an afternoon coffee in my favourite mug.

The weekend never actually means time off as I am just one of those people that even when watching a film, I'm knitting or unpicking something!  I'm sure I am not the only one that does this!!

Later on today I will be designing and making new things for the Three Crafty Birds stand at St Georges market this weekend.  After last weeks trading my sister Linda and I went for a rummage in The Rusty Zip. The Rusty Zip is a fantastic vintage and retro store that is an institution on Botanic Avenue, Belfast.  Lets look inside the bags!...
 

 

The Rusty Zip has just had a complete refurbishment and lots of fantastic clothes swinging on the rails. 

 

I spyed this jacket... I'm a sucker for Donegal Tweed and a real find at £10! 

 

 

 

The fabric is so beautiful, but it didn't deserve to be finished in a tired bawley woven nylon binding.  I knew I had the perfect length of leather at home and that all this jacket needed was a little TLC, and a little patience and time.

 

 

Carefully snipping off the binding

 

Stitching the new leather binding on.

 

Large glass headed pins securely attaching the binding.  Much better looking than the tired binding now discarded to the left.

 

Bias Binding and a good pressing gives the jacket new life, with many more years ahead.  I added a soft leather belt, perfect colour match.

 

 

Think twice before you throw clothes out...give them a second chance!

 

Have a great weekend everyone, happy sewing, creating and crafting.

 

See you next week xx

Christine