This is a super easy skirt I whipped up in literally a few minutes. It is very easy, and I will say it again, very easy! You can make it and you will make it! Err… anyway, the black fabric is Japanese fabric, made of thick cotton with brownish swirly pattern on it. Actually I wasn’t really sure what I was going to make when I bought the fabric, I was thinking of making a bag with it. Then I suddenly had this idea and proceeded to make it. The fabric has wide blank area on each sides, so I […]
I have had this book, ‘The Art of Manipulating Fabric’ by Colette Wolff for some time, it is sort of wonderful textbook of any kind of fabric manipulation. Ruffles, gatherings, shirrings, pleats, darts, anything. I really like the book and read it several times already. But as much as I enjoyed reading it, I felt a little bit guilty for not using it for a real project. I finally used one of the technique, called single-shell ruffle for this blue dress. The blue fabric is double-gauze cotton by Nani IRO. I just love all fabrics from this Nani IRO collection, the […]
These are the cotton tunics that I made last week. I really love the natural colour of the fabric and how comfortable they feel to my skin. The shape of the tunic is very simple, sort of basic item that can be combined with lots of things. The tunic has round neckline and front opening with fabric loop and button. I use cotton linen binding strips for the loop and neckline. The linen fabric also used as side tab and details on sleeves. Love the result! And don’t they look good together? ^.^
I love making identical things with slight differences between each other. But of course this opportunity doesn’t come very often if I only made things for myself. Next week I’m going to participate in a local craft market, so I’m kinda busy preparing some things for the day. This fabric with Matryoshka pattern was bought in Nippori, but I guess they’re pretty famous already and can be found in lots of places. I just sewed a piece of lace on each doll, put linen fabric on the back, slip some grosgrain ribbons, and sewed around the doll shape. Then I […]
I had a bit of irritation in my eyes from contact lenses and doctor told me to give my eyes some rest and not wearing contacts for at least two week. Yaiks! I’m so used to wearing contact lenses that I wear them all day, so I don’t have a proper eyeglasses for my minus 3 eyes. The only eyeglasses I have is not very comfortable and I can’t get a new prescription until my eyes are okay. Oh, well. Anyway, I still managed to finish these two dresses for the shop. Although I worked slower than usual because my […]
When we went to Indonesia last summer, I came back with quite a heap of fabrics. Several of them are from my mother’s collection which are too beautiful that I’m still afraid to cut them, and several are store-bought. This cotton batik is bought from Danar Hadi, a batik store in the city of Solo, Central Java; the brown and indigo pattern is called ‘Parang rusak‘. I browsed through my Japanese pattern book and find dress F in ‘Stylish Dress Book 2’. The pattern is very simple, a loose dress with raglan sleeves, several rows of shirrings on neckline, and […]
A few days ago, I joined a cooking class in the neighbourhood. And just a day before the class, my friend told me that I had to bring an apron. I guess it wasn’t too unusual since almost every housewife in Japan has an apron that they wear everyday. Well, I do some cooking at home and had thought about using an apron, but somehow always postponed making it. I immediately turned to my scrap bag and found that I still had some leftover from my IKEA bags. This one was just enough for a small apron without pockets. Maybe […]
This ‘Stylish Dress Book 2’ is one of the most popular pattern book among crafters, and I’ve been eyeing it for sometime. I’ve already had ‘Stylish Dress Book 1’ and made several dresses from it. The dresses in both books are relatively simple, yet so pretty. The pictures are also very simple, both books featuring the same model standing against white wall with serene look. I finally bought the book and decided to make the first pattern in the book: A. The top has flowy sleeves and several pleats on the front part. The fabric is thin cotton with stripes […]
These are the three dresses that I’ve finished almost a month ago (gasp!) . I’ve been very lazy after the vacation and keep postponing to take some pictures. They are actually in the same pattern as this madras dress that I’ve made a couple of months ago. Two of them are made of Sevenberry cotton in ochre bird print and turquoise elephant print, and one is made of another madras fabric. The summer vacation is over and Sidra has started going to school again. Now I had the chance to take some pictures and uploaded them here and to my […]
I should be packing by now because we’re going for summer vacation the day after tomorrow. And I should be folding my dresses neatly to be put in the luggage instead of making a new one. But yeah, I just… can’t… resist….. But how could you resist this lovely fabric from Kokka? The fabric is called Girly & Bitter, designed by Asuka for Nina’s sewing factory line. It has birds, buttons, scissors, bunnies, stars, candies, mushrooms, girls, basically every pretty things on it. This dress is made without pattern, it’s simply smaller rectangles for bodice and bigger ones for the skirt. […]