Author: Lola

Taming wiggly stripes

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…Or not.

While waiting for my packages from India I started a couple of sewing projects from the same stripy fabric. It was not the most joyful sew however. You see, it all started with the iconic Jean-Paul Gaultier version of the Breton T.

I lust myself one but bought the wrong type of stripy knit. An earlier swatch I had would have been perfect. But because I’m not a great fan of B&W stripes much less navy I didn’t commit then. When I subsequently took the plunge I didn’t have that swatch with me. All I could remember was that it was a B&W stripe bamboo+lycra from B&J Fabrics NYC. The only one I found when I went back was this thinner bamboo even stripe. Taking a closer look at the inspiration pictures I discovered shock horror most Breton T called for uneven stripes – ie thinner black/navy & thicker white stripes. I lost all enthusiasm for this fabric, but decided to get it over with asap by sewing something up quickly. Oh no, I ain’t wasting this $19.95/yd fabric by trashing or swapping it.

To motivate myself I hunted the internet for inspirations that don’t look too complicated. Something that’s just interesting enough to keep me going but not so ambitious that I have to drag my feet to finish. You know what, inspiration número uno came from another blogger – Tia Dia’s vavavoom stripy dress version of Donna Karan Vogue Pattern 1282. Her version looks Vivienne Westwoodish. So I followed that clue to find my inspiration número dos, a VW original top. The asymmetry were the hooks. And I know V1282 should be an easy peasy sew & VW top looks just about achievable if I stick to feature on the front only. The original may very well have asymmetrical back as well. But that’s a bit more effort than I’m willing to spent on this fabric miscalculation.

Tia Dia’s vavavoom V1282
Vivinne Westwood stripy T

While both designs were relatively straightforward to construct, like the current series of the Great British Sewing Bee, the projects were made hard, Really Hard, by PITA fabrics. This thin & drapy bamboo knit was really unstable. So you can imagine how stripe matching went. The asymmetry of both designs didn’t help. There’s only so much one can do if the two sides of a seam has different number of stripes. Here’s what I tried this time…

Stripe matching: Where the stripes are fairly even & running in the same direction on both sides of the seam I just pin almost every other stripe edge. Where the stripes are uneven in number and/or running in different direction I had to work from the right sides, fold one seam allowance back, align the seam line, and cajole as many stripes to match as possible, aiming for at least matching stripe edges if not colour. Then this alignment is basted with slip-stitches, again from the right side. Lastly turning to the wrong sides, I starch the hell out of the seam line area. Which leads me to…

Homemade starch: My last few knit projects I’ve used commercial spray starch. This time I ran out of the commercial stuff & as I was stuck at home waiting for delivery I had to give homemade starch another try. I tried the proportion of 3 teaspoon corn starch/flour to 1 cup water suggested by someone who sew a lot of jersey knits and this time it worked a treat! Not only did the stitch area becomes stiff & stable as thin cardboards, it tamed the curling edges, and bonus – it acted as temporary glue sticking the two sides of the seam together – great for matching wiggly stripes! One down side is that it took many MANY rinses to get the starch out. But definitely much saner than unpicking stitches multiple times! Will have to test some more. I had tried homemade starch before but abandon that for some reason. May have been clogged spray nozzle. Or maybe trying to use that on water-hating petro-checmical fiber like poly-lycra.

Even with my bag of tricks however, the stripe matching wasn’t perfect. So hats off to the contestants of the Great British Sewing Bee. Presumably they’re not allowed the tricks nor the time to properly tame such beasty fabrics. Hope those viewers who don’t sew appreciate how much skills go into making even their cheap fast fashion & not think that these home-sewers are just not very good.

More about my two stripy projects later. My orders from India have actually arrived by now & I must go shopping for shoes so I can hem the half-made skirts, and maybe make my own embellished blouse from scratch. Yuppie! More fabric shopping!

