Photo Friday

Happy Black Friday everyone! I will not be partaking in the festivities, but if you are and you need a little break from all he fun, this post is for you.

Today we are going to take a look at one of my favorite composers of all time. I give you, Johannes Brahms.

Johannes Brahms, ca 1853, 20 years old.

Rarely do we come across early photographs with exceedingly beautiful people, but Johannes proves us wrong. Here he is at 20 years old, lookin' fine. *I found this picture on My Daguerreotype Boyfriend.... which has many tasty pictures of fine looking men of years past*

I've played a couple of pieces that he composed. One of them being Rhapsody in G minor, op79 no2, which I played 5 years ago for my audition into music school.



Happy Black Friday!!!!

Photo Friday

Since I'm doing The 1888 Project I've been looking at gobs and gobs of CDVs and this one is one of my favorites I've come across.

This series of photos, done in a gif, is from the Metropolitan's collection.

"Dancing a Waltz" (ca.1883-1886)

by Eadweard Muybridge  (American, born Great Britain, 1830–1904)

Here's the page it comes from, Metropolitan Museum of Art

 What I love about this gif is that you can see the movement of the dress and you get a full turnaround to see what the other side of the dress looks like.

The couple also seems to be having a good time, which you don't see often in antique photographs.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Chewbacca

Here he is... the mighty Chewbacca!!!!

Chewbacca!

Side View

Back view

I used a brushing technique to get him "furry". The body was stitched the same as you would for a normal amigurumi then brushed to oblivion with a wire brush I got in the pet section at the store.I finished him while on route to Star Wars Celebration VI for our Honeymoon.

Chewbacca: Cool as a Cucumber

Isn't he cute? He has his Bowcaster and his Satchel. When sitting he's about a foot and a half tall while sitting and when standing he is 2 feet tall. He's become one of my all-time favorite creations so far!

Close up of Bowcaster

Smilin'

He needs some Burt's Bees

C-3PO: But sir, nobody worries about upsetting a droid.
Han Solo: That's 'cause droids don't pull people's arms out of their sockets when they lose.
Wookiees are known to do that.

Baroo?

Chewie's mouth opens completely to reveal his beautiful teeth and my favorite part, the tongue. The tongue is attached to the back of the mouth and moves wherever I want it to go. It makes posing a little more fun and gives him some attitude!

What a healthy mouth!

WHARBLGARBRRLRRLRL!

Now he just needs a backpack with a mangled C3-PO to carry around :)

Photo Friday

This week's Photo Friday is a painting by Marcus Stone called "In Love", painted in 1888.

Marcus Stone, 1888, "In Love"
Photo from Plum Leaves' Flickr stream

I love the soft colors of the painting and the very earnest look the young gentleman is giving his love, sitting oh, so far away. I wonder though, what's behind him? Is it a pillow or book of illustrations? What do you think?

Photo Friday

 "Woman Seen from the Back" ca 1862, Paris, France
 This is a really wonderful backview of a woman's hair, dress and necklace. I find it to be really educational since this is a rare seen view of a real woman from the period.

Salted Paper Print from Glass Negative, ca 1862, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Here's the description from the Met:

"A wealthy amateur photographer and a familiar figure at the French imperial court, the viscount Onésipe-Gonsalve Aguado de Las Marismas joined the Société Française de Photographie in 1858. With his better-known brother Olympe, a founding member of the society, Onésipe Aguado was among the early makers of photographic enlargements. The two brothers also collaborated on tableaux vivants that depict with wit and playfulness the fads and amusements of elegant society.
At once a portrait, a fashion plate, and a jest, this fascinating image expresses Aguado's whimsical mood, and is probably an extension of his work on foreshortening. It is strangely devoid of depth, as if the sitter were a two-dimensional cutout, a mere silhouette. The figure brings to mind the compositions of such painters as Caspar David Friedrich and René Magritte, both of whom made haunting use of figures seen from the back."

Finished painting!

Yay! It's finally done! Here are a few progress pictures before it was at this point

:)

Detail of Shawl

Detail of Face

Original with my version!

 Tada! Now I am able to choose another painting to copy. Anyone have any ideas?

Snow White

This year for the Athens Block Party I dressed up as Snow White!

 I set my hair about 2 hours before with roller pins. I did exaggerated fingerwaves at the front and barrel curls at the back, alternating direction with each row. After I combed through it with my fingers it was extremely easy to put up.

I already had the skirt, which is a corduroy circle skirt, and I made the rest the day before-day of. I wore the costume with my Blue Stays and made the bodice + stomacher out of Navy moleskin upholstery stuff (with a piece of yarn to give the yellow line at the front). The sleeves are tiny little puffs of light blue poly lining fabric and tufts of red chiffon. The Ruff is a piece of stiff curtain lining (from the drapes I used for my Ophelia 1910's bodice) with a small channel sewn in to house wire from a white wire hanger. My apple was a ball of yarn with a scrap of green fabric for the leaf

Photo Friday

© Bridgeman Art Library / Rafael Valls Gallery, London, UK
Painted by J. Mulnier

Today's Photo Friday is going of an 18th century woman with a ridiculously huge hat.... but I want it.

Have a great weekend!

Fabric!

Hooray! I finally got my fabric in for Harriet's gown!

