Slow Fashion October, Week 4: WORN

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Slow Fashion October, Week 4: WORN

Happy Week 4 of Slow Fashion October, where our theme is WORN — i.e. heirlooms / second-hand / mending / caring for things / laundering for longevity / design for longevity (bucking trends, quality materials …). Longevity is an overarching theme of the slow fashion discussion, but it’s not just about choosing well-made goods over cheap ones, it’s also about how to care for those things or extend the life of those you already own. There have already been so many great stories shared about treasured garments and their long lives, and I’m hoping to hear lots more, along with lots of thoughts on how to make things last.

My hope had been to have that previously-promised sashiko tutorial for you today, but sometimes I bite off a bit more than I can chew and I’ve definitely done that this month. With everything going on, I haven’t been able to photograph and write that yet, but I will get to it as soon as it’s feasible, I swear.

Meanwhile, I want to point you to my essay from last spring, Make, Knit, Mend, if you haven’t already read it. And I also want to direct your attention to some people who are specifically influential to me and/or in the larger community when it comes to this week’s theme. Images clockwise from top left, this group leans very heavily on the mending end of things, which is just one facet of the week’s theme—

– Tom van Deijnen (aka @tomofholland) runs the Visible Mending Programme and launched the #visiblemending hashtag on Instagram

– Luke Deverell of Darn and Dusted is another huge influence, doing beautiful things to worn-out garments and working to change people’s perceptions of mended clothing — also on IG as @darnanddusted

– Katrina Rodabaugh of Make, Thrift, Mend was mentioned in my Make, Knit, Mend post above — I met her at the embroidermending workshop that inspired that post (and where I did my first patch to those jeans everyone asks about). She’s been making especially great contributions to the #slowfashionoctober feed; see her @katrinarodabaugh page for that

– Molly de Vries, my good friend at Ambatalia (who makes the indispensable Bento Bags) has “the non-disposable life” as her personal mantra and posts a lot on her Instagram feed about her strategies for everything from avoiding take-out waste to laundering her clothes so they’ll last

I can’t wait to hear from you all this week!

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PREVIOUSLY in Slow Fashion October: Slotober Frock step 2: What will it be?

Elsewhere: SFO edition 2

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Elsewhere: Slotober edition 2

Slow Fashion October rages on, to my great delight. Here are some highlights and related links for this week—

– Best, funniest slow fashion-y tale of all time: the conclusion of Eight Yarns, One Sweater (and yay! Kay and Anne are blogging again)

– Lots of people discussing/questioning the kids’ clothing aspect of all of this; I wanted to highlight this blog post of Wilfumina’s ; see also @brienne_moody’s great IG post as well as @xilary’s

– Loved this personal history from Fancy Jaime, one of my handmade heroes

– and seeing the Kollabora team jump in

– Thoughts on slow fashion from a fast-fashion employee

– An episode of Craft in America (recommended by Karin Marie in comments), which I haven’t had a chance to watch but sounds fascinating, Threads

– Same goes for this podcast interview with the founder of Zady (recommended by Beatrice)

– And I’m eager to catch up on the latest contributions on this topic from A Playful Day and Curious Handmade (I need to figure out to work podcast time into my life somehow)

– Favorites from the #slowfashionoctober feed this week include Bristol’s hand-me-down sweater and this extremely dapper fellow (and so many more — please check out the full feed!)

– Two newly launched ventures I want to mention: Sifted aspires to be a slow-fashion directory/resource, and Martha McQuade’s @fiberdestash will help you re-home your stash. I’ve also seen talk of attempts to put together a fabric stash exchange of some kind. Will you all please note any and all resources like this in the comments below?

I also want to congratulate my friends Sam Lamb and Elizabeth Duvivier of Squam fame on the collaboration that’s resulted in their first sewing pattern, the West Water tunic — which felt especially sweet to me since I met Sam at my first Squam (which was also her first Squam) and my cabin (and Anna’s) was West Water. Love all these ladies. Also brand-new are the Fancies’ Fen Pattern, which I’ve been impatiently awaiting for  months, and Jen’s Tamarack Jacket. Can I please have a week to do nothing but sew all day and knit all night??

