Reality Sewing

January 12, 2024

I'm a great fan of Dr. Cloud's book Boundaries, and he has a great way of pulling in boundaries in a hugely normal, practical, and spiritual way that is perfectly sensible.  It's all based on scriptural passages. However, he doesn't preach or admonish at all.  He's very positive in his teaching and messages, which I appreciate.  Sometimes you can get "under the radar" by being gentle rather than preachy or castigating.  

I like to bring that into all aspects of my life, including fashion.  Basically, the principle here is that keeping boundaries in sewing is a protection to keeping it lively and interesting but not weird, creative but not offbeat, and fun but not silly.  And above all, sewing is fun for me, and that's what I like to pass on to others.  That means keeping it real about sewing.  

Sewing is as much about fun and creativity as it is about being real. 
If a garment isn't really fitting well,  

if it isn't really feeling comfy, 

if it isn't really looking great, 

it just simply isn't going to work.  

That's the reality of sewing.  Now, that doesn't mean that the garment has to be 100% perfect every time because that's the other extreme - not allowing for the reality of being human.  It does mean that it mostly has to be right.  

That pertains to fashion and trends, too.  When a trend is too exaggerated, it misses the point.  When a trend isn't pronounced enough, it gets passed over.

Here's a great example of fashion gone to an extreme.  A fashion trend can last so long that it goes to extremes, as in the shoulder pads above and the tattered look below.

And this is inevitable with fashion trends.  I watched the Twiggy classic simple style go to weird proportions and threw the classic out the window. (See Audrey Hepburn's wardrobe in How To Steal A Million, which, along with the 2001 Pan Am hat, was just junk.  OK, the black lace with the lace overlay on the face was gorgeous, but the rest was junk - it was NOT timeless.)  Then watched the hippie go to Bohemian, to to just pure junk.  Then watched the 80s pure elegance go to over-extreme opulence (from the hairdos in Working Girl and Sweet Sixteen to the over done shoulder pads of Dynasty) .  I was designing by this time and had requests for beading to be draped around gowns, and fortunately, I refused those contracts.  I not only didn't want to do it, but didn't want that sort of stuff attributed to my designs.  Every age and fashion goes through that.  

But just as much as they go through those exaggerations, they also go through the classic part of the trend, and they are gorgeous.   This classic trend is exactly the "Tipping Point" of the trend we should be sewing. 

The Twiggy/Mod look of the 60s, the Bohemian look of the 70s and the opulence look of the 80s all have their classic styles, and to be honest, I would wear (or make) any one these styles (above) today.  Yes, the Twiggy/Mod looks is a little short, and no there won't be any visual pollution involved in wearing that.  This  style has such great proportions and design, that it can be done as a "top" with very slim pants or leggings, and look perfectly lovely on a more mature figure.  

The Bohemian/Yellowstone top is almost classic personified, cause I can't think of a time that it wouldn't be appropriate, except on a tropical beach, but that would be totally normal!  

And the YSL suit is just elegance on steroids, and there's hardly a place that this wouldn't be appropriate.  

Granted, each style can use a smidgen of updating, like the shoulder pads modified on the YSL suit, the Yellowstone jacket not quite so voluminous, and the Mod dress not quite so short.  But all the trends have magnificent bones, and we can apply that today to our most current fashion trend.  They are the epitome of the classic style, which is most characterized by the question:  Would I wear that outfit today - 30, 40, 50 years later?...if you answer yes, then it's classic.  

That's been my style for as long as I can remember.   Classic just seemed really remarkable as it lasted for ever and at the same time it was elegant and made me feel special wearing it.  

  Even though I've gone off the rail a time or two...

I try to stay on the classic side of things.  

But it's hard to find real when you look to designers and they bring you this:

I mean this sort of malarkey looks more like a con than fashion.  Sort of like, "let's see what garbage we can get the fashion victims to wear now?"

And then what should appear as I'm searching through looking for something just slightly normal, is this jewel of a show, which was an homage to Carolyn Bessette and Michael Kors last show for Celine in F/W 2004, that you can see here, but you probably have to subscribe to see it.  I always get irritated when folks do that, so I've put it in a pdf here (one page like you'd read it online) or multi-page (like if you want to print it).   This article epitomizes the "classic" look of stealth wealth and quiet quality.  For the day, both Diana and Carolyn wore their styles beautifully.  

There are two important parts about both of these classically-clad ladies - they both didn't go through the Grunge era, and will always remain queens of classic fashion forever in our minds.  The second is that even though they were both just on the edge of the Grunge era, they had beautifully classic clothes.  This has become so important in these days of sloppy clothes that it's refreshing and downright new-looking to have this powerfully gorgeous look.  That's what this article says to me more than anything.  Vogue thinks it's so fashionable that they pick up two style icons from 30 years ago to use as examples. What's even more interesting is that the show that Michael Kors did is so yummy and classic, that literally we could take every garment out of the collection and have it in our closet today and be perfectly happy.   Getting online to see all of it, is a problem without a subscription so I put them up on a Pinterest board, so you all can see all of these GORGEOUS looks!  

Droll with your mouth closed and enjoy!

The SewingArtistry Resource Library is designed to contain information to not only make your sewing better, but to aid in you fitting and flattering your shape, size and style.  Check it out. 

Look for future classes coming in 2024
The Core Pattern Shirt, (one of my favorites for woven core pattern that you can make into a myriad of different garments), 
Basic Knit Top (core pattern class for knit basic tops, shells, tees, dresses, and tunics)
 

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