Prologue These past few months I rediscovered my love for miniskirts, and since then I've been yearning for sewing shorter and shorter iterations of them. While drafting my own was an option, after days of looking I came across the Sophia Pencil Skirt by Patterns for Pirates. This pattern seemed to offer something for everyone,… Continue reading The Sophia Pencil Skirt: a Tragedy in Three Acts
If you follow me in instagram, the fact that I started wearing clothing other than tailoring - a little corset there, a miniskirt here - must not have passed unnoticed. How did I get from sharp suits to skirts in such a rapid succession? How am I reconciling this dichotomy? I've alway professed there is… Continue reading Reject femininity, embrace…something else?
This is part III of an ongoing series on wasai. Look here for part I, which deals with measuring yourself and cutting your pieces, here for part II to learn to mark the pieces, and here for the introduction. Now you have marked all the pieces, and are ready to sew: congrats, the hard part… Continue reading Another tailoring: sewing an authentic Japanese kimono
This is part II of an ongoing series on wasai. Look here for part I, which deals with measuring yourself and cutting your pieces, and here for the introduction. Now that you have your pieces cut, you need to mark them, since wasai doesn’t allow for notches, and the seam allowance (SA) varies depending on… Continue reading Another tailoring: marking the pieces of an authentic Japanese kimono
You have read my long rant here, have examined your motivations, and are determined to actually sew the kimono? Well let's go then. First off, I want to once again specify we are going to work on an unlined kimono, or 単衣/hitoe. I think cutting is the most interesting part, as it is a zero… Continue reading Another tailoring: cutting an authentic Japanese kimono
Why this guide After almost a decade in Japan I have had the chance to sew myself and others quite the selection of 和服/Wafuku (Japanese clothing): from さみえ/samue, to underwear, to kimono, I have made it all. Recently, though, I started making proper kimono again, a turn of events powered by Yahoo! Auctions and a… Continue reading Another tailoring: a small guide to Wasai and Kimono sewing
"People stare""Back in my country I can wear strappy dresses""Masks are a muzzle. In my country we don't wear them any more""I feel constricted in Japan because *insert reason why Japan is not another country*".I come across comments such as these with some regularity on Instagram, and 90% of the time from white people, mostly… Continue reading Food for Thought III: Cultural Imperialism and majority privilege
After much procrastination, it is here: a short guide on bast fibers in Japan. This took way too long to research, if I have to be honest with you 😅 but in truth I explored several walls of kanji so there’s that. First of, let’s define bast fibers: bast fibers are plant fibers collected from the… Continue reading Bast fibers of Japan
If you follow my Instagram account you must be familiar with a couple of pairs of trousers I have been wearing a lot lately. These pants feature a unique side closure, which is inspired by the iconic and in my opinion problematic Gurkha trousers. When I say iconic, I mean it: Gurkha trousers feature a… Continue reading The Gurkha trousers: when style meets imperialism.
Hello Friends. Yet again another no-tailoring-omg post.As you all know I've been knitting up a storm in the last 9 months or so. I have to say knitting is way more relaxing than sewing, not to mention portable and fairly mindless, so naturally it fits very well in my WFH/office life.After seeing how somebody seemingly reinvented… Continue reading Japanese Knit Charting – 1/?
Making&Candor 