Bookhou large pocket pouches from Fringe Supply Co.

OK, speaking of known-origin, artisan-made goods, I’m happy to announce that these beloved Bookhou large pocket pouches are finally back in stock at Fringe Supply Co., in a couple of new print variations. Arounna of Bookhou is one of my heroes. She draws her designs, screenprints her fabric, and does all of the cutting, sewing and leatherwork, all in her Toronto studio with the help of her mother on the production end. Beauty, quality, utility and artistry — the whole package. I love being able to say that your support of Fringe Supply Co. not only makes it and this blog possible but also helps to support small maker businesses like Bookhou. Thank you so incredibly much to everyone for that.

I’m off to my very first Rhinebeck!! Have a great weekend, wherever you are.

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PREVIOUSLY: Elsewhere, SFO edition 1

Photos left to right: @brienne_moody, Anne Shayne, @bristolivy

Slotober Frock step 2: What will it be?

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Slotober Frock step 2: What will it be?

Where this fabric Allison made is concerned, there are two of me:

One me thinks this is very special fabric and that I need to think long and hard about what it wants to be. I don’t want to rush into anything, cut it hastily, risk wasting it by sewing it into the Wrong Thing. The extreme version of this me thinks the wisest thing to do — especially given how Spring-y the fabric feels to me — is to say, you know what, I’m going to learn the lessons of Slow Fashion October and not try to crank out a dress this month after all, because that would be rushing it and making for the sake of making (to meet my own arbitrarily set goal) rather than being certain I’m spending my time and energy making something I’ll truly get a lot of use out of.

The other me thinks, yes, this is indeed special fabric, but it’s not actually spun from GOLD! I don’t want to overthink it and risk paralyzing myself out of fear of getting it wrong. This is also supposed to be fun, right? The extreme version of this me wants to sew it up into a floor-length Anna gown and pray for just one occasion in my life where a dress that dramatic could go. It would be the most beautiful dress ever. And I would wear it with my biker boots.

Here’s the thing about this fabric that’s stumping me a bit, if I’m being 100% honest: I’m not sure it’s me. I think it’s gorgeous and amazing and I could happily stare at it for hours on end. But how much does it have to do with the rest of my wardrobe? What do I layer it with? Can I make a single outfit with other things I own, or is it only worn one way: on its own.

The best word for it is pretty — it is insanely pretty — and that’s not a trait I relate to much. It would be very simple to sew it into a very pretty dress for someone else. (I see all those hands shooting up right now.) What’s harder is figuring out what it can be that’s me. I have to be able to imagine getting up in the morning and putting it on. It’s also quite a statement, and like I was saying the other day, that tends to limit frequency of wear. I feel like whatever it is needs to be fairly spare and simple — I don’t want to be drowned by the pattern or to feel like the dress is wearing me, but a simpler shape will also allow the fabric to shine.

So I’ve sketched a bit. I’ve piled the fabric onto my dress form. I’ve started a Pinterest board. For now, I’m just going to think about it. But not too hard.

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PREVIOUSLY in Slow Fashion October: Week 3, LOVED

Cowichan-style Knitalong FO No. 1: Andrea Rangel

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Cowichan-style Knitalong FO No. 1: Andrea Rangel

Andrea Rangel is the first of our illustrious panel for the Cowichan-style Knitalong to finish her vest — not too surprising since her swatch was two entire front panels of the sweater! She’s answered some questions for us below about how it turned out, and you can see additional photos on her blog.

For more from Andrea, follow her on Instagram and sign up for her newsletter. And I also want to let you know she’s on the brink of publishing a revised, unisex version of her Dude sweater as well as a kids’ version! Would you look at this photo? So keep an eye on her in whatever venue for more news on that!

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You mentioned at the outset that you had chosen a yarn that was “not one bit” Cowichan-y. And you’ve also knitted this with a single strand at bulky gauge rather than superbulky. How do you feel about the weight and character of the fabric in the end?

