Forcast

I'm sorry I have been slow on getting pictures up but I was back stage the whole time and couldn't take photos. I'm waiting to hear back from some folks who took pics so there should be more. We also are going to have a real shoot sometime soon so you can see more photos then. These photos are stolen from the mercury and Love Portland. There should be more and some video coming.




This is Russell wearing our striped shirt and work pants.


Sarah Wizemann


John Blasioli


John Blasioli


Frocky Jack Morgan


Frocky Jack Morgan

STRUT

STRUT has announced their lineup for the May 16th show, and I am excited to be a part of it! I will be debuting the apparel side of my line, Heating & Cooling.  I plan to show eight looks, four mens and four women's. All proceeds go to benefit Basic Rights Oregon, so come check it out! www.strutpdx.com 

More info

As per Alison Cumming comment I wanted to clarify my issue. The difference in FI's tutorial and my own is mostly a two part placket vs a one part placket. Although in mine the underlap is 1/4" smaller than the overlap. I'm not sure what it is on hers. I imagine I would have the same problem however I could just be thinking about it wrong. Here's what is going on with mine.

Here is what it should look like in paper.


This is what it is doing.

Plackets

I know I promised to do other tutorials, and I still will, I'm going to post about how to do a shirt placket. Because I have to have some thing to look at to remind me how it all goes together, you all have to look at it with me. So here goes.

This placket is the set up used in the sleeves of dress shirts and the neck opening of pull overs. I stole this almost entirely from David Coffin's book-Shirtmaking. I have tried other methods of sewing a placket and other shapes such as the two part placket and pointed ends vs square ends. Coffin's method is the easiest minus two details, the final top stitching and folding the point, but we'll get to that


This is right out of Coffin's book.


Here's my pattern. I went a little crazy with the notches.


The pink is the placket and the red is our imaginary sleeve or shirt front or whatever.



The first part is all ironing. I think that making the top square and then folding the triangle makes the top too bulky and is difficult to make a perfect triangle. In the future I will cut the triangle with 1/4 seam allowances and use a triangle shaped piece of tag board to iron around.







Here they finally get pinned together.





You can't make out the stitch line very well here but you can see it better in the next one. As a note I will draw this box in with pencil to make it easier to stitch around.

Make sure to clip all the way to corners.


You should iron placket opening at this point.


Top stitch the underlap.






I top stitch the overlap up to the point where it joins the shirt and then take it out of the machine, line it all up again and put it back in to top stitch the triangle but I forgot to put in that picture.



Sewing this rectangle on is the worst part I can't seem to get it to line up just right on the underside. Does anybody have a good trick for it? If I have to hand baste it I know I'm doing something wrong.


See. Its still crooked. It makes me crazy.


Ta Da!

Show Time!

Well the time is now! Come see some awesome fashion. Come see my new project. Here's the info and if you click on the title it will take you directly to the mercury site and a place to buy tickets.

Sandra Buckland

After a year and a half in the garment industry in NYC, I have to admit to being a little jaded about design. I don't read fashion magazines much anymore because I'm just generally a bit bored with the clothes...so it's really exciting to come across something that I absolutely love and have never seen the likes of before. I don't know anything about Sandra Buckland, but her work is amazing... although I'm not sure if I would wear most of it out of the house.
Oh hell, yes i would.



And for the extra super ballsy among us, we have....human hair!!!
Gorgeous, until you think about it.

Branching Out

Things have slowed down a bit in the patternmaking world lately. At first I thought it was all post fashion week fatigue, but the lack of work has dragged on past the normal month or so. I think people are really assessing things, determining where to go next in this environment, and taking their time thinking about it. The result for me however, has been monstrously long "weekends" and 2 or 3 days of work a week. This week I didn't work at all. Now this could be fun -- for instance, my roommate Lillian and I are planning on spending the entire day working on our summer wardrobes (this involves lots of bleach, distressing, and black dye). But it also means I need some work on the side.
Which is a lead-up to say that Lillian and I have been working on a project that involves germ filtering tents for baby car seats. A fun technical problem, but not something either of us are going to be excited about putting on our resume. This led to a couple conversations with friends about what our worst or most ridiculous job related to our field has been. Lillian made patterns for a woman who was creating "designer scrubs." Another friend, an artist, made a backdrop for a Marlboro ad and felt like she was selling her soul the whole time. And my friend Julia, a videographer, worked for a year at a company who's main client was Popeye's Chicken. And she's vegan.
My most absurd career related job was a freelance gig I took a couple summers ago for a wealthy young man who wanted costumes for Burning Man. I agreed to sew him three v-neck t-shirts and two pairs of pants, all made of animal print spandex, much of with a metallic finish. He wanted them all VERY tight, to the point that when I was taking measurements he mentioned that I should take a little extra off the pants measurements because he doesn't wear underwear out at Burning Man.
I had successfully completed the t-shirts and started on the pants when my sewing machine stopped working. Completely stopped, full of loopy bobbin mess and weird thumping sounds, unable to proceed. Oddly (and fortunately), it worked fine on every other type of fabric. So I pawned the pants project off on a friend. She told me later that he had insisted on doing the fitting for the pants without his underwear on. Jesus. I haven't taken a freelance sewing job since.
I want to hear everyone else's stories of skill and talent used for odd and/or soul sucking jobs. Post yours!

Paging LT Cute!

You have been waiting for it!  It is a tie (yes a tie).  For a lady (yes you). And... dun dun dun... it's here ... The Lady Tie!    Tell me this isn't the cutest thing ever!  For more info, check out UltraPDX  and/or  www.ladytie.com