Lehenga Choli fantasy sewing

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I crumbled. I was all psyched up to sew my own wedding lehenga choli (Indian/Asian skirt + cropped top). I even planned in my head how I was going to sew them up:

  • Micheal-Kors-FW2012-ad-1Half-circle lehenga skirt to preserve as large a piece as possible for future refashioning into a Michael Kor style gold lace skirt. Most lehenga seems to be umbrella/panel/gore skirts, but there were some mention of circle skirt variations as well.
  • Skirt hem border built up from skinner trims to help distribute the inevitable easing required to attach straight trims to curved hem. The home-sewn lehenga YouTube videos I saw seem to just pleat in the ease as they sew. If the trim is wide then the difference between top & bottom circumferences needed would be great & the pleating would be more visible. If the trim is narrower, then the difference between top & bottom would be smaller, so it might even be possible to ease the difference rather than pleat it.
  • Sewn on stones/sequins on dupatta shawl made from red silk geogette from the Stash rather than glued on stones. Again, YouTube videos seem to show a lot of gluing. Don’t know if it’s just the DIY crowd who rely on glue or if RTW also rely on glue, but I’d be worried about stones/sequins falling off.
  • Silk shantung or dupioni for skirt lining & as blouse base fabric.
  • Zardozi and stone/sequin embroidery to mimick the original blouse embellishment.

But fabric & trim sourcing tripped me up…because I was too stuck on that one particular design I showed you in the previous post. I found an online shop (Samyakk) that has a very similar design at a reasonable price. They also showed close-up photos of the fabrics & trims they used. I was in love.

Samyakk’s version
Skirt fabric
Blouse fabric
silly Google

I tried Google image search to help me source similar fabric. Google thought the fabric pictures were of dirt! LOL. Anyway, I couldn’t find anything similar online. I’ve even checked Mood and B&J Fabrics. I also took the pictures with me to various London fabric shop areas – Walthamstow, Goldhawk, Wentworth/Bricklane, Green St, even Southall! No one has anything like it. (OK, I didn’t bother with the Berwick Street fancy fabric shops because I knew their prices would be astronomical.) Funny thing is when I asked shop keepers if they have something similar, several said yes then proceeded to show me something that looked nothing like the photos I showed them. I didn’t know whether to be mad or to laugh! Were they simply trying to shift whatever they had in the shop & lying through their teeth? Or did they have a different pair of cultural glasses on & really thought what they showed me is like what I’m looking for?

In any case I’m amazed at how difficult it was to find such simple looking fabrics & trims. So after checking Samyakk’s reputation (looking for any complaints on reviews.co.uk, sitejabber & compalintsboard) & confirming a few details with the shop, I took the plunge. Fingers crossed it’ll turn out well. I feel a bit more reassured by the fact that despite this being an obvious wannabe, the shop showed their version on the website instead of showing you the original then sending you something different. (I do wonder though perhaps in some culture it is common to treat designs as Look Books & get local tailor/seamstress to knock off a copy – sometimes a very different-looking copy!)

lehenga_gold-red_1-2All is not lost in terms of sewing though. I’ve ordered all of my lehenga with unstitched blouses. So I would still have to sew the blouse at least. And I’m still thinking of copying the original Gajiwala Saree blouse design & saving the Samyakk fabric for a more western casual luxe top (if there’s enough fabric). I still need to figure out the details of how to do these embellishment. While it might only be a top that I have to make now, I may still combine some ready-made trims with manual embroidery to save time & preserve my sanity. There are a few good Indian/Asian trim shops in Southall, Walthamstow, and Green St at reasonable prices £1-£4/m. I will need to do more research on Indian embroidery for the bits where ready-made trim just won’t suffice. Here’s a good intro video to Indian/Asian embroidery made by the V&A. Shame I missed their Indian fabrics exhibit…

And while it might be overkill to source a big rectangular embroidery frame like in the above video, if I go break one of the dining chairs (!!!) maybe I can make myself one like this…

Maybe with practice I can become as fast as this artisan! 😀

 

Wedding Bling Plotting

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So MR & I have decided to finally tie the knot. Which means an opportunity to make or buy a preeeetty dress.