This is the most important question about this project for sure. I used Rowan Brushed Fleece, which was just this frothy, fluffy puff of a super soft yarn. The gauge is great and the yarn was fun to work with, but I’m still not really satisfied. As I worked I felt increasingly ridiculous for using such an incredibly luxurious, soft yarn for outerwear that I would hardly have against my skin. I’ve decided that, while I do quite like the finished vest, the yarn would be much more suitable for a pullover or neckwear so I could take full advantage of the yummy softness. It would also be more sensible to have a more serious, rugged wool for a vest like this. At the beginning of this project my first impulse was to go with Imperial Yarns Native Twist or Quince and Co. Puffin, and for the next iteration of a bulky vest, I’ll go with one of those (or now that Brooklyn Tweed has Quarry, I might have to try that too). I’ll see how much I end up wearing this vest to determine whether the project was a success or not in the long run.

You were also unsure whether you’d be happy with your color choices — what’s the verdict?

I like how it looks, but I still feel unsure how much it’ll fit into my wardrobe. The colors are so bold! The next vest will definitely be in more earthy or natural colors.

I’m in love with the main motif you came up with — the starburst shape — and they way you’ve positioned it so there’s one centered off each side seam, rather than being centered in the back of the vest. Where did all of that come from?

My husband actually helped me brainstorm that one a bit and then we just charted it out. I figured that since I was objecting to the highly decorative look of the motif in the pattern I’d try something totally different.

The size also looks fantastic — did you hit your target proportions and are you happy with it?

Yes! The size turned out great, pretty much right on the predicted numbers. I expected that it would given my (excessive) swatching — thank you, math!

Tell us what all modifications you wound up making, apart from the gauge/size tweaks and replacing the colorwork motifs.

I forgot to knit pockets, so I decided I must not have wanted them that badly. But I did round the armholes and add short row shaping to give a nice slope to the shoulders. I also worked the edgings, button bands, and collar with a smaller needle after completing everything else to keep them neat. The collar was improvised rather than bothering with the pattern and it’s a bit slimmer, which I like.

For the edgings and button bands, I used a US9 needle to pick up stitches at about a rate of 2 sts for every 3 rows. Then I worked a few rows in garter stitch and bound them off. I made one-row buttonholes, which is my favorite buttonhole method. For the collar, I used the traditional method that I described in the Cowichan q&a. To keep the collar relatively slim, I worked the front collars just to about an inch below the shoulder seam. Then I picked up and worked the back collar with the front flaps. Because this method requires you to join the back collar stitches with front flap stitches until the front flap stitches are used up, the top width of the front flaps (how many stitches you end up with after working the front flaps) determines how tall the back collar will be. If you keep picking up stitches and working the front flaps all the way to the shoulder seam, you’ll have a more generous collar than I ended up with.

As you’ve watched other sweaters taking shape on Instagram and Ravelry, was there anything you wished you’d done differently?

I was definitely jealous of the Puffin, Native Twist, and Quarry I was seeing. I just love those wooly wools so much! It’s been really fun to see everyone’s take on this and I’m happy with mine, but not so happy that I won’t keep pursuing this idea in other ways. Bulky vests are fun!

They really are, and it’s already clear to me there there’s another one in my near future. Do you mind if I steal your starbursts?

Not at all! In fact, I just posted my charts on my blog so anyone can use them.

Awesome! Thanks for everything, Andrea!

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PREVIOUSLY IN #fringeandfriendskal2015: How to knit a Cowichan-style collar (full series here)

How to knit a Cowichan-style shawl collar

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How to knit a Cowichan-style shawl collar

We’ve talked about and looked at a lot of Cowichan sweaters in the course of this knitalong, and clearly one of the most distinctive characteristics is that little shawl collar, so important in the blustery Pacific Northwest climate, where a Cowichan is considered outerwear. With our shaping-free, Japanese, Cowichan-style vest pattern, it’s also the most interesting part of the knitting. And also a little bit cryptic. But once you’ve worked it and worn it, you’ll find yourself wanting to knit one on every sweater going forward.

