Brown Dress with Pockets

I said that one day I would sew all the projects from this japanese book. This is the third pattern from the book and the 4th finished project.

My adjustments: Shortened the length to below-knee instead of the ankle-legth of the original. I just don’t wear maxi-dresses, that’s all.

The fabric: a wool-cotton blend maybe, I forgot to ask, very soft and drapey and denim-like.

The collar: I love anything with a raised collar. I can’t help it, it’s fetish. I feel safe in it. I used medium to thick collar interfacing to achieve the looks of this one.

The pockets: woo-hoo. They are great and the metal detail adds character to the dress. At least I think so. But I will have to stop this bad habit of mine of filling pockets with stuff and then forgetting where they are…

The garment: I love it. First, it’s cozy, second you can wear it all four seasons with different combinations of t-shirts, pullovers, knits, long-sleeves, short-sleeves, 3/4 sleeves and so on. It looks great with all my shoes (very practical). It makes you feel like you’re going to the country for a walk to harvest wild-berries.

The weird fact: It has a 30cm zipper on the back. The instructions called for it and I didn’t question them, until I finished the garment and realized there is no need for a zipper, since you can just pull it over your head. So, why did the pattern called for it? Design reasons? Psychological ones? Who knows. The most important thing is that the method for placing it, was different than the usual zipper instructions you find in books and that resulted in THE BEST ZIPPER I HAVE PLACED SO FAR. Really. I’m adopting this method for sure.

The invisible fact: I used purple thread for the sewing. I did. I thought that since it had many decorative stitches, it would be nice to have a little color variation. Well, you can’t see it. Why? This purple thread on this brown fabric becomes invisible. If you don’t look at reaaaaally close, you see nothing. I must remind myself to frequently take two steps back from any sewing project and look at it from a different angle in the future.

 

The coat is ready and the weather is still hot…

The coat is ready and the weather is still hot, so I’m not out of schedule. No kidding, we’ve been wearing t-shirts for the past 2 weeks here in Greece, the weather feels more June-like than mid-November-ish right now. So I couldn’t wear and model my new coat, but I sure got some pictures to show you. I like the result, I made no mistakes this time, I handstitched the lining twice (it puckered the first time) and I’m very satisfied with the result. Looks very pro. What I didn’t think before starting, was that maybe this type of coat is not really my style. That’s why I like it better when it hangs on the sewing dummy than when I’m wearing it. And it’s not a matter of size because the sewing dummy is custom made and is exactly like me. But the coat is so nice and huggable that I’ll get over my theory and get used to wearing it. I will, I promise. When it gets cold at last.

So here is the finished project from the Burda magazine free pattern

Ok, I know that at the front the overlaping is not 100% accurate….

front waist detail

sleeve detail

front closure detail

back waist detail

and…

the lining!

I swear I bought this IKEA kids fabric because I thought it would match my purple fake fur that was already in my stash. And I had no idea what I would make with the combination. I know it looks a bit weird, at least to people that want to look serious and grown up, but that’s not me. I always like to add a bit of fun to my clothes. And that’s why I like sewing wearables in the first place.

This project pretty much sums up what I’m like. An adult that refuses to grow up. And that’s how I’ll finish this post, murmuring “I Don’t Wanna Grow Up” by Tom Waits

 

September is here and I wrote you a letter dress….

September is here. I’ve got to catch up with a month of heatwaves, stress, lack of vacation, swap mania and crochet. Officialy it’s the end of summer, unofficialy the weather is still hot here in Greece. In a few days I’ll be leaving for my 10 day vacation in a mountain region of central Greece.

Until then let’s write a small review for a small and adorable book full of zakka!.

This one features mainly crochet projects and a couple of knitting ones.  I’ve tried many of the items and they work up fast, they are perfect for a quick handmade gift to your loved ones. Last month I did some Ravelry swaps with handmade items and this little book from Ondori helped a lot. I also made something for me too, a happy orange cotton/linen hat. I love it!!!

1. Happy Summer Orange Hat, 2. Linen Coasters, 3. Small Box, 4. Olive Green Dishcloth, 5. small pouch, 6. Blocking, 7. yarn, 8. Linen Coasters, 9. Olive Green Dishcloth, 10. small pouch, 11. Happy Summer Orange Hat, 12. Linen Coasters, 13. small pouch

I told you I needed at least three variations of this dress. And luckily I found some time to sew the last dress for this summer. I used the same pattern from the japanese book “Dresses with Straight Stitches” (ISBN: 4309280196). I used a japanese cotton with letter print, I found at reprodepot.com.

Seeing this last picture reminded me of the new craft love-slash-fetish I got. Habu textiles yarn! Oh, the colors, the quality, the texture. Texture is something most yarn manufacturers forget. Or they add texture in the form of fugly novelty yarns. Habu yarns seem to have a texture dictated by the fiber not just for the sake of it. I could rant for rows and rows of blog space about habu yarns, but I won’t. I’ll just say this scarf is made with 3 skeins (28 gram each) of Aresco cotton tape yarn with black/mustard blotches.

