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julielivingstone

~ It isn't always about getting what you want. Sometimes it's about wanting what you've got.

julielivingstone

Monthly Archives: February 2016

Prior Preparation & Planning Prevents Poor Performance?

18 Thursday Feb 2016

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design, fabric, ideas, workshop

I’m excited to be going to a workshop on heat transfer dying with Angela Ferolla this weekend. Angela teaches at the Fremantle Arts Centre, among other places, and I’ve done other workshops with her before. This one is being run by my neighbourhood group of the Australian Sewing Guild.
In preparation I’ve been trying to come up with some designs to put onto fabric, with the idea of being able to use the fabric for something afterwards. I find often that going to workshops results in a bunch of samples of different techniques, but I tend to bring them home and put them in a drawer, and never end up doing anything with them. I’d really like to be able to come home with a piece of fabric that would be useful, to go into a garment, although to be fair that’s not what the workshop is designed for, it’s supposed to be an opportunity to learn new techniques. However, I think that if I put some thought into it beforehand, I ought to be able to use the new techniques to create a coherent piece which I can then transform into a garment. I’ve sorted out two or three potential bits of fabric from my stash, all a metre or two long, although the requirement list says ‘A3 or bigger’. This in itself was a bit of a challenge, since the dyes only work on synthetic fabrics, and my stash tends strongly towards natural fibres. I had one piece in mind which I was unsure about, but when I did a burn test I’m pretty sure it’s natural, probably rayon, which is no good. I’ve always found the burn test difficult to carry out successfully, I’m not sure why, but there was a definite smell of burning paper, which doesn’t seem like the fabric is synthetic.
I also spent some time playing with some images, although I chose to focus just on shapes rather than colour, because I didn’t have any of the dyes to practice with, and I’m not sure how their colours will relate to watercolours or acrylics, which I do have. I looked out some photos I’d taken at my daughter’s property, and found this shot of old fence wire, which I think has potential.
coils of old fence wire
There was also this, a just-opening agapanthus flower head.
partly opened agapanthus flower head
It remains to be seen whether I actually use either of those images, and whether I manage to come home with a usable piece of fabric!
Another shot from the country
sheep and puppy

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Slow Clothing

04 Thursday Feb 2016

Posted by julielivingstone in Uncategorized

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clothes, reconstructed, recycled, sewing, upcycled

I don’t ‘do’ Facebook, but I do occasionally look at others’ pages, and something on the Australian Sewing Guild’s page caught my eye recently. It was called ‘Slow Clothing – 40 garments in 40 days’. Wow, I thought, if I made 40 garments in 40 days I wouldn’t call that slow! At my recent rate of progress 40 garments in 4 years would be more likely.

Of course, all was not what it seemed. The Slow Clothing Project is an initiative by a Queensland sewer (or maker, to use her term) designed to get people to think about where there clothes come from, who made them, and whether they really need yet another pair of jeans. It’s the antithesis of fast fashion, the current cult of buying the latest look, having a whole new wardrobe every season, a new dress for every party, and then just discarding stuff when it’s only been worn once or twice, or maybe even not ever.

The 40 garments will be made by 40 different people, a diverse batch of makers scattered around Australia. Using either cast off clothing, or fabric from their own stashes, they will refashion, recycle, upcycle, reclaim or rework the fabric into new garments. The intention is to demonstrate that even though something isn’t brand new, it can be a useful and stylish garment which can have a new life.

Apparently Australia exports 70 million kilograms of cast off clothing to the third world each year, and presumably other countries are on a par with that. Only 20% of the clothing in op shops actually finds a new home, so even if you give your unwanted clothes to the op shop you aren’t really helping the situation much. Not buying so many new clothes would be far better, and save you money!

I started shopping in op shops some time ago when money was short, and now I still do it, because I can find plenty of things to wear without contributing to the wasteful industry that is high street fashion. Some things I buy to wear just as they are, others get re-fashioned. I’ve recently been shopping for some garments to use for the Castaway to Couture competition, but even that gives me pause. I wanted about 5 garments to use to make my one entry, and I do feel uncomfortable about destroying 5 perfectly good pieces of clothing which somebody else could have bought and worn as they were, whereas I will only end up with one garment. With that in mind I limited myself to shopping for the items which were half price, since I am pretty sure that these are the ones which are destined to go to landfill next week, or shortly anyway. I’m quite happy with what I’ve got, now to start creating!

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