Andrea talked in our interview last week about the traditional way the collar is worked, which is a little bit different from how the knitalong pattern has you do it. If you’ve read her description and it makes sense to you, I can’t see any reason you couldn’t do the collar that way on this vest. But I want to walk you through how to do it as the pattern is written.

First, let’s review: You knit the back piece, which is just a big rectangle with cutouts for the armholes. Then you knit the two front pieces, increasing gradually toward the tops of those pieces to create a pair of triangular flaps for the front parts of the collar. You bind off the shoulder stitches and keep those top flap stitches live on a holder (while you block your pieces). Once the shoulders are seamed together, you pick up 17 sts across the back neck and from those knit the flap for the back part of the collar. Then you seam the back collar and the two front collar flaps together.

For that back flap, you need to scrutinize the pattern. On the diagram, there’s an annotation at one end of the flap that says 9 sts are increased to get the correct finished width. At the other end is the “#-#-#” style annotation that Meri explained for us. It tells you to increase 1 stitch every other row seven times (14 rows), then 1 stitch every row for 2 rows. Again, that gives you 9 new stitches (over the course of 16 rows, followed by 4 work-even rows). In both cases, these annotations are referring to one end of the flap. To get the inverted trapezoid shape and the necessary 35 sts, you need to work those increases at both ends. I’ve written that out another way and in a little more detail here.

Once you’ve knitted and bound off that back flap, all that’s left is to seam it together. But wait, you’ve got live stitches for the front collar and selvages on the back collar. What to do?! I had ideas, but I was curious to know how some of the greatest minds in knitting would do it, so I took the sample sweater with me to the trade show last spring and passed it around. All sorts of people weighed in, and pretty much everyone had a different idea about how they would do it (including not having done it this way in the first place). Then Olga Buraya-Kefelian — who I’m always calling “our foremost knitting engineer” — took one look at it, said what she would do, and everyone else said some version of, “forget mine, do what Olga said!” That’s Olga with my sweater in the photo up there, between Bristol Ivy and Julie Hoover, three of the sharpest, most technical knitters I know. This was also when Bristol clued me in about Navajo ply. Olga’s solution seemed simple and obvious once she’d said it, but I don’t mind telling you it was a little daunting to do it with everyone watching — Navajo ply plus this bind-off in a very noisy and crowded hotel lobby after I’d had a couple of drinks. If I can do it under those circumstances, anyone can!

It really is simple. All you need to do is take a smaller needle and run it under 18 bumps along the back collar selvage — to match the 18 live sts on the front flap — and knit them together just like a 3-needle bind-off. (If you’re working with yarn held double or triple, make sure you’re picking up the whole stitch and not just one strand of it.) This is garter stitch we’re dealing with, 20 rows or 10 ridges, making it easy to pick up the 10 bumps at the ends of those ridges, so you just need another 8 sts from the gaps in between. It doesn’t look very pretty, as you see in my photo up there, but it works out!

Keep in mind that a ridge will form where you do the 3-needle bind-off seam, so you need to think about whether you work it with right sides or wrong sides together, depending on whether you want that seamline to show on the front or back of the collar. I chose to have it exposed, so I knitted them together exactly as they’re pictured above, with right sides (or outsides) facing me.

If you haven’t done a 3-needle bind-off before, it’s simple: You insert your working needle into the first stitch on the front needle and the first stitch on the back needle, then knit them together. Work the next stitch the same way and pass the first one over to bind it off. Then repeat to the end of the row, working the stitches together and passing the previous one over. Tada!

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PREVIOUSLY IN #fringeandfriendskal2015: The Cowichan influence with Andrea Rangel (full series here)

Slow Fashion October, Week 3: LOVED

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Slow Fashion October, Week 3: LOVED

Week 3 of Slow Fashion October is upon us, and this week’s theme is LOVED, as in your proudest accomplishment / most loved item / most frequently worn item / thing you saved up for / investment pieces / thing you worked a long time on / oldest thing that’s still in rotation. (I just noticed that’s seven suggested prompts and I might literally do one per day on Instagram this week.) What is it about those items that makes them so cherished?

