Wild Sargasso Laurel

Another day, another Laurel, by Collette Patterns... After seeing the huge number of beautiful versions on Flikr I got started, and haven't stopped, with two previous versions, here, and here!

This time I wanted to use up another fabric from my stash, I had a metre of this fantastic jungle print fabric from Liberty. Since the moment I saw it, I've thought about Wild Sargasso Sea, the book by Jean Rhys, which tracks the life of the 'mad woman in the attic', Mrs Rochester. The jungle is described as, dark, oppressive, and haunting, and I think this purple and lime green / yellow fabric has some of that feeling about it too.

Choosing trimmings was tricky, but with a bit of guidance from Renee and Emma via Twitter, I chose some purple bias, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out!

 

As always, zero pattern matching happening! This time I had the excuse of having no extra fabric, but there always seemes to be an excuse.... I really should learn how to do it!!

 

 One of my favourite things about this fabric is that it has really rich, autumnal colours, yet it's actually a really fine cotton. Now the shops are all full of clothes for winter, I think it works for that awkward period between seasons. However I have decided - no more Laurels for a while, and not until I have a idea takes it a little away from the basic design!

The Metropolis Project

A while ago I invested in an order from Decades of Style which included a 1940s blouse pattern, redrawn. Shortly afterwards a good friend of mine @LovesNMacarons happened to mention on Twitter a fabric she liked from Liberty, inspired by the film Metropolis...

Well, an idea was born, and the rest is history.

This was by far the most difficult project I've attempted to date and I had weeks of feeling so intimidated. At one point I thought I'd lost a pattern piece (I hadn't). Once it was done it seemed remarkably easy - what was I worrying about? It's a really fragile blouse due to the dodgy sewing but hopefully it still turned out looking vintage and yet modern enough to be wearable!

I'm still awaiting a photo of her in the finished project (she's just about the busiest person I know) but will update this blog post as soon as I get one!

Me Made (Saturdays in) May! Week 2

Well it's Week 2 of Me Made May. Today's been spent mostly essay writing and sewing, however there's only so much of one room I can take before I go a little stir crazy! So here's Week 2's entry, shots taken in my local park. The blouse is my JJ goes girly blouse, based on a Burda pattern. This shirt has so many problems, straining at the bust, random creases - luckily you can't see any of them in these shots. Time to finally fix the issues I think!

What do you think - how would you wear this blouse?

The Ted Faker dress / TPD / Lisette 2209

So, finally another dress... This one is the dress of many names! I made this using Lisette 2209, which I got free with Sew Magazine. It's a really easy pattern, which would be perfect for anyone's first project.

 

I fell in love with this Wookey Hole Liberty Tana Lawn fabric, picked up from Shaukat. It was created by merging a painting and photography of the caves in Somerset. I loved the pattern and remembered having driven past recently, it seemed perfect! I combined it with a lightweight poplin

So... here's the finished product! 

What do you think? My Mum thinks it looks like a Ted Baker design, hence 'Ted Faker'. TPD stands for The Purple Dress :)

And wearability? Well that's the next post!