Category: sewing

Blast from the Past – skirts (part one)

blast from the past - eternal magpie skull skirt
blast from the past – eternal magpie skull skirt

Please excuse the teeny-tiny picture – this photo is from 2007, when my digital camera apparently had fewer pixels than my phone does now! 

This was my very favourite skirt for years and years, and I wore it until the elastic gave out and the fabric went very thin indeed. I called this a “stealth goth” skirt, because it looked so colourful and pretty from a distance that it usually took people a long time to notice that the design was actually skulls!

blast from the past - eternal magpie space skirt
blast from the past – eternal magpie space skirt

This one was a very close run second – and I think the first skirt that I ever made from an old duvet cover. The print is space travel, and features carefully labelled astronauts, space craft and planets. 

eternal magpie TARDIS skirt
eternal magpie TARDIS skirt

The reason I stopped making these skirts is that the frilled elastic I used for the waistbands has been discontinued. There is a similar one now available, but it isn’t as soft, and it’s three times more expensive, which adds quite a lot onto the cost of the finished skirt. I’m still thinking about whether that’s going to be a viable option for the future. I’ve been using up the last few little elastic scraps to make skirts for my niece, but I’ve very nearly run out altogether. 

eternal magpie Star Wars skirt
eternal magpie Star Wars skirt

The other nice thing about making skirts for my niece is that I can use licensed fabrics, which I don’t do for eternal magpie unless the customer supplies them to me.

(There’s a huge grey area about what you can and can’t make with licensed character fabrics, particularly now that Star Wars belongs to Disney, who are very hot on preventing infringement.) 

ball dress pattern and Star Wars fabric
ball dress pattern and Star Wars fabric

I’d originally bought this fabric – which glows in the dark! – to make a dress for my niece and a pair of pyjamas for my husband. Then my niece decided that she’d rather have a skirt, and my husband decided that glow in the dark pyjamas might be a bit disturbing… so I find myself with quite a large piece left over. I know it’s silly, but I have to confess that the temptation to buy some bright orange lining and made myself a ridiculous Hallowe’en dress is extremely strong right now.

Blast from the Past – t-shirts

blast from the past - gothstuff Baby Cthulhu tshirt spotted at InFest 2018
blast from the past – gothstuff Baby Cthulhu tshirt spotted at InFest 2018

Well, this was an unexpected blast from the past! 

Way back in the mists of time (otherwise known as 2001) I ran a business called “GothStuff”. It did what it said in the tin – I made and sold a variety of clothing, jewellery and footwear, online and at various goth/alternative events. One of those events was Infest, a music festival that’s enjoying its 20th anniversary this weekend. My husband is there… and he spotted one of our t-shirts out in the wild! We haven’t sold these for at least a decade, so I’m extremely impressed that this one still going! 

(Particular thanks must go to this lovely man, and also to my husband who, when he texted this to me, was met with the reply “GDPR!! Ask him if I can blog the picture!!”) 

blast from the past - gothstuff Baby Cthulhu tshirt
blast from the past – gothstuff Baby Cthulhu tshirt

This is what Baby Cthulhu looked like when he was brand new! Paul designed the characters, and we heat pressed them onto heavyweight t-shirts using a flock medium, so the images were fuzzy. Each colour had to be cut out and pressed separately.

blast from the past - gothstuff Baby Frank tshirt
blast from the past – gothstuff Baby Frank tshirt

All of the characters were horror literature or movie themed – we called them “Baby Horrors”. This one, as you can see, is a baby Frankenstein’s monster… 

blast from the past - gothstuff Baby Mummy tshirt
blast from the past – gothstuff Baby Mummy tshirt

…and this one is a Baby Mummy. (I know. Very confusing.)

blast from the past - gothstuff light reflective bat tshirt
blast from the past – gothstuff light reflective bat tshirt

We also had a range of… I suppose you could call it “casual clubwear”, if that’s a thing. You can’t really tell from a picture taken in daylight, but this silver bat silhouette was light-reflective.

blast from the past - gothstuff skull & crossbones shirt and tie
blast from the past – gothstuff skull & crossbones shirt and tie

We also had neon colours that were blacklight/uv responsive, which we printed onto more formal workwear, as well as onto t-shirts.

(I don’t think I ever went to work looking quite like this, but those actually were my work trousers for a while!) 