(detail)

I have searched the internet and was not able to find a single crochet project made with Aresco yarn! So I decided to use a scarf crochet pattern for tape yarn I found in this book. Aresco yarn has these beautiful blotches of color and  creates a chunky 3D effect all by itself. I think this simple pattern was a good choice for it.

I shouldn’t forget my crocheted cat. He already took the plane to his new home somewhere in Alberta, Canada. Here are some photos the day before his departure where he is resting with one of my cats, Fulman. (pst, Fulman didn’t like him much and she was glad he went away…) Pattern is free from a japanese site, translated too. Found it via Ravelry, where it is very popular. link

 

July is here and I’ve made a new summer dress

July is here and the heatwaves arrived. Not much energy to do crafting. But still I’ve managed to finish yet another summer dress from the infamous book of my previous post. I ranked it as the perfect summer dress. Plus it’s really easy to sew. All you’re gonna need is 2,5 meters of fabric and about 20 meters of elastic thread. And some patience to sew the elastic thread parts. The only problem now is that I need at least two variations of it. And around autumn I will need the sleeved versions too. Good thing that Marimekko was on sale this week and I got a good grip on it. Can you imagine marimekko dress with this pattern? I can.

This is called brilliant pattern design, don’t you think? You just cut straight pieces of fabric and then let the elastic rectangular details do the fitting job. How didn’t I think of this? (uhm cause you don’t design patterns, that’s why). So here is the technical drawing of the dress.

And here it is finished and modelled by me:

and a view of the details:

Once more: the book is called “Dresses with Straight Stitches” and has ISBN-10: 4309280196

 

Japanese books collection and my new linen dress

At first there were just 3 of them. Then another 2 came and they had company, then two more from ebay, then 3 more were sent with a swap, 4 more were approved and 2 more to accompany the set of rakuraku hooks in their long trip fron Japan. And now they sit and talk all together in their native language and from time to time I take them off the shelf to just browse or consult or meditate thinking what my next project should be. And ofcourse I’m talking about my ever-growing collection of Japanese craft books. There are so many projects I want to do in them that could be enough for a life time of crafting. Yet, I want more. They have stopped serving their usual role as patterns and inspiration and we have moved all together to the collector’s land. I’m usually grabbing books about sewing and crochet, rarely knitting, felting and when I’m done with these, I’m gonna start origami and paper crafts.

Since I have them adorning my craft book shelf, I thought, why not giv’ em a review. They deserve it after all. Once in a while (meaning when I find time and I’m not sleepy) I’ll try a simple review of them, after all not all of them have “see inside” features, if you try to figure out online which one would be useful to you and your craft. If there are any, I’ll show off a thing or two I’ve managed to complete from said book.

I’ll start with one of my favorite books so far. Comes with ISBN-10: 4309280196 and it’s translated into “sewing with straight stitches or lines or something”. And guess what: there’s not a curved line anywhere in this book.

No ready patterns are available but the drawings are more than enough to make your own. Don’t be easily put off by it, it’s as simple as doing elementary math and using the ruler right. Each design comes with a simple math calculation that has to do with your bust and hip size. Then you apply your number to the design and just enlarge what you see with your found measurements. Illustrations for the process are enough, if you have some experience in sewing. Each design has a drawing of the amount of fabric needed and how to cut the pieces and then numbered ilustrations of each step you’ve got to make.

The book features mainly dresses. Unique ideas about how to transform a rectangular piece of fabric to a lovely dress or tunic. There are 15 basic designs and most of them have two variations like long/short, sleeves/no sleeves and other decorative ideas. All of them count up to 26, numbered with the english alphabet A-Z. And trust me you’ll want to make most of them. Light summer clothing, with linen, cotton and simple colors.

For me it was the kind of book I fell in love simply by looking at the cover. Even if anything else inside was useless, I had to get it for the cover dress. In the meanwhile, a flickr and swap friend posted another creation from this book and I was convinced. Right now I’m currently working on three projects from it. The first one which is finished is, guess what! (insert suspense drums here) The cover dress!!!

Made with linen (I love linen dresses for summer), I impovised at the closure and used buttons with the same size but wiht different colors from my stash. The interfacing was really important for this pattern. Don’t even think to omit it. It will give shape to the neck and button closure. I regret not having used a thicker one, but I can live with it.

Math worked great, sewing it was easy. I made a small mistake at the neck size, just remember that you’re gonna have to calculate it according to your measurements, don;t count on the numbers given. Who knows maybe it was written somewhere… in japanese. So here it goes. (shoulders don’t look so good on the sewing dummy, look better in real life)

(back side)

You’ll have to excuse me for not ironing it to perfection before showing off. But you know linen… and you don’t know how hot a Greek summer is… Hot summer and ironing don’t match, I tell you. And what for anyway, in the end it’s gonna turn like a linen dress that you wear in real life in no time. sigh.

Verdict: a simple rectangular piece of linen, shaped at the waist with the attached cord, fabulous side button closure, neck that you can wear closed or open. Beautiful.