Finally, a lemon dress! - Butterick 6582

I had thought the title of this post would be, "Chica in yellow meets Lady in Gold," as Prof. R. and I recently went to see the famous Klimt painting, "Lady in Gold," or "Portrait of Adele Block-Bauer I," at the Neue Galerie.  However, they didn't allow pictures.  Then we went mattress shopping, and as nice as the sales people were in Sleepy's on 6th Ave., it just wasn't picturesque enough in there for photos.

In the end, we settled for our backyard, AKA Soho.  Despite all of that, it's finally here!  I now have a lemon dress:

 This is Butterick 6582, my second version of this dress but my first of version C (first here).  The fabulous lemon fabric was purchased at Joanns on a recent business trip, breaking my New Year's Resolution of not buying any new fabric; but I just couldn't help it.  Really!  Ever since I saw the Kate Spade lemon dress back in 2014, I knew I had to have one.  However, you'd be surprised at how hard it is to find lemon print fabric.  When I spied this fabric, I had to make my dream of a lemon dress a reality.

Fun in the wind

Since this was my second version of this dress, it came together fairly quickly.  Because the fabric wasn't wide enough for the skirt pattern, I did have to add a wedge of fabric to the sides but it's such a busy print, I don't think it's noticeable, unless you hold the skirt out while someone takes a picture of it.

I purchased the belt buckle in a booth at a vintage mall with several other really cute cards of vintage buttons and pins.  I hope to incorporate these into some future makes.

We're still experiencing warm temperatures here in NYC, which is great since I have two things left in my summer queue before I begin my fall sewing.  I've been working to eliminate the stash, and have been on a cotton dress sewing binge, lately.

Hasta pronto!

La Loteria at Tea - Butterick 5603

Hola,

Today we had tea for lunch!  When we were on sabbatical in London the year before last, we just had "tea," but here it's what Professor R. and I (well me - he likes the rarebit) occasionally have for "lunch."  I ate almost all of those sandwiches and teacakes.  My stomach is still bursting!!

This is my Butterick Retro 5603 in Loteria fabric purchased online from Joanns.  Yes, this fabric has reproductions of the mexican card game, Loteria!!  As children my brother and I played this to learn spanish words.  If you're not familiar with it, it's a bit like BINGO, but instead of numbers, the caller calls out different spanish words that are pictured on individual cards, like playing cards.  If the caller calls off a picture that you have on your card, you can mark it.  Four in a row wins - oh, fun times with raw pinto beans!

I've topped it off with my black and white fascinator from Sara Tiara which I purchased at the Portobello Road Market in London.

If you're looking for an easy to sew 1950's pattern, this is your little amiga.  You sew some long straight seams, create gathers around the bust, sew on some contrasting or self fabric for trim, insert a zipper and you're good to go.  I think I made this in a few hours over several days.  How long it sat around waiting to get hemmed is another story, though... ahem.

The back flows into a gentle V and the zipper is inserted on the side.

This weekend is a nice long three day weekend, so I hope to finish my final summer sewing projects for 2016.  The sewing queue for fall is growing!

Hasta pronto!

Sewaholic Cambie Chica at The Met

<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/10803287/?claim=38aws5c3fzy">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>

Hola!  I've been sewing like mad and blogging not at all - until now.  This past weekend, Prof. R. and I attended a fabulous exhibit at the Met: Manus x Machina.  If you're in NYC and haven't been yet, I strongly encourage you to make the trip to view it.  It's just incredible!!!

In short, Manus x Machina explores the intersection of manual or "by hand" (manus in Latin) techniques with techniques more technologically related ("machine" or Machina in Latin) within couture.  The exhibit is arranged by the various Metier (trades) within the French couture world, e.g. Lace, Feathers and Flowers, Leather, etc.

Think laser cut leather strips manually connected with jump rings...

or a machine sewn dress with beading and sequins applied by hand.

The sequin detail is blown up and projected on the wall behind the dress.  Clever and cool!

