Friday, June 29, 2012

Lars Wallin 2

Of course there where bridal This simple yet so nice dress
belonged to Patricia Borg
and this more "more" dress with atouch of cupcake to Amanda Elmander ( please dont ask me if her husband plays fotball or hockey....)
Here a "live" photo
There is a little bit to much going on in this dress for my taste but I really like the hemlines....

Olive

640 people have done this design on ravelry and 64 of them used Holst yarn. This is a Helga Isager design ( Amimono ) and part from being easy to knit as well as fast I took time to read some project notes and started the yoke at it´s lower edge using a crochet chain and casting on in the back bows, worked to top and making it fewer stitches as the rows went by and ended with a very tight cast off. Then I picked up the stitches at the bottom and made some shortrow stitching to get the front lower than the back. I also did long sleeves
The original sweather has different colors on each row of the yoke, I used the same, here you can see a lot of really good use of variegated yarns. T made the largest size and used 4,5 balls of Holst and maybee 0,5 of the pale pink, this sweather does not weight much
It+s my first project using Holst and it looks kind of weird before soaking....then it gets fluffy and soft and nice to wear.

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Lars Wallin Couture

Lars Wallin is together with Pär Engsheden the most famous couturiers of Sweden. Per made the Crown Princess´s weddinggown and Lars have dressed a lot of swedish celebrities as well as margarine ( I didn´t know that but apparently you can eat your sandwiches in style using "Flora") Last year where was a big retrospective exibition in Stockholm with his work and some of that are now touring Sweden and is until november 4 in Kristianstad at the museum with free entrance!!!Then it will move to Västerås ( my ex hometown that´s rather close to Stockholm ) There where a lot of dresses as well as shoes, jewelry and margarine boxes... and there was a room showing some toiles and a couple of garments they led up to. And you can send your letters in style using a stamp with one of his dresses on. The clothes where mostly displayed behind a net and sometimes I got a better shot at the net
These are costumes for Alcazar singing "Not a sinner nor a saint" click here for a link to the video This is one of my favourites, like the double bodice of this
and this coat is in Silk organza, There was one coat in this style too but short made in see-through plastic with big swarowski buttons, really cool idea for a raincoat
I think it´s this dress that´s on the stamp
I got more photos and will show more later

The blue dress

This is the blue dress based on the ottobre pattern
I changes the sleeves like this
buttons from stash
and chopped the dress up and made side panels, longer bodice pieces, the closure is on straight grain and I´m really pleased with the result. All the seams but the princess seams are made french and then topstitched
French seams are my new favourite. I sew the pieces together 1 cm wider than finished result laying the pieces wrong side to wrong side, then I trim the seam, press it open and turn right sides together and sew 1 cm from the edge and the seam allowance is included. It can be left like this or topstitched.

Ottobre dress- the wadder

I bought a set of pillowcase and duvet cover (?) not really sure about the correct term here but I bought it at a fleamarket and got a lot of yardage for very little money. It was so cheap that I went back and found the set in blue too. They are never used and is chambray. I might go back and get the black set too.... It´s the cover model from the latest issue but with sleeves. I had some issues with the cut before starting but went ahead and used the pattern anyway...with not so good results. If you follow the pattern the ends of the front where the closures are will not be on straight grain...The seamstress that made the plaid dress must have had an issue with that too and made ajustments in a way not told in the magazine
This is a photo of the back, not so good either...Burda had a simular cut in the latest issue but did it without scooping out the bodice piece.
Here´s a picture of me trying to fix the front.
I was not too keen on the sleeves either, but decided that I could make a nice blue dress using this pattern with a lot of modifications and I can use the fabric of this dress for something else

Monday, June 25, 2012

Almgrens Silk Weavery

I spent a couple of days in Stockholm in may and one of the places I visited was Almgrens sidenväveri a museum in central town there they still do some weaving but not anywhere close to how large it once was The looms are jaquard looms and this means the pattern is made by punchcards that rotate through a system and you can change the pattern in the loom simply by changing punchcard Since the punchcard makes the pattern there´s only one "pedal" ( trampa) that feeds the punchcard and there was plenty of silk on the shelves The museum is in the part of Stockholm called "Söder"; South A place there my mother was born over 80 years ago

Friday, June 22, 2012

Aeolian lace shawl

Aeolian is a Knitty pattern that´s been around for a while and includes beads and nupps. Here shown over my wadder dress that looks really good together colorwise I used Guterman beads that I put on using a crochet hook that I filed down to be able to get the beads on. Here´s two closeups on leafpattern and border and shawl in blocking Purple is my color and the beads add weight to the shawl that makes it an addition for my wardrobe

Saturday, June 09, 2012

Missan

Missan , lady of the house

Everybody can sew a tank top

These patterns called "alla kan sy" Everybody can sew are old in an unsofisticated way, the fabric of choise was bad even when they where produced... But they are actually great, basic styles that fit well and they can still be found at fabric sshops across Sweden I used to make a lot of this tanktop 10-15 years ago. very nice, very bra friendly I havent been sewing this for a long time and was curious how my new bust would work and I have to cut of about 4 cm at each side at bustlevel to get a good fit. I wanted to try it out becourse I used to have good experienses with it way back and I want to make myself som summer dresses. It worked very well, I used a purple thai silk, gift from Annika that I washed in the machine befor cutting and cut it on the wro´ng direction to get the stripes vertical. Really very easy sewing, french seams at the sides and som lace inside for a little extra...