Wardrobe Refashion!

I'm signed up for Wardrobe Refashion for the months of June, July, August, and September. Although I just got around to posting the pledge, I have already done a re-construction of a t-shirt into a dress for one of my friends (posting soon!) and have a stack of tees ready to re-construct for me, among other things. So here's my pledge:

I Elizabeth, pledge that I shall abstain from the purchase of "new" manufactured items of clothing, for the period of 4 months. I pledge that I shall refashion, renovate, recycle preloved items for myself with my own hands in fabric, yarn or other medium for the term of my contract.

I pledge that I will share the love and post a photo of my refashioned, renovoated, recylcled, crafted or created item of clothing on the Wardrobe Refashion blog, so that others may share the joy that thy thriftyness brings!

Signed, Elizabeth

Can You Handle Helsinki?

Hel Looks showcases a wide variety of styles in their streetfashion photos of Helsinki.

Other Street Fashion Blogs and sites:

New York City: The Sartorialist

London: London Street Fashion

Paris: Face Hunter

Tokyo: Tokyo Street Style

Now that I've spent a bunch of time thinking about what everyone else in the world is wearing, (yes I know that is an extreme exaggeration and the world is alot bigger than 5 cities...) I should probably get back to making things.

But if you know of more online street fashion sources, please comment and tell me!

Up & Close-Harajuku ( photos by AJPSCS)

I don't know jack about japanese street styles, but I do know that ajpscs has posted 87 pictures he took of the Harajuku District in Tokyo in a flickr set that you should see.

Sharon Boggon Is The Queen Of Details!

I discovered the most amazing blog when perusing pics in the flickr group:CrazyQuilting.

In the About section of the rich resource that is her blog, In A Minute Ago,Sharon Boggon explains her content in much more specific terms then I would, so I thought I'd lift a few bits from it directly to share here:

"In a Minute Ago is a blog of online resources which relate to contemporary and historical textiles, embroidery and needlework, quilting and crazy quilting, fiber arts, paper and book arts. It also performs a “whats new” function for my site, and documents current projects which are of a textile nature.....
Another area of my site is the Stitch dictionary which I hope people find useful. Each stitch is illustrated in step by step photos and I have categorised each stitch as to its degree of difficulty.....
For Crazy quilters there is also diagrams of embellished seam treatments....
For needlework enthusiasts I have also put online images of embroidery samples I have stitched. Some are simply ‘doodle cloths’ others are designed as samplers....."

She writes about samplers and the way they developed in aesthetics and function from the 15th to the 19th century, the broad cultural themes that influenced them, and the way that you see can see this history reflected in these handmade works.

That is so exciting because I had been thinking about doing a sampler quite a while ago, and I knew it had alot deeper meaning than just cross-stitching some cute stuff and maybe your name and the date, but the needlework and embroidery books I had just didn't get into it, and I did not have computer access at the time.

ie:"Before printed pattern books, embroidery designs were passed from hand to hand, many travelling through Europe from the Middle East. The recording of patterns and motifs on fabric for future use was an essential method of storing information. This stitched reference resulted in the creation of a sampler. New patterns and stitches were avidly collected and exchanged...."

On top of all this, she is featuring 100 Details For 100 Days, which is now on Day 66,and is a vast wilderness of inspiration for ways to be expressive with combinations of stitches and trims and buttons! Thank You Sharon B!

As if that wasn't enough, she is offering 2 online classes at Joggles.com. I am thinking about taking this one:Develop A Personal Library of Stitches that she explains as "a new class which is aimed at people who are interested in exploring and designing stitches".

I'm interested! I don't think that I'll have time to mess around with thread when it starts in November, but my mind is tossing around the notion that I could possibly, MAYBE, be able to make the time....

WAWAYA-doragon#1

WAWAYA-doragon#1
Originally uploaded by gnip.

Some chick in Chiba, Japan crocheted this super cute dragon and posted it to Flickr. She made many other awesome things as well. And now if you're a friend of mine that cares enough to check out my blog, you're seeing it too. This is so neat, the dragon itself, and how easy it is to post it here.

I've been seeing a hell of alot of crocheted stuffed animals on this here internet. It's oddly inspiring. I have no idea why I would need something like this, and yet I am seized with the desire to make them. Sometimes my head fills with crocheted animal ideas all day. It seems so fun and expressive, and single crochet is so easy to do. I have so many other types of projects going on right now that I can't fire into those cutie-pie amigurumi dreams just yet. I fear I may go on a TANGENTAL MANIA! Amigurumi rules!