Other beautiful creations included 3D printed collars or belts applied to hand sewn garments and beautiful lace and feather gowns.  There were also garments that featured good old fashioned embroidery, but lots of it.  Very yummy!!!

Examples of pleating - from the videos at the exhibition, it's a fairly manual process!

The showpiece of the exhibition is a Karl Lagerfeld for Chanel wedding dress with a 20' train.

The design of the gold pattern was drawn by Karl Lagerfeld! 

The dress is Renaissance in style but is made of scuba knit, which is so au courant.  The train features a gold lace like pattern with hand beading - YES, hand beading.  The pattern is projected on the ceiling so one can make out the beautiful detail.

Close up of the 20' train

Ceiling projection of the gold train pattern

For this outing on a really warm day, I wore my unblogged Sewaholic Cambie.

On the very crowded and windy rooftop deck of the Met!

I completed my Cambie last year towards the end of summer and was ambivalent about it.  What made me hesitant was the back.  The skirt is gathered with the back piece being almost twice the size of the front.  I thought it might make me have a bustle butt, but now I'm good with it.  What do you think?

Bustle butt in the foreground, Manhattan in the background

One of the things I love about this pattern is the top.  It fits almost perfectly right from the envelope!

I also really like the fabric I've chosen.  Yay parasoles!!!  It's Kanvas Cabana Umbrella Stripe Red from Fabric.com.  It's a nice weight cotton designed by Maria Kalinowski but is no longer available. Sorry :(  I lined the top in red cotton batiste which makes it nice and cool for the warm summer days we've having.  And best of all, it has pockets!!!

Overall, I'm really glad I finally jumped on the Cambie train and made one of these.  I think of other colors and fabrics I'd like to use for future versions, but now I'm madly trying to squeeze in some last summer projects before beginning my fall/winter sewing.  Are you still sewing for summer or have you moved on to fall projects?

Hasta pronto!

Valentine Chica - Butterick 6582

Prof. R. and I are big time Valentine’s Day celebrators.  I usually receive a bouquet of flowers during the day, and Prof. R. makes a reservation at a fancy restaurant for dinner.  Of course, I have to make something new for our special dinner, and this is the dress for Valentine’s Day 2016 - Butterick 6582, View B (which started as View A, then became bodice of View C with bows from View A, then finally View B):

I really like this pattern with one exception.  The bodice for view A creates a seam rather than the surplice or faux wrap neckline.  However, this can be easily remedied by using the bodice pattern pieces for view C the full-skirted version.  Once I figured this out and re-cut the bodice pieces the rest was a fairly simple sew. 

Since I was doing most of the sewing during the day on February 14^th, naturally, I didn’t have time to finish and attach the bows.  I attached them later that week but found I preferred the dress sin bows.  Once attached, the bows just stuck straight up, giving me little "wings" on my shoulders.  Maybe I just used interfacing that was too stiff, although I’m not sure.  I do plan to make the full-skirted version at some point and will experiment with fabric and interfacing to see if I get a result I like.  One thought I had is just to make them smaller.  We’ll see…

The fabric is from Fabric Outlet on Mission St. in San Francisco.  I purchased it when I was in SF just before Christmas.  It’s polyester brocade that washes and handles very well, with a few precautions (no going back to SF for more fabric if I botched it up).  First, I washed it by machine in a mesh bag but didn’t put it in the dryer.  Then, before laying out the fabric for cutting, I filed my nails and kept my nail file on hand (a nail file lives in my sewing supply bin with my marking pencils and pens) throughout construction.  So far, the fabric has remained snag free!

My little bracelet is a refashion from a bow on elastic that was stretched around the vase in the Valentine’s floral arrangement Prof. R. sent to me the first year we were married.  It’s so cute, and I’ve kept it on hand thinking I could use it for something.  It only took me 5 years to figure I could simply shorten the elastic and make a little bracelet out of it!  

Hasta pronto!