I wrote last week about some of my most-loved and most-worn pieces, but in anticipation of this week I’ve been thinking about the times in my life where I put on an outfit and thought, man, this is it. This is what it feels like to put on clothes that are me. The first time it ever happened I think I must have been 11 or 12 years old. My mom told me she’d heard about a new children’s boutique one suburb south of us and she thought we should check it out. I was old enough to be mortified at the idea of being taken to a children’s boutique, but shopping was also something of a difficulty with my mother and me, and I was not about to turn her down. It turned out to be full of things that made me drool, but the defining moment was when I tried on a burgundy velvet pantsuit that fit as if it had been custom made for me, and was the coolest outfit I’d ever been near, much less in. My mom or the shoplady, I don’t know, had picked out a dusty pink blouse to go under it, and there happened to be a matching pink “silk” (who knows) scarf with Karen written on it in burgundy caligraphy. Which of course got tucked under the collar, ends dangling so you could see the name. It sounds horrific, I know — it must have been 1979-ish? — but I’m telling you, I felt like I could rule the world. I’m sure it was expensive, by our standards, but my mom agreed it had to be mine.

I’m pretty sure I felt the same thrill every time I put that outfit on, and it was definitely a lesson in how good clothes could and should be, but I think that was also the outfit that ultimately taught to me to steer clear of statement outfits. When something is that much of a standout, and thus memorable, you don’t get to wear it very often. People will definitely recall that you had it on the last time you saw them. And I either didn’t yet have the hang of mixing and matching, or I didn’t have other pieces in my closet that would work with just the pants or just the jacket. I’m not sure how often I wore it or what ever became of it, but it was the garment love of my life at that stage. And probably also the birth of my love of a good blazer.

Flash forward to 1994. I’m 25 years old, going through one of my biggest hardships, and had been briefly and tumultuously dating an older man named Bob. We’d decided to stop dating, having found it impossible to get through an evening without having a massive fight about something ridiculous. But before the break-up, I had bought two tickets to a Counting Crows show and made a date with him, and it turned out he still expected to go. Obviously, I needed to look amazing. I was broke but an excellent bargain hunter, so I hit the mall, and I came away with these two items that together gave me all the confidence I needed to go on this awkward non-date. The natural linen tunic came off a clearance rack at The Limited (made in Hong Kong — I just checked) and black linen mini skirt off another clearance rack at The Gap (made in Malaysia). I already had the perfect black sandals. It was the summer of the best tan of my life, and it was also blazing hot in Kansas City — the year all those people died in the Midwest. So the outfit would help keep me cool (physically, anyway) in addition to boosting my confidence.

Bob and I have been together 21 years now. I don’t credit this outfit for it — it was a trouble-filled evening, and we definitely did not get back together that night — but at least I felt amazing in uncomfortable circumstances. And I knew he noticed.

I loved both these garments and, as you can see, have never been able to part with them. For years, they were in an underbed box with some other souvenir clothes, almost all of which I finally parted with when we were packing up for our cross-country move last year. But these two remain. The tunic went back into my closet — I figured it would be useful in the Tennessee heat, and I’ve wound up wearing it multiple times a week since we got here, including through the winter under sweaters. At this point, it’s threadbare and a little discolored around the edges, and I’m glad I have the sewing skills now to make a pattern for its successors. The skirt is a little too small and a lot too short for me now, but it’s still one of the best-designed pieces I’ve ever owned and I think of it all the time. (In fact, there’s a bag in my sewing WIP basket right now that’s black linen with contrast stitching, inspired by this skirt.) It has the perfect shape, perfect pockets, perfect amount of detail. I apologize for not ironing it, but it’s a garment I’m studying and thinking about how to translate it into something that will work for me now. Garments with long lives and legacies, that’s what I crave.