These photos were taken in the summer of 2004, and while I was digging around in the depths of my computer looking for them, I also turned up some other photos of things I’ve made over the past few years. So, prepare yourselves – there’s a new Blast from the Past coming every day for the rest of the week! 

Something a little bit different

eternal magpie vintage style boucle jacket
eternal magpie vintage style boucle jacket

Remember the cardigan I made recently, from Simplicity 1319? 

And you know that moment when your husband asks whether you can make a birthday gift, needed in just a few days? (No? Just me?)

Well… here’s another one! A jacket version this time.

My husband chose this fabric and, for the record, I would like to state that I am never letting him choose anything ever again. Or at least, if he chooses a heavy stretch polyester bouclé, I’m going to tell him exactly what he can do with it. 

eternal magpie vintage style boucle jacket
eternal magpie vintage style boucle jacket

I’ll confess that I allowed him to get away with his choice because I knew I had these buttons lurking in the stash. They’re iridescent glass, and they pick up the traces of pinky-lilac hiding in the fabric absolutely perfectly! 

Despite being a bit grumbly about the thickness and the bumpiness of the fabric, and the general unwillingness of my scissors and my sewing machine to deal with it gracefully, I’m very relieved to say that it pressed well, and it’s turned into a really nice – and definitely striking – jacket.

Working with such thick cloth has made me want to try out a winter version for myself, maybe in a nice rich tweed. Perhaps not in August though… 

Pink Flamingo

eternal magpie recycled duvet cover pink flamingo dress
eternal magpie recycled duvet cover pink flamingo dress

Two years ago (according to Facebook, very helpful, thank you!) I made this dress. 

Can anybody tell me why I gave it to the charity shop? It looks to me like the perfect item of clothing to be wearing during this summer heatwave!

Inspired by a half-remembered Laura Ashley dress from the early 1990s that I never owned, this was intended to be worn over a set of Edwardian combinations that I never did get around to making. Although I can see the pear-embroidered hem of my bloomers just peeping out from underneath.

eternal magpie recycled duvet cover pink flamingo dress
eternal magpie recycled duvet cover pink flamingo dress

This dress was specifically designed not to touch any part of my body, as the fibromyalgia was particularly bad at the time. (I used to have blisters when I took off my work uniform, from the seams touching my skin. Not nice.) 

You can see from the picture on the mannequin that the armholes are extremely low. This was a very common feature in early 1990s dresses that were intended to be worn with a t-shirt underneath – in fact a lot of them came with a t-shirt pattern included. 

eternal magpie recycled duvet cover pink flamingo dress pattern - Style 2910
eternal magpie recycled duvet cover pink flamingo dress pattern – Style 2910

This one, which I found during one of my extensive Etsy-browsing sessions, doesn’t include a t-shirt pattern but it does include a version that’s a jumpsuit! According to Instagram (which is apparently my style guide now, rather than Pinterest), jumpsuits and dungarees are very popular amongst Creative Types at the moment.

I do own a pair of dungarees, but they’re two sizes too big (aaah, the joys of internet shopping…) and strictly for wearing only while digging up the garden. And though I’m not usually one to jump on board a bandwagon, I do have to admit that I’m looking at that left-hand illustration and contemplating my fabric stash. Organic cotton checks, maybe? Or a floral duvet cover?

I don’t tend to buy many sewing patterns on Etsy these days – most often I’ll see a style that I like, and then figure out how to draft an approximation of the pattern for myself. Partly that’s because so few patterns are available in my size, and partly because the cost of shipping from the USA (where so many vintage patterns seem to be) has increased quite dramatically – particularly since Etsy has started charging fees to sellers on their shipping costs and forced people to put up their prices.

Anyway… I am extremely tempted by this one. It’s reasonably priced, it’s in my size, and it’s in the UK so no extortionate postage costs, and it should arrive pretty quickly. 

1990s dungarees, at the age of forty-four. Shall I? 

Only Eight Who Do.

Tote bag with recycled slogan patch
Tote bag with recycled slogan patch

Look, I finally got around to something I’ve been meaning to do for ages!

This central panel used to be a tote bag that I bought from The Body Shop way back in 1992, or thereabouts, at the height of supermodel mania. The glossy magazines were filled with Naomi Campbell, Kate Moss, Elle McPherson, Christy Turlington, and presumably four other supermodels who I can’t remember right now. (1992 was a long time ago!)

