I don’t recall when exactly but I told you I’d post pictures of my studio (a fancy way of saying office) after I painted it grey (from bright yellow).  Well, it’s probably been a couple of years now but here it is!

A perfectly styled room it is not.   Isn’t it better to see how I really live?  The most significant thing I’ve done to prepare for these photos was clearing off surfaces.  I can’t help but live with stacks of papers (work, sketch, etc.) on my desk and sewing table but I figured that would be too distracting.

This space is really me, a jumble of all my favorite and mostly old-fashioned things.  And I love pattern so much, I buy fabric just because of the print (I know many of you do the same!)  and I’m surely running out of room.  I’m also in love with old, delicate, falling-apart things (as you know) and now the north wall is looking a bit like a bricks ‘n’ mortar vintage shop with the Edwardian blouses and 1930s dresses hanging from it.

You can see my mother-in-law’s rug in the lower left corner of this pic, in front of the antique sewing thread cabinet my landlord gave me.  Isn’t the lighting here a little odd, like I had the flash on?  I didn’t though - it’s just the white morning light coming through the facing windows.

Below is my little nook which includes this unglamorous but functional Ikea futon.  At least it’s a comfortable place for my childhood teddy friends.

Hi Totoro!

I’ll end this post with the seat at my desk, a place where I spend a lot of my day working, drawing and gazing out the window with my dear cat Spoo. (He often sits behind the curtain to watch the busy little house finches in the morning.)

I hope you enjoyed this mini-tour of my world.  Enjoy the weekend!

I’ve had this dress for almost a year, picked it up for $15 at the antique market.   It is almost a relief to have finally done my fixes on this dress; clothes are really moving from the to do rack to the closet!  I really love this dress, I feel really at home in it.

Here’s a look at the before:

A 1970s version of a 1930s dress.  You can’t see it in the photos but the little flowers are flocked which I love (not much flocking left but still counts for something).  There’s absolutely nothing wrong with the style, only it needed some repairs here and there.  But for the most part I don’t like high necklines; I feel too closed up.  And the sleeves were shortened in a slapdash fashion by its previous tenant (Hmm, I sense a trend) so I had to do something about that.

This is what I did:

• Cut out and lowered the neckline; removed neck facing that was clearly visible under the sheer fabric.
• Added a pleated Petersham collar that I tacked down by hand. (The stitches seem very obvious to me even though I tried my best to not sew too tightly; I might redo it but it’s fine for now.)
• Cut the sleeves down, leaving a little bit of the previously gathered fabric which I hemmed creating little ruffles.
• Fixed some general wonkiness around the bust seam.
• Cut off the lace and ruffle at the hem and shortened the skirt.  I considered fixing and re-attaching the ruffle but decided I liked the simplicity of the plain hem.
• The ties were very much uneven so I shortened one. (I did not match the lengths exactly as I don’t see a problem with them being off just a little.)
• Fastened a little brooch to the neckline (from Seventh Muse).  I’ve fashioned other things like a yellow velvet bow and such which I can switch out at will!

I have to say I quite enjoy detailing all the repairs and alterations I do to my vintage finds and I hope you do too!  I think so, and I find your comments very kind and encouraging.  Thank you.

This is a smaller post since 1) I wasn’t able to finish my updates to the other yellow (print) dress I was going to include in this post and 2) I (luckily) didn’t have to do much to this one!

So this dress is what has gotten me interested in 1920s style, in terms of actually wearing it, not just admiring it from afar on perfectly willowy, old Hollywood starlets.  I have been fairly convinced that this style makes me look  like a sack of potatoes but when I saw this in Clever Nettle’s shop I knew it had to be mine!  I think this dress works on my frame because it’s short, sleeveless and pretty simple in design. Anything fussier wouldn’t do.

When I got this dress, I also knew it was the perfect place to apply these beautiful antique sequined stars, few of the little things I collected while shopping for wedding stuff last summer.  (They never actually made it into the wedding but I figured they’ll find their purpose eventually.)  And they go so perfectly with this little sequined bag I found a while ago too.

These stars are fragile; the backing is paper.  To make them more sturdy I glued felt to the back (I used Tacky Glue):

Instead of sewing I pinned the stars onto dress - very gingerly as the fabric is, sadly, frail in some areas.  I have a bunch of really tiny sequined stars too which might be cute applied to the shoes!

Oh, and there’s a cape!  To wear in a mad caper?

I wore this ensemble once to a gallery opening (with different shoes though - seafoam green t-strap sandals from Seychelles and a lacy cream-colored, embroidered cardigan) and it’s already one of my favorites.  In fact, I was so inspired I’m working on an emerald green georgette ’20s dress as we speak!

I have this habit of buying vintage for a bargain (because pieces are damaged, ill-fitting, etc.) and taking forever to getting around to making repairs and thus wearing said items.  But I’ve made the commitment to change this bad habit into a good one and I’m working my way through my to do pile. This is the first post of my vintage dress parade and I’ll detail the fixes and tweaks I’ve made for each one.  I’ll try to remember to include “before” shots next time, hee hee.

The above late 1930s or early ’40s dress was quite the steal as it was falling apart in various places, had a motley crew of ugly buttons and was an unflattering mid-calf length.  My fixes:

• Changed the buttons to clear glass ones with faceted edges; I figured this would work well both in the light-colored printed (and flocked!) fabric as well as the navy blue organdy.  (My camera died before I could get any close up shots.)
• Added bust darts for a better fit.
• Trimmed the flutter sleeves for a little bit more modern look.  (I felt like I would fly away before I narrowed them down!)
• Hemmed the skirt by a few inches.  Each tier in the skirt was a little bit wider (taller?) than the proceeding one, from waist to hem.  Instead of hemming just the bottom tier (and messing up the sequence) or hemming each tier (too much work!), I hemmed the second navy blue tier to match the width of the first one.  This way there is still some order/design to the width of the tiers.
• Used the piece I trimmed off the skirt and turned it into a sash (original belt was missing).  I can see here that the sash could stand to be shortened (that’s the beauty of taking photos of your projects - you see things you might miss in the mirror!).
• Made other minor repairs like loose seams, wonky tiers, etc.

Next: I love wearing this ’50s dress.  I found it soon after seeing (500) Days of Summer and thought it looked like something Zooey’s character might wear.  I bought a pale grey-blue crinoline just for this dress.  I’m also wearing the same pale blue slip I’m wearing under the dress above.  I considered going dark but then you wouldn’t be able to see the print on the sheer fabric very well.  Anyway, here’s what I did:

• Removed the sleeves: this dress had half sleeves with quick and dirty hems that were not so great.  Since I don’t like fixing/sewing sleeves I just took them off and finished the openings by simply folding under the edges (which doesn’t always work due to the curves but luckily it did in this case).
• Let the waist out: the wearer before me had a tiny waist and had taken it in in several spots around the ruched waist panel.
• Hemmed the skirt. (I will almost always do this!)
• Repaired little holes and opened seams.
• (I thought about pinning on that dark blue rose that I’m holding at the waist along with a ribbon sash but the flower is a bit dark and I think the dress looks nice unadorned.)

Hope you enjoyed this little dress tour!

(By the way, thanks for the Lucy love from the last post - it made her blush!)