The Makeover Magic

You have to live in a climate like Canada's to understand our constant fascination with the weather. I'm sure we're always talking about it because there's actually something to talk about. Our weather changes drastically day to day.

Yesterday, the temperature was -14 Celsius. Today, it's supposed to go down another ten degrees. I know from all the social studies projects that I helped my kids with that the temperature range in some countries is not that wide over an entire year never mind a couple of hours. Either way, today will be very cold. How nice to be snug and warm in the studio.




I finished the ribbed yardage by late morning. The white stripe on the one fabric is a chalk line. I drew one line on each fabric piece - on grain - and then followed it with the presser foot to make the first ridge. The rest of the ridges were made using the edge of the presser foot as a guide.




With this technique, the fabric shrinks significantly especially if you are using a wide twin needle. Give yourself LOTS of extra space and fabric. As you can see above, the front barely fit on to the piece I'd made. Normally, it's not that tight. Extra is better. The left over scraps can always be used but not enough of a self made fabric is a trickier problem to work with.




This is what the ribbed yardage looks like from the front. There are narrow ridges and wider furrows. On the other side...

... there are wider, flatter ridges and narrow furrows. When I noticed this, it occurred to me that I might want to rib my yardage upside down sometimes for this completely different look. That's a new technique for my tool box. Every technique we learn becomes a possible answer to our how can I and what if questions.

The pieces are all cut out. You can see from the earlier picture that I drafted full pattern pieces for the front and the back. This was more accurate than cutting them on fold. I also cut out the sleeves individually, thankfully remembering to cut one right side up and the other right side down so that I had a left and a right sleeve instead of two the same. This is a step easily forgotten. I pinned the shoulder seams together and tried that on to check the neck depth. Now, to start stitching the seams together.

Last night, I started rereading Nothing to Wear by Jesse Garza and Joe Lupo. This remains my all time favourite makeover book. Apparently, I still need making over. They listed the five major indicators of style incompatibility - signals that tell you your look and your life are out of whack because your image and your identity are out of sync. The more symptoms you identify, the more disconnected things are. I had four out of five - LOL - which sounds worse than it feels. I don't think it so much style incompatibility as that rut we've talked about a few times.

Every time I've read this book, I've come out an Avante-Garde/Chic . That category feels right and it doesn't feel right and yet every makeover book I read that has a test of some kind puts me in a similar category. It must be right. Some of the discord is that I'm slightly dramatic not hugely dramatic. I think that's the taming of the Chic. Maybe the real me is more of a drama queen. Who knows. This time reading through, I paid more attention to the individual descriptions and especially to the Chic description. Here they are from page 37:

Chic: This style is defined by a powerful look and sharp lines that seem to come together in an effortless way. It is often monochromatic and combined with bold accessories.

Avant-garde: This is an ultramodern style that uses fashion as an extension of the wearer's creativity. It often seeks to make a dramatic statement. Typically, the foundation for this wardrobe is black.

Doesn't that make sense? LOL - I mostly dress monochromatic. I wear a lot of black. I LOVE BOLD ACCESSORIES. Wasn't I just saying a few weeks ago that I didn't really need a lot of clothing, I needed more exciting accessories. The description of the Avante-garde/Chic combined style on page 47 feels more comfortable. It reads:

This mixture works particularly well. Think back to our description of the Avante-garde style and the profile of Natalie. The Avante-garde/Chic is someone who moves back and forth between these two style types as needed so that she is more approachable. Incorporating one Avante-garde piece - a pair of modern jodphur trousers, or a blazer with an asymmetrical zipper closure instead of the traditional two-button or three-button blazer - will get you just the right Avante-garde edge without looking loony! It will add interest and still look sophisticated.

The next step in the book is to clean your wardrobe. VBG - no need for that. Mine is sparser than sparse. I doubt Jesse and Joe will ever have seen a small closet like mine with plenty of blank space. It'd be fun to show them. It'd be fun to have them make me over.

Don't you wish the author came with the book? I would love to sit down and talk to Jesse and Joe or to Kim Johnson Gross or Linda Grant or Malcolm Levene or Kate Mayfield or Christopher Hopkins - all authors of makeover books that I've enjoyed. I would love to be made over - to experience first hand the make over magic - like a Oprah moment. Unfortunately, even if I could afford their services, most of these authors are just too far away, often in New York, and Oprah certainly isn't calling me.

If I was in New York, I'd love to go to Mary Adams The Dress or take a workshop with Mary. She offers private lessons on her techniques. What fun that would be. I sent Mary an email over the weekend to say how much I enjoyed her book, The Party Dress Book, and got a lovely email back. Our processes are so much the same that I know we would have a lot to talk about if we were in the same room. I wish. If you check out her website, you can tour through the gallery and see many of her dresses. The details are amazing. Just click on Showcase and then on the individual categories and there's a slide show.

For now, there's just me, learning about me, trial and erring my way through. I really enjoyed working out the problems with the purple sweater last week and making over the RTW top. It made me think that one of my next steps would be to look in my clothes to be made over box and see what was in there to transform.

A few years ago, one of my if I wasn't afraid I would _____ list items might have been to refashion clothes. The possibility of failure was terrifying, paralyzing. It prevented my creativity from moving forward and it prevented me from achieving good fit and design. When you reach the stage of realizing it's only fabric - that they're making more every day - that some how in some way you'll figure it out - that oh well, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work - you find a new freedom that allows you to push ahead and, quite surprisingly, raises your success levels. It's as if by not thinking about failure, you no longer experience it in the same way whereas when your focus was so completely on the possibility of failure, it showed up far too frequently. Brain power - the choice of thought and where it leads us - is such an amazing thing.

Talk soon - Myrna

Grateful - central heat