Traditional white wedding dresses was ruled out because I really would like something I can wear again. Or at least refashion into something more wearable afterward. And as white isn’t my favourite colour, I don’t think I’ll get much mileage out of a white wedding dress. Instead I have fallen for fancy sarees from the Indian subcontinent. Originally I thought I’d just treat the saree I get as fabric & make a more western dress out of it. But the more bridal wear photos I looked at the more I’m tempted to stick to their original designs.

lehenga_red-gold-1What I didn’t realize was that their bridal wear differs depending on the region, with South India favouring the saree (draped fabric skirt/shawl + top + maybe petticoat), and West & East (North?) favouring a top (choli) + skirt (lehenga) + shawl (dupatta) combo. The latter seems to have the more intricate embroidery, but obviously would be harder to refashion. So I’m a bit torn.

The other problem is you set foot in those shops and your eyes glaze over, overwhelmed by the bling & variety. Where to even begin! I’m tempted to shop online, but am worried because most online shops are based in India, and not of that extraction I’m nervous whether cultural barriers might prevent a smooth online purchase. Things like whether what you see on the website will really be what you get – especially since I’ve been told that many items are hand-embellished, so difficult to reproduce exactly. Or how long it’ll take – is it off the shelf or do someone have to make them to order. (I only have about 3 months to sort out my outfit.) And my preference would of course be to just get the fabric & sew up myself to ensure better fit. But of course some of the nicer embellishment has to follow the pattern shape – eg neckline. So I don’t see how that would be possible if I get only the fabric.

It’s all a bit nerve-wrecking. I just ordered two lehenga cholis by Nakkashi online from Haya Creations.com. We shall see if (a) they arrive at all, (b) arrive in time, (c) the quality is acceptable, (d) if they look anything like the photos. (I would have ordered from Nakkashi’s online shop, except the order form doesn’t seem to work for international customers.)

Nakkashi Royal Prestige 5036
Nakkashi Royal Prestige 5033

Both of these – if the fabric quality is good enough – should be easily refashionable into casual luxe. They don’t look too OTT for the minuscule registry wedding ceremony we’re going to have.

I’m still debating on what my Plan B should be. One options is to try to get something from a brick & mortar shop, maybe from one of the shops on Green Street near Upton Park East London (- a must see if you like Indian/Asian Bling – apology to other nationals from the region for lumping you all under the “Indian” label for brevity – being another type of Asian myself I still can’t get use to calling you guys “Asians” because that’s what I’m used to calling Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, etc.). It’s an intimidating options due to the sheer number of choices & possibly higher prices or possibly less reliable fit.

Another alternative is to pick a similarly simpler design online & try to source the material to make it myself. Judging by the proliferation of the same photos online + complaints against stores, seems like maybe many shop are selling imitations & not the originals anyway. I think this one might be doable if I can source similar fabric & borders.

Gajiwala Saree GS7384
Original Gajiwala 7384 design

There were a couple of fabric / trim shops on Green Street carrying bling fabrics /trims presumably for exactly such purpose. Barbara, a London-based sewing friend, also found some in Walthamstow.

And of course any suggestions from you would be most welcome! As would any advice from any (British) “Asian” / Indian subcontinent readers of course! 🙂

Now if I may leave you with a few more eye-candies…

And I’m totally in awe of these tailors & embellishers’ skills…

Amazing! And nerve-wrecking to watch how the embellisher maneuver the cord back & forth under the high-speed couching machine. Hope no fingers were hurt in its making. It’s easy to criticize poor quality end products. But given the work pressure many of these workers are under, I think they’ve done pretty well. Certainly much better than I could have done under the same pressure.

No news on Stretch Pattern School book :-(

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Catching up on emails some of you left via my contact form, I noticed quite a few inquiries about when Stuart Anderson – the author of the now defunct (Stretch) Pattern School website – will be publishing his book on drafting swimwear patterns. Unfortunately I have not received any update from him.  It’s a shame that the knowledge may be lost, but I have to respect the man’s right to a peaceful retirement. If he feels it’s too much work & investment to assemble & publish a book sharing his knowledge, then it is too much work & investment. 