Its first emergence from the box! SQUEEEE!!!!

It's little more teal in color than I was expecting, but it'll work beautifully, nontheless. I purchased this beauty from Nicole at silkfabric on Etsy. It is a silk velvet, very soft and light hand and is really just great. I love the sheen it has to it. 

This is a more accurate depiction of the color of the gown
Harriet Foster Carr Wedding Gown, 1888
Athens County Historical Society

Here is my fabric! As you can see, a little more teal, but almost spot on!

For the lining of the jacket, I purchased a Silk Dupioni in an Almond-Beige color from ThreadrareDestash ,also on Etsy. It's pretty similar to the original lining, but I may have to purchase more, as I entered the wrong amount on my original transaction... :(

Lining of jacket
Harriet Foster Carr's Wedding Gown, 1888
Athens County Historical Society

This is the picture from Etsy, I couldn't get a good picture of it myself

I'm excited to be working on the project in the coming weeks! It has to be done by Dec 17th!!!!

1885-1887 Cotton Corset

Along with working on Harriet's gown, I am going to be doing a living history presentation at the Athens County Historical Society in February. For the living history project, I am going to interpret for a middling class seamstress, as Harriet was. I have no garments suitable for the time period so I have to make them all.

Cotton American Corset, ca1885-1887Metropolitan Museum of Art

I have decided to undertake reproducing an American cotton corset from the 1880s. This corset is on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and I fell in love with it on the first glance. I love the blue tambour-work on the front panels. It is from a little earlier than when Harriet made her gown, but it's safe to assume that being in "rural Ohio", even with Ohio University, that everyday styles were a little behind (probably no more than 5 years) for practicality reasons.

The only measurements given by the Met are the corset being 13.5" long at center back. So I decided to make it my own measurements, which are: 33" Bust, 28"Waist, and 35"Hip. My other corsets bring me down to a 23-24" waist, but it's sometimes uncomfortable because the smallest measurements result in complete closure at center back. I also know I could go a couple inches more (with proper training of course)

So, this corset will keep the same silhouette as the original garment, while allowing there to be some wiggle room for my waist sizes. Here was my process: I decided what size I want my waist to be at its smallest; I chose 22". Then I deducted around 2.5" from all my measurements (with the new waist measurement) to allow for whatever room between my laces that I want to maintain. This made the measurements of my corset to be ridiculously small: 30"B, 19"W, 32.5"H

Pretty Pattern Pieces

 I flat patterned the corset, using Corsets: Historical Patterns and Techniques and Corsets and Crinolines as visual reference. ^Here are my pattern pieces looking all pretty^

I hadn't been able to find twill fabric in the color I wanted for a good enough price, so I improv'd. I found a pair of $3 Goodwill khakis (size 12) and went from there.

yay $3!

You can kinda see the nestling I did with the pieces.

After the pieces were drawn onto the fabric, I did some embroidery. I did tambour work using a doily hook.

"Tambour"

Then I put some pieces together!

I wasn't able to keep the exact number of bones or cording channels as the original, mainly because I think the one I'm making is significantly smaller than the original. The overall effect of the corset seems to be on the right track, but we'll see when I have the front and back pieces in. My busk hasn't come in yet, and I've not made the grommets in the back piece. But here are some pics of my progress:

Woo back!

The Front!
(and only held together with the waist-tape)

Photo Friday

An interesting bunch of photographs have been floating around on the web and I just had to share them.

"part of a collection of 2500 mugshots taken by New South Wales Police Department photographers between 1910 and 1930 - give a fascinating glimpse into the role of women in the seedy underbelly of early 20th century Australian life"
                 ~The Daily Mail

I'm going to a couple of the most interesting ones.

Yeah, she was a bad cat, but look at those shoes!

"Fay Watson is listed in the New South Wales Police Gazette from 1928. She was arrested in a house in Crown Street, Darlinghurst, and subsequently convicted for being in possession of cocaine for which she was fined ten pound"

"Man-woman murderer: Harry Crawford, above looks like a man but her real name was Eugenia Falleni (right). She spent most of her life masquerading as a man.  In 1913 she married  widow, Annie Birkett, whom she later murdered. The case whipped the public into a frenzy as they clamoured for details of the 'man-woman' murderer. "

"Stealing: Doris Poole appeared before the Newtown Police Court charged with stealing jewellery and clothing. She had previously been convicted on a similar charge in North Sydney and so received a six-month sentence with light labour"

Auction Bounty

Recently, I started going to the auction with my Grandmother near her hometown. I certainly didn't go "hog wild" but I did get some cool/useful stuff

Roll of 1881 Barbed Wire

The wire itself is a lot thicker than I'm used to.

First, I got a roll of 1881 Barbed Wire for a dollar. I think I'm going to use it as fall decorations for my front yard. It's a bit too big to make a wreath out of, sooooo Idon'tknow.

A neat picture with the corner burnt off

Then I got a really cool picture frame for Devin to put in his computer room, also for a dollar

I'm really excited about these

I got a whole bin of drawer pulls for 4 bucks. I'm going to use them as pegs to put about in my
sewing room

And finally, I got some good fabric; or curtains, rather. A nice ivory silk with slubs (I love slubby silk) that I can use for some cool projects.