The tote bag had been on its last legs for a very long time – the straps were frayed and fragile, and the fabric was stained in the corners from 20+ years of spilled drinks and lunches. I didn’t want to throw it out because I love the sentiment:

“there are three billion women who don’t look like supermodels, and only eight who do”.

The Body Shop

Recently my husband brought home a new tote bag from an IT conference, so I decided to chop up my beloved old one, and use it to cover up the huge logo on the new bag. All I did was cut out the central panel, and use one of the fancy embroidery stitches on my sewing machine to attach it to the new bag. I didn’t bother with hemming the edges – I knew that the fabric would fray, and I quite like the visual reminder that it’s actually a bit old and worn out – just like me!  Even without a sewing machine, this would be a super easy fix. You could stitch a patch onto a new bag by hand, you could use fabric glue, or you could use an iron-on interfacing to stick it into place.  We have another one of these bags, and my husband has at least one beloved t-shirt that’s becoming too worn out to wear, so that would be an ideal candidate for a similar makeover. Cut out the print, stick or stitch it over the logo, done! 

What’s In Your Pockets? July Edition

eternal magpie tunic dress with pocket full of plums
eternal magpie tunic dress with pocket full of plums

It’s July, and here in the UK we’re in the middle of a heatwave! Most of my garden is looking a little bit dried up and sad, but next door’s tree is full of lovely ripe plums. 

We’re currently between neighbours, and the plums were starting to fall off the tree and attract wasps. We didn’t want them to go to waste, so we’ve picked the ones we could reach and popped them into the freezer. Our current plan is to make some kind of plum liqueur with them, and give it to our new neighbours as a housewarming gift. 

It turns out that one nice big eternal magpie pocket can easily hold 350 grams of lovely little ripe plums – and one tiny little pink caterpillar! 

I definitely wouldn’t recommend leaning over the fence and picking your neighbours’ fruit… but if you know where to look you can quite often find plums and cherry plums growing wild. (The park close to my house has a couple of lovely cherry plum trees.) And it’s been so hot lately that blackberries are starting to ripen already, so if you’re lucky you might be able to spot a few nice juicy ones. 

What are you going to put into your pockets this month? 

Outfit Post: summer sun & bloomers confusion

eternal magpie Spellbound dress and bloomers
eternal magpie Spellbound dress and bloomers

This is a fashion statement which I’m going to be calling “middle-aged overheated goth recovers from uncharacteristically busy day with a nice cup of tea”. 
Reckon it’ll catch on? 

I know it seems ridiculous to be wearing black in the middle of a heatwave, but I did have a good reason, I promise. I was going to a creative session run by the local art group, Jelly, and I didn’t know how much mess I was going to make. From that point of view, a white or pale summer outfit seemed like a rather bad idea!

It sounds very dramatic and a bit over the top to say that outfits like this have saved me this summer, but I think it’s true. My fibromyalgia doesn’t cope very well at all with the heat, and having any kind of restrictive clothing touching me can cause quite a lot of pain. These dresses, and the bloomers, are so light and flowing that they’re really, really comfortable. 

(PS – if you’re a UK size 6-8, I have a dress in this fabric in stock for you.)

eternal magpie bloomers in white cotton batiste
eternal magpie bloomers in white cotton batiste

I did have the bloomers for sale on the website, but then the manufacturers discontinued my favourite elastic, and I couldn’t find a way to make the size chart not-confusing, so I temporarily took them down again. That was about a year ago. Oops.

As far as the elastic goes, I’m now making these with one inch wide elastic inside a folded waistband, as in the photo above. I have seen a similar elastic to the frilled-edge one that I used to use, but it’s four times as expensive and not as soft, so I’m not totally convinced it’s going to be a good replacement. I need to make a pair for myself using the new elastic, and see how they feel. 

I don’t think I’ve managed to un-confuse the size chart either… and a quick question about it on social media the other day resulted in requests for lots more information, including actual garment measurements, so that’s something that I need to work on. 

For now though, the bloomers are available to order… but if you really have no idea which size to go for, just let me know your actual waist and hip measurements in the notes when you check out, and I’ll run up a nice loose pair that should fit you nicely! 

Lovely Testimonials: Rebecca

eternal magpie feedback from Rebecca
eternal magpie feedback from Rebecca

Yesterday I received this lovely message from Rebecca. 

