New job, new waistcoat.

Style 1815, herringbone waistcoat

I start my new job next week, so I thought I should probably make myself something smart to wear. Hopefully I’ll have just enough time to finish this waistcoat and its matching trousers.

The pattern for this waistcoat is Style 1815 – it’s dated 1990, but I probably bought it in 1997 as I didn’t have my own sewing machine until then. There were no “shorten here for petite” markings on the pattern, so I just folded each piece to take about 2″ out of the length of the body. In hindsight I wish I’d taken a bit less out of the body and balanced it with a bit taken out of the shoulders, but hey. Maybe next time.

The fabric is a sort of a greyish-brown herringbone. I discovered after I’d bought and washed it that it has a high percentage of linen, so I’m hoping that I don’t end up looking too crinkly whenever I wear it.

All I need to do now is slip-stitch the lining side seams together, add the buckle at the back, and work out what I’m going to do about the buttons. My sewing machine absolutely refuses to sew buttonholes for me (despite performing this function perfectly every time I take it back to the shop to complain), so I tend to fasten everything with poppers, and then sew decorative buttons over the top. That may be the answer for this, too. I don’t want to spoil it at the last minute by taking a risk and hoping that maybe this time the buttonhole function might decide to work. Or I might just bite the bullet, and sew them by hand.

Hematite and polymer clay

Hematite & polymer clay necklace

This is another of my experiments with polymer clay and tumbled stones. The pendant is made by simply wrapping the edges of a tumbled stone with polymer clay. The large bead at the top of the pendant has a third hole in the bottom, and this was pushed right into the polymer clay before it’s baked. The flower embellishment has a bead in the centre which was also added before the pendant was baked. No glue was used in the pendant. The texture was created by rolling a decorative button over the surface.

After baking, the textured pendant was painted to tone down the colour of the clay and to bring out the texture in contrast to the smooth stone. Once that was done, it was simply a case of looking through all of my hematite beads, and deciding what the necklace was going to be like. The longer strand measures 21″, with the pendant adding an extra inch and a half. The inner strand measures 19″.

I don’t think the photo accurately conveys how glittering and shiny this necklace is. I also couldn’t figure out how to take a picture of such a reflective surface without having my hands and the camera appear in every bead!

I have plenty more tumbled stones, so I think a few more of these pendants are going to be forthcoming in the near future.

Jeffery West Sylvian Brogues.

Jeffery West

Yesterday I went into London, to visit the Foale & Tuffin exhibition at the Fashion & Textile Museum with a friend. Afterwards I had a few hours to spare until I was due to meet another friend for tea, so I’d planned to spend the afternoon looking at the Relics of Old London exhibition at the Royal Academy.

While I was in the area I thought I’d just have a little wander down Jermyn Street, to have a little look at some lovely shirts and shoes. From there I ended up in the Piccadilly Arcade, where I was ambushed by Jeffery West, whose shoes I wrote about a few weeks ago.

I asked the lovely salesman whether the shoes were ever made in a size 39 (a men’s size 5), and he said that they weren’t. Then, as every good salesman should, he suggested that I try on a size 6 and see what they were like. I agreed, safe in the knowledge that they wouldn’t fit, and I’d be able to leave the shop without buying an extraordinarily expensive pair of shoes.

The pair he brought out were the Sylvian plain front gibson winklepickers, in black. They were beautiful, but not what I wanted to buy, so I still felt relatively safe.

And then I put them on.

They’re so narrow and so pointy that once I’d put my orthotics inside they turned out to fit perfectly.

Oops.

The lovely salesman then checked on the computer, and discovered that he had one other pair of shoes in stock in a size 6. They were a customer order that had never been collected, due to the customer moving abroad. The design is an old one, so they’re no longer on the Jeffery West website, but just look at the picture above. I have to say that these are pretty much my perfect shoes!

The Gibson style is a much better fit for my peculiar feet than the usual Oxford. Beautiful brogue detailing, and they have the signature Jeffery West cleft heel. Despite the extreme pointiness, they’re wide enough to accommodate all of my toes (something that women’s shoes never quite seem to manage), and the colour and shine are just beautiful.

Even better, because these shoes are no longer part of the regular range, the lovely salesman was able to offer them to me for a substantial reduction in price!

And then he told me that after you’ve bought five pairs, you’re entitled to a lifetime discount.

Damn him.

California Pants

California Pants

This is what’s been keeping me busy for the past few days – Laughing Moon #106, California Pants.

These pieces are just the linings and facings for the pockets, waistband, gussets and fly.

As you can probably tell, I’ve still got a long way to go with these! My plan to try and make two pairs before starting my new job is going to have to be abandoned, I think.

Changes.

Changes.

Some of you may know that I’ve been looking for a job for some months now.

Well, as of this week, I’ve finally found one!

I’ll be working as a Website Administrator for a local information service. Between three days at work and two days volunteering at the Museum each week, that isn’t going to leave me very much time for anything else.

As a result, I’ve had to make the decision to stop taking on custom sewing requests completely. This includes the sewing lessons that I’d been planning to start giving this year.

I’ll still be sewing and knitting – starting with a pair of trousers and a cardigan to wear to my new office! But updates to the Etsy shop will be sporadic, as I’ll mostly be making things for myself rather than to sell.

I know it’s supposed to be the craftsperson’s dream, to get out of the rat-race and work solely for yourself. But I’ve been doing that on and off for almost ten years now, and I have to admit that I never once managed to make a living wage without relying on part-time jobs to help me out. Then I had a prolonged period of ill health that meant I was barely able to work at all, and being self-employed rapidly turned into a nightmare. I’ve been looking for a new job for the best part of a year, and I’m over the moon to have been accepted for a position that I think I can really enjoy.

I have just less than three weeks to get myself ready, and I’m really looking forward to it!

Sarah’s Angel

Sarah's angel

My friend Sarah saw the stamped Fimo pendants I made a few weeks ago, and asked whether I could make one for her Mum.

The brief was simply “pale yellow, with an angel”, and this is what I made.

The pendant is just less than two inches long, and made from pale yellow Fimo. The angel isn’t stamped, but rather drawn into the clay with a sharpened pencil. The whole pendant was then washed with a coat of metallic gold acrylic paint, to give it a slightly “aged” look, and the angel impression was also painted with gold. I hung the pendant on gold organza ribbon, and finished it with a gold bolt ring and matching loop.

Thankfully it turned out to be exactly what Sarah wanted – and I hope her Mum likes it too.