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November 08, 2007
chilly morning
Frost on the grass today.
These past two days have felt a lot more like November should, but I have to say that after more than a month of the typical Georgia autumn, in which the mornings are cold and by lunchtime it's up in the seventies again, to have it suddenly stay cold all day is a bit of a harsh transition to make.
I really have to get some sweaters made, since I prefer not to wear stuff over the dresses that I haven't made myself. Gotta start thinking about a jacket too. Last night I had to go out late and it was 4 Celsius (I know I've said before that 4 degrees is t-shirt weather, but that's only in March after a hard winter; that's how relativity works, kids). So I cheated and wore a sweater coat over my dress, a really sweet oversize curling coat that I got at the buckapound over the summer, with intarsia curling rocks and brooms all over it. I'm looking forward to making that my number one winter coat once this project is over, but for now I've got to either get sewing or be cold.
Posted by jodi at 08:39 PM | Comments (2) | categories: canadians love to talk about the weather : wardrobe project
September 03, 2007
printing weekend
Yesterday I printed another layer of woodcut over three of the skirts I've been wearing:
My goal is to make a change to each garment in between each wearing. The ink on these is already dry, so I'll be wearing one tomorrow.
I also printed up a small batch of shirts for the shop:
Tonight is my last night of dogsitting, so tomorrow I'll be back on the sewing machine and hope to make some progress on a few more new dresses. This week I'm also going to get the knitting machine set up and start working on the knit portion of my thesis project. Although the days are still hot, these last few mornings have been cooler, giving me hope that I may actually need the sweaters sometime soon (but not too soon).
Posted by jodi at 07:28 PM | Comments (4) | categories: capitalist pig : in the studio : wardrobe project
August 22, 2007
so far.
If you like, you can follow this link to my MFA thesis blog. It's ugly but serviceable, and we'll get it looking like the rest of the site soon.
Posted by jodi at 07:26 PM | Comments (1) | categories: wardrobe project
August 19, 2007
it's too hot
I see now how it's going to be. Hundred degree days stretch out before me like an endless, hot, freshly laid gooey black road in a flat, treeless, relentlessly sunny landscape. I'm beginning to believe that I won't experience a day with temperatures in the double digits again until I set foot back in Canada (and not just because in Canada the thermometer doesn't go to a hundred).
I'm trying to get a new piece of clothing made every night to wear the next day and failing miserably, not because I'm not excited about this project or because I don't have the time to sew, but because I drop every article of sewing like a hot potato as soon as I get to the point where it needs to be ironed. I've made two of these gathered skirts and they're easy and painless, just a big tube gathered onto a strip of t-shirt material, but I want to do some more complex, tailored things, professional clothes, shirts with buttons, shapely aprons, pleats, darts. IT'S TOO HOT. Tonight I cut out a charming little surplice top from a vintage pattern (printed in 1970, isn't it odd to be the same age as something that can be called "vintage"?), but when I had all the pieces cut it hit me: facings. Need to be ironed. Bah.
Posted by jodi at 08:57 PM | Comments (10) | categories: canadians love to talk about the weather : wardrobe project
August 16, 2007
one week he's in polka-dots, the next week he's in stripes
Today was the first day of classes, and I taught my first litho class today. It's also the day I chose to kick off a little performance project I'll continue until I graduate, in which I'll wear clothes made from my prints every single day. I'll continue to print and draw on the clothes as I wear them, and date stamp each item every day that I wear it. Eventually I'd like to have both tops and bottoms printed/drawn/made or altered by me, but for now, since I didn't really get all any of the sewing done that I wanted to over the summer, I'm mixing and matching with plain things. All of my tops and skirts that are not a plain solid colour, and t-shirts not printed by me, I left back home. I'm also going to whip out some plain jumpers on the knitting machine that I can print on and print from and wear. They'll get kind of gunky with ink but I think it could be fun.
This project isn't just about making clothes, but rather than write about it just yet I'm just making the work and thinking about a lot of things that are all tangled up together, some of them contradictory. More later when I start to weed out all of the less important ideas and whittle it down to why I'm doing this.
Here's the new skirt I wore today, and my "first-day-of-teaching" outfit (who's the dumbass who gives a litho stone graining demo in high heels? me, of course):
I don't have a good close up photo of the fabrics, but the skirt will get printed on some more anyway. The shirt will too.
I'm working on a skirt tonight in this yellow/green fabric, and can't decide whether this little fragment of last year's embroidered drawings would make a nice patch pocket or whether it's gawdawful ugly. I'll probably end up putting it on there anyway, because ugly doesn't actually matter that much to me and I need pockets.
Posted by jodi at 08:14 PM | Comments (4) | categories: wardrobe project
July 12, 2007
one step closer to ugly bag lady
We're taking a weekend off to take the train up to Toronto, visit friends and buy some kozo at the Japanese Paper Place warehouse. I hate walking around crowded places with my ratty yellow purse gaping open with the digital camera coyly hanging out waiting to get stolen (and also the many knitting needle holes in the front of the bag are starting to stretch and fray), so I made myself a new satchel for the trip. Check out the awesomeness but please ignore the ugliness of the fabrics; it's canvas I hadn't yet finished printing on, all part of what I've started referring to as my "clown project", in which I will spend my final year of grad school wearing clothes made from fabrics I've printed and drawn on, and in which I expect to look if not like a clown then like someone who gets dressed (and goes clothes shopping) in the dark. Also I'm going to keep drawing on the bag as I use it.
Anyway.
Awesome new satchel!
Under the front flap there's a pocket, and a scary head. Some of you may recognize her.
Inside, a big pocket, a loop to attach my keys to, and a cell phone pocket. This pocket is almost too small for my phone, which only confirms my suspicion that cell phones are evil and also useless. That's okay, because the cell is my Athens phone and as soon as I'm finished grad school I'll get rid of it, and then I can use this little pocket to hold tampons, yo. And microfilms.
Posted by jodi at 12:21 PM | Comments (11) | categories: wardrobe project