A tiny obsessive perfectionist sewing her way through history
Hello! I did that thing again where I vanished! I promise I'm still making things and they are as wild and unnecessarily complicated as always. You may know, if you've been around here for a bit, that I work with historic textiles professionally as well as study and recreate them for fun. Last fall I [...]
A while ago--well, probably well over a year ago at this point-- I introduced you guys to the project I am calling the Opus Anglicanum Bag of Doom, or OBOD. This is a gift I'm making for a friend, in my grand tradition of making excessively complicated things for other people, and then taking forever to do [...]
Wow. I disappeared there. Like, seriously. I don't even have an excuse this time--my internship ended in January (I actually managed to finish rehousing the 500+ pieces in the core collection by myself with FOUR DAYS TO SPARE [the other intern left early because she got a permanent position, so I was flying solo for [...]
The most common thing I hear when talking to people about my counted thread embroidery obsession is "I can't do that, there's too much counting and looking at charts". And they do have a point-- if you are a person who hates looking up from your work, finding your place in a chart, and looking down again, counted thread might drive you a bit mad. But, there are a number of tricks you can use to make the whole process easier.
After two years working at Lacis, and being a frequent patron of both Needle in a Haystack and Old World Designs Needlepoint, I've tried a lot of threads. No really. A lot. Go on Lacis' website for an idea of exactly how much thread they stock. A while back I wrote up this chart [...]
Drachenwald Crown Tourney has come and gone, actually more than a week ago? I did kind of massively overdo things that weekend and spent most of the week recovering. But! I went! I did finish my fitted gown in time, thank god, because it was chilly. Going up the spiral staircase to the dormitories in [...]
I felt like I had a few weeks there were I was so productive and now everything has slowed to a crawl. So here I am to show you what I've been doing and remind myself that I have gotten things done! 1. Alyce's camicia was finished on time (an addition to what is apparently [...]
I have a friend who, when I update him on my projects, always says "you're so talented!" And that always baffles me a little bit, because there is a big difference between talent, skill, and just having the patience to do something that seems outrageous to other people. I truly believe that anyone can sew. [...]
This is my apartment this morning All that white stuff on the far right? More white linen. As usual, too much fabric, NOT enough space. I finally drew up an actual plan for William's shirt: I based on the Nils Sture shirt and the 1535 boy's shirt in the V&A (the first one in PoF [...]
Sorry for the short break in posts-- I've just been chugging along on a few different things. Last Sunday I downloaded an app to keep track of the time I've put into different embroidery projects. If you needed proof that I'm Bad at moderation, here's what I've done over the last week and a half [...]
Not Another Costuming Blog 