I just realized the most recent instance of pulling on an outfit and having that magical feeling has a lot in common with the linen combo above — it’s the linen and wool combo below, which I don’t apologize for posting again! Perhaps somewhere in the back of my mind it reminded me of my Counting Crows clothes, or maybe it’s a coincidence. But it’s nice to feel that old feeling again, this time in clothes knitted and sewn with my own two hands.

Slow Fashion October, Week 3: LOVED

PREVIOUSLY in Slow Fashion October: Elsewhere

Elsewhere: SFO edition

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Elsewhere: Slow Fashion October edition

The abundance and richness of discussion that have sprung up around Slow Fashion October is already beyond whatever I may have anticipated, and I continue to do my best to keep up. If you haven’t read the comments and blog posts on this week’s theme post, that alone could keep you busy for a bit. I’m also attempting to highlight some of the standout posts at Instagram by mentioning them on the @slowfashionoctober feed. If you’re not technically on Instagram, click through to that feed in your web browser and explore those. I highly recommending spending some quality time with the entire #slowfashionoctober Instagram feed, though — it’s pretty amazing. And also the hashtag activity at Twitter.

I’m planning to do an Elsewhere-style post every Friday this month, as a way to highlight some of the great blogger contributions and also to mention some other/related worthwhile links, so here we go:

SLOW FASHION OCTOBER

– Z’s origin story cracked me up (and she also did a great post recently about some ethical shoe brands)

– I love Felicia Semple’s thoughts and her focus for the month on making herself the frocks she never gets to, but don’t miss this earlier post from her about the human brain and desire

– Karyn Valino is spending the month revisiting patterns she sewed when she was new to sewing — read her intro and keep up with her series as it develops here

– Then there’s Liesl Gibson on living with plenty

– Fibre Sprite on the distinction between sustainability and wasting less

– and Kristine Vejar on the evolution of her Seam Allowance club (in which she also mentions a few more good shoe companies)

RELATED

– The case for expensive clothes: “The next time you buy something, spend a whole lot on it. Enough that it makes you sweat a little.” (thx, Kay)

– Why I wear the exact same thing to work every day: “To state the obvious, a work uniform is not an original idea. There’s a group of people that have embraced this way of dressing for years—they call it a suit.” (thx, Jennifer)

– The hypocrisy of “helping the poor”: “Every so often, you hear grotesquely wealthy American chief executives announce in sanctimonious tones the intention to use their accumulated hundreds of millions, or billions, “to lift people out of poverty.” …  In most cases, they have made their fortunes by impoverishing whole American communities, having outsourced their manufacturing to China or India, Vietnam or Mexico.” (thx, Elizabeth)

– Vintage Kate Davies: “And we luxury knitters wrap ourselves in fuzzy notions of domestic continuity and tradition, consume mountains of expensive yarn, and somehow still manage to pass off the results as utilitarian and homespun rather than extravagant.” (thx, Brynn)

– Vintage Ysolda: “I pretty much help people to make their own clothes for a living, but I make a very small percentage of my own wardrobe. In many ways, I’m not sure that opting out of the global garment industry is a solution.” (thx, Ashley)

– See also the URLs Bristol Ivy shared in this IG post

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Double Basketweave Cowl kit in Bare at Fringe Supply Co.

In Fringe Supply Co. news, a lot of you have asked for photos of the Double Basketweave Cowl worked up in the undyed Sincere Sheep Luminous and I’m happy to finally have these to share. (Thanks to Jo for knitting the sample!) This version was also knitted with 3 repeats of the pattern instead of 4, for those who’ve wondered about making it a bit narrower. We have a good cache of the undyed cowl kits for you in the shop right now, and we’ll have more of the indigo soon! And in the spirit of Slow Fashion October, I’ll note that all Sincere Sheep yarns are responsibly sourced and naturally dyed.

Have a great weekend, everyone! I’ll see you on the Slow feed.

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PREVIOUSLY: Elsewhere, Cowichan edition