Things you’ll need:

• Assorted photo frames, in various sizes (I got