The first one of these dresses that I made for myself was because I was having surgery and needed something comfy to wear afterwards, so it’s good to know that they work for other people too! 

eternal magpie Celestial dress and bloomers outfit
eternal magpie Celestial dress and bloomers outfit

My own stars and moon dress is also getting a lot of wear this summer – it’s a lovely lightweight cotton which is really comfortable to wear, and it washes and dries nice and quickly. 

I have two in stock, one in a size 20-22, and one in size 26. I also have enough fabric left to make a couple more, which you can order in children’s sizes, or in adult sizes.  

So, here’s to wishing Rebecca the best of luck in recovering from her surgery… and meanwhile we’re happily discussing some gorgeous vintage curtains that are going to be turned into a dress one day – when they’re not adorning Rebecca’s windows!

Reducing waste by design

cutting layout for smock with zero fabric waste
cutting layout for smock with zero fabric waste

I’ve been wearing my ancient cheesecloth blouse since the heatwave started. As I pulled it from the washing line yesterday I realised that it’s made entirely from rectangles, which means that no fabric waste was left over from its production. This has been bothering me lately. I’ve been making lavender bags and summer hats from my fabric scraps, and I donated a bag of bits to a friend who’s organising a charity quilt project, but I still have more leftovers than I’d like. So… why not try and design the leftovers out?

This rang a bell with a cutting diagram that I’d seen in one of my textile history books… and here it is! How to cut a top or dress, using the maximum width of the fabric, without wasting a single piece. 

nineteenth century smock
nineteenth century smock

The garment in question is one of these – a nineteenth century smock – but the construction is identical to the summer blouse I’m wearing today. 

The first volunteering I did for the Museum of English Rural Life, about nine years ago, was documenting their collection of smocks, so I’ve been lucky enough to get my hands on about sixty examples of the real thing. Another volunteer and I took detailed measurements, studied whether they’d been stitched by hand or machine, and described the patterns of smocking and embroidery stitches on each garment. One particularly interesting thing we noticed was that the vast majority of the adult smocks were made from the same width of fabric, regardless of the size of the wearer. The side seams were almost always made from the selvedges, so we could see straight away that the entire width of fabric had been used. 

I’m starting to feel an experiment coming on… not to replicate a 19th century smock, because I know how much time that would take! And probably not a 1970s or 80s smock like the ones in my pattern books. But maybe a pintucked blouse or a coat dress, made entirely from rectangles, with no scraps left over. I like that idea very much. 

smocked aesthetic dress
smocked aesthetic dress

Mind you, there is one thing I’d like to replicate at some point… and that’s a smocked aesthetic dress. Obviously this one has a much more complex construction, including a very heavily structured inner layer. Not quite the no-waste experiment I’m looking at right now, but isn’t it gorgeous? 

What would you keep in your pockets?

Image copyright Rainbright Photography
Image © Rainbright Photography

For our dress giveaway, Sarah of Rainbright Photography and I asked folks to leave a comment describing what their child would be most likely to keep in the pockets of this dress. The results were many and varied, ranging from kisses (so sweet!) to little toys. Certain themes did crop up quite frequently though, so I’ve compiled a Top Five list of Things To Keep In Your Pockets: 

what would you keep in your pockets?
what would you keep in your pockets?

Stones, pebbles and rocks were the most popular answer, by a very long way! Maybe the current painted rock craze has something to do with that… or perhaps everybody loves a nice smooth pebble? 

Daisies and other flowers were second on the list – perhaps inspired by Sarah’s beautiful photos of Sienna, who definitely enjoyed picking lots of different flowers and popping them in her pockets! 

After that, there were clear groupings of other items. Natural treasures such as leaves, feathers, sticks, acorns and fir cones were very popular. Then came a selection of actual creatures, from slugs, snails, worms and baby birds to a pet mouse! There was some concern as to whether a pet mouse might nibble a hole… but can’t you just imagine a sweet little mouse curled up in a cosy pocket nest? 

In fifth place, with an equal number of comments, came fairies and snacks – clearly both very important items to keep about your person!

Given that the majority of the pocket treasures on the list are things found in nature… I had an idea to maybe write a monthly(ish) blog post (or start a mailing list) about what you might find out and about each month that you could bring home in your pockets. What do you think? Is that the sort of thing you might be interested in reading, either on the blog or in an email? Let me know!