Make it With Wool!

It's October, so among with other things (the Houston International Quilt Festival, for one) that means the Make it With Wool contest.  This national contest is sponsored every year by the American wool and mohair industry.  It offers scholarships to youth nationwide and offers wool enthusiasts of all ages a chance to compete and show off their love for wool.

Thanks to the Houston show being early this year, I've been able to compete.  I really want my friend Pamela to win for Washington state (my lovely friend Anna was runner-up last year).  It's a bit of a challenge - of course I want to make a good showing - I won the national contest back in 2004, and have been unable to compete since.  But I'd much rather see my friends do well;  I've already had my turn in the spotlight.  So I'm getting back into the swing and just having fun this year.  I will likely be having schedule conflicts in the future but I'm glad that Pamela and I will be able to travel to the state contest and have fun being contestants together this year.  I have no doubt that Pamela's incredible skills and fabulous design sense will shine through and she will do very well!

Photo courtesy of Vogue Patterns.

For my ensemble, I will be wearing a Donna Karan design from Vogue that I made to wear as a layering piece on my trip to Japan this past spring, as shown.  I did alter the pattern to make it longer (to compensate for my height) and changed the sleeves to a wider sleeve with deep cuffs, rather than the shirt cuff called for on the pattern, which I felt did not work well with the design.  I chose this design as a layering piece because its unusual cut and drape made it very comfortable for travel and it can be layered over anything from a turtleneck to a camisole, which is what I have done.  It's made from extrafine grey Italian wool that is incredibly lustrous.  It is truly an elegant fabric, and the unusual lines of the shirtjacket suited it very well.  There is just enough body to give the jacket the dimension it needs, but enough drape that I do not look like I'm wearing a circus tent.  I did not choose to make a skirt to go with this jacket, as I felt that it was not a flattering silhouette.   I've finished off the ensemble with a simple but classic pair of black wool crepe pants, using a McCall's pattern by Palmer/Pletsch.  My next blog posting will talk about the adventures of preshrinking wool crepe and taking its lively nature into consideration when cutting designs.

Back in the Studio

It's nice to be home.

Arrived from the Houston International Quilt Festival on Monday evening, exhausted but exhilarated and ready (after some sleep!) to get back to work. 

It's always an interesting experience for me to teach at a quilt show.  It often takes people by surprise that I do teach at quilt shows, because, as my friends and colleagues know, I. Do. Not. Quilt.  Okay, true confessions - I have pieced a top or two, and my final project for my 2D design class in college was actually structured around traditional quilting motifs.  I have even been known to include Seminole piecing in competition garments.  But on the whole - working with small pieces of fabric drives me crazy.  I love the end result but I take no pleasure in the process.  And if you don't enjoy the process, why do it at all?

That being said, I think that quilters and apparel designers have a great deal to learn from each other.  Quilters have an amazing scope and landscape for color play that would be difficult or undesirable in a garment design.  The minute attention to detail shown in aligning pieces and precise cutting/stitching is something we should all aspire to accomplish.  On the other hand, apparel designers employ a range of seaming techniques that add a great deal of architectural detail but are rarely, if ever implemented in a flat design. The ability to sculpt fabric and manipulate its inherent qualities (texture, for example) to create a garment that is not only beautiful to behold in its own right but also flattering to the body that is beneath it is a quality sadly lacking from many (thankfully not all) "wearable art" pieces.  

So - sewing enthusiasts unite.  Whether you prefer to create 2 or 3 dimensional sculpture, we all have much to share with each other to elevate our respective arts.  Thank you to all those wonderful quilters out there who help me to understand color relationships better and to consider new ways to incorporate embellishment and surface design.  You broaden my horizons, and I earnestly hope that in the course of teaching I help you to do the same.

That's why I enjoy quilt festivals.