Now I Know Where It Comes From.

Get ready for what might be the most exciting blog post of my life. I was talking to my mom on the phone about a week ago, and she told me that while visiting my grandma (her mother) she had taken a picture of her because my grandma had a shirt that was similar to one of mine. My grandma knew this because I was wearing it in one of the pictures included in last years family Christmas card. My mother is technologically inept, so first of all it took her a few days to send the file in an e-mail (I’m sure because she wasn’t sure how to transfer it from her iPhone to the computer) and then when I opened the file it wasn’t a picture, but rather a, awkward video clip of my grandma waiting for a picture to be taken. So first of all I was able to giggle at my mother, and then squeal from joy because… well you’ll soon see.

Before that though, here are some pictures from my birthday party last year, where I wore the aforementioned top.

Get ready…

 

BEST PICTURE EVER.

Honestly, I’ve never considered my grandma as “stylish”. Usually when we’re visiting she’s in house clothes/slippers/a muumuu. She dresses comfortably, not fashionably… but obviously I need to do some closet raiding next time I’m back home in Texas because clearly she has some hidden gems!

Totem Poles and Matryoshka Dolls.

This is my second and final project that I completed last semester for my Fashion Design class. My inspiration this time started as the totem poles of the First Nations in British Columbia. I vacationed there last summer with my family and fell in love with their culture and art. (You can check out some pictures from that trip here.) It was difficult for me to find enough images of their work, so I expanded my inspiration to also include the Indians of the Pacific Northwest.

We followed the same process as the first project (you can check it out here), except we took it a step further and included what are called flats. Flats are the technical drawing of each design. In the industry illustrations tend to be more abstract/gestural/free and a flat is what the article of clothing would literally look like if it were laid down on a flat surface. It shows all details of construction and is a kind of map for a seamstress to follow along with the patterns. I enjoyed the flats much more than the illustrations, most likely because I love sewing so much and they made sense to me because they are more technical and based in construction. My fabric choices for this project were black and pink lightweight wools, a magenta silk dupioni, olivey-green bamboo jersey, and a purple silk chiffon. Overall I’m much happier with this collection because I feel it’s more true to my inspiration and is also much more cohesive than my first project. Like the first project, it’s very hard for me to pick a favorite piece. If I had to choose though I’d say that the highwaisted shorts in the second look are probably my favorite piece, although I would also love to have the pants in the last look as well!