Let’s just pray that if it’s not him, then some other stretch pattern expert with proven industry experience will step up to the plate. And let’s appreciate and not take for granted all the wonderful online resources that are still available, many of which are free! Who knows which website will go offline for one reason or another. Access to these info is not a right, it’s a gift from authors & teachers who generously share their knowledge with us. Let’s support them when & where we can. At the very least thank them for sharing!

And I’m certainly grateful to Stuart for sharing his knowledge that enabled me to develop my current set of pattern blocks for stretch fabrics.

2020-07-20 update: GREAT NEWS! Mr Anderson is back from retirement with his (Stretch) Pattern School 2.0! I haven’t explored it in details yet, but he says the info has been updated to reflect latest developments in swim / dancewear technology. Unfortunately the free auto-generated custom block feature is gone because the company that host the new website doesn’t offer such sophisticated programming options. But there is now a Pattern & Block Shop for RTW designers & interested home-sewers. Presumably this will be standardised sizing rather than custom based on your measurements, but certainly better than nothing! There’s also a Pattern School Online Facebook group & he’s also on Instagram (pattern.school.online) if you want to get latest updates from him. Have fun!

2017-05-19 update: I tried contacting Mr Anderson again for an update on his book publishing plan & got a lawsuit threat in response. He is highly protective of his copyrights & privacy. Any form of sharing is strictly forbidden regardless of whether he publish a book or not. So to avoid lawsuits absolutely no sharing of his content if, like me, you saved some pages for your own personal reference. Hopefully my review of my experiment using his instruction doesn’t constitute a copyright infringement. He made clear to me that I’m not to contact him again, so I will not follow-up with any update on book or no book.

If you’re looking to draft your own stretch block, then you will have to look elsewhere for instruction. Mr Anderson’s method is no longer an option.

Since part of the fun of writing sewing blog is the sharing of experience, I’m going to look into replacing my Pattern School blocks with one drafted from instructions that are still publicly available. Then hopefully when I design from my stretch blocks then you too can learn to create & design with your own stretch blocks. I’m thinking maybe Pattern Cutting for Lingerie, Beachwear and Leisurewear by Ann Haggar…or go back to Designing and Patternmaking For Stretch Fabrics since I’m not really looking for swimwear blocks. I may also experiment with adapting my 0-ease woven blocks – either my Kenneth King moulage or my body wraps.

If you’re looking to enter the swimwear design field & can expense professional books & subscriptions, maybe try Intimate Apparel Journal (ia-technical.com) website. They have articles on “Introduction to Swimwear Pattern Cutting Principles” & “Grading Swimwear” available at $19.90 each. Or you can buy a subscription which costs $299/yr for verified students or $399/yr for professionals (4 issues/yr). Their shop also offers past issues of the IA Journal, special-topic compilations, or individual articles for purchase. The site is run by a Hong Kong professor with experience in the intimate apparel industry. But the above articles are written by David Morris, a British technical designer who worked for well-known intimate apparels brands & also taught at university level in the UK. David also runs Intimate Apparel Technical website (iatechnical.com) which offers a remote learning course on Swimwear Pattern Cutting & Grading for £250.)

Both are above my pay grade since I’m only sewing for myself, so I can’t comment on whether either professional sources are worthwhile. But I may just pay for an article or two from the Hong Kong site to learn the basic principles again from a publicly available source.

When blogging tool goes bad

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Just a quick post to apologize to everyone who’ve tried to contact me via my About page. The form has gone on strike again & refused to forward you comment to me via email. I only just discovered all your feedbacks today while trying to fix the broken commenting form – Thanks Sasha of Second Piano for bringing this other problem to my attention. Bear with me as I sort out these technical glitches. And I will also go through my Contact Form logs & reply to your feedback soon.