Update Time

Coming to the salesroom tomorrow, Friday April 16th...

Kanzashi

Whilst I've been using some doll Kanzashi that I bought, I knew that I wanted to be able to make my own tsunami kanzashi, partly as the ones I can buy are limited to basic colors that don't necessarily go well with certain colors and styles, partly because I relished the challenge. It's taken a while to acquire all the necessary components and as the kimono girl I'm working on at the moment demanded, I've finally gotten my first ones done. I really didn't expect them to come out this well and I'm over the moon. It's extremely labor intensive - the silk has to be starched, then cut into small squares (1/2 & 3/4 inch), then each square is folded four times, then cut if needed and glued into place. These two probably took me about 8 hours. But it was worth it!

BADD

This past Sunday, March 29th, I was invited by my local doll club BADD (Bay Area Doll Divas/Divos) to do a presentation on my OOAK Barbies. I worked many long hours the last couple of weeks to make sure I had a good number of 'girls' to show off. The dolls up in the case are a selection of OOAKs & reroots now residing in the collections of BADD members...

As it closes...

Well, it's been a long time since I last posted - my apologies. This past year has been a struggle & keeping up a blog has been low on my priorities. Hopefully the coming months will see a change in that.

Gran's passing over back in January has cast a shadow over these past few months & I've been under a cloud of mild depression. What with the time I've had to take off from working, I've been feeling under an immense amount of pressure to keep on top of everything & make ends meet, which has compounded my bluesy feelings.

I've been feeling in a reflective mood the last couple of days, taking stock of where I've been & looking at where I want to go. Not totally surprising, as if one were to follow the pagan calendar, Hallowe'en/Samhain marks the end of one year & the beginnging of the next. Me personal spiritual beliefs are a mish-mash - I'm one of those who can see the truths in all the beiefs & religions, though none seem quite the right fit for me, so I do my own personal thing which keeps me in tune as best I can with the universe.

I feel like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel with work...I'm almost caught up with commissions & will be fully so by the time it comes to leave for my Christmas hols. It's a really good feeling, and a huge weight off my shoulders. The weight lifting is allowing me to look towards the future, too, to new styles of dolls & new techniques to learn.

For some reason, I've become completely entranced by the Japanese kimono & the looks of the geisha/maiko/oiran & have been spending hours researching construction, patterns, fabrics, history of kimono, haistyling & kansashi, the hair ornaments. The biggest obstacle is finding things in the right sort of scale & if one cannot, then one has to figure out how to make the things. Thank goodness for sites such as youtube that have videos on tsunami kansashi, the folding of fabric into flower shapes for the hair ornaments. I'm not aiming for perfect historical renditions, as that's not my thing...it will be my take on it all, but to imitate, one should have as thorough as possible an understanding of that which one is imitating.

Making It Work

The idea for this latest creation came to me a couple of weeks ago, when I was in my local fabric store looking at trims, specifically one that consisted of tiny rag pieces of black, white & grey tulle. I designed the whole look around this trim and was really excited about it. Of course when I went back to the store, it was gone. So, to quote Mr. Gunn, I had to "make it work".

The closest thing I could find was some ostrich feather trims - a black one, a white one and a white with black stripes. I made a small, yoked petticoat with tulle, then attached the feather trim to the yoke. The feathers were too long to be left as was, so I went through and curled them all (the same way one curls ribbon), as you can see in the pics above. I'm not sure quite yet if I want to take them shorter or leave them as is, but that can be decided upon later.

I've decided that the collar is too big - quoting Mr. Gunn again it's a "lot of look" - so that will be redone into something thinner. One of the main obtacles with the jacket was figuring out how it could be removable yet be worn by a "hand-on-hip" Silkstone...I really wanted that particular body pose as it exudes to much 'tude, but the thumb sticks out so much, regular sleeves won't fit over, unless they opening is left very large, which wouldn't have worked at all. So I came up with the solution of not hemming the sides below the elbow, instead lining and sewing the side seams of the lining & fabric together - they will be secured by loops and buttons - I have some tiny black freshwater pearls to use for that. The pouffiness of the upper sleeve also worked for the thumb issue - I'm really pleased how that turned out...my first time doing that. If you're not sure how it's done, all you do is take your regular sleeve pattern piece, cut it in to strips of equal size, lay them down on whatever you use to make patterns, space the pieces apart equally, then draft the new pattern from that outline. Easy :)

I'm painting later tonight, so no more sewing for today, so the collar will be fixed tomorrow, hopefully have her all finished by the end of the week, if the Swarovski crystals I ordered arrive in time...

More 'Hello Dolly' patterns

I used the #126 pattern again, this time in a gold silk/lurex blend...I learnt from the first version and am a little more pleased with the gold version. I'm not sure that it's one I'll use a lot, though. The gown in the foreground is another 'Hello Dolly' pattern which needed a fair bit of tweeking...the first version had the bodice turn out too wide at the sides and not long enough, whilst the skirt part was also not long enough. The cummerbund was also not long enough, so what you see is the second draft, after I tweeked the pattern pieces. Me gusta mucho.

Helly Dolly Boutique pattern #126

My first attempt at a 'Hello Dolly Boutique' pattern. I'm pleased with the result and don't regret the investment. This is the "Side Draped Halter Cocktail Dress", though you can't see much of the side draping due to the panel, but that's not a great loss as the side draping effect gets rather lost on a 1/6 scale...I believe the woman who makes the patterns takes vintage patterns for human clothes and scales them down.