When I was younger — well, up until a few years ago, really — I used to sit around drawing outfits. It was the best way for me organize my thoughts and remind myself of ideas when thinking about how the garments in my closet went together. Or what I needed to shop for. They were super crude — I was never the best at drawing, and didn’t get a lot of practice. But I’m a lifelong admirer of fashion illustration and always dreamed of being good at it.
I’m pretty sure the first I ever heard of Fashionary was a photo last year on @lladybird’s feed. (aka Lauren Taylor of the Lladybird blog — hi, Lauren!) I was stunned at her confident drawings, bemused by her stylish way of staggering the figures on the pages, in awe of how uniformly … sized … they were … hey, wait a minute, what is this? And then I read the caption and learned it’s a sketchbook called Fashionary, which has the faintest of figures outlined on the page for you to draw over. Not to discount Lauren’s illustration skills at all (the girl can draw), but it’s basically cheating! It’s BRILLIANT.
It turned up again a month ago on Grainline Studio, and I broke down and ordered one. The day it came, I started sketching the tops I want to make to go under all my cardigans. Then I sketched my sweater queue. And within a few minutes of receiving it, it ranked among my favorite possessions in the world. So naturally I ordered a big box of them for Fringe Supply Co!
I’m not nearly as talented as Lauren or Jen, but by drawing my same plain line drawings over these figures, and thereby getting the relative proportions right (!) I sorta-kinda look like I know what I’m doing, right? I have never been more excited about my sweater queue.
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p.s. I’ve had a request or two for a post about good tops for wearing with cardigans, and that’s something I’ve actually been working on, so consider that upper image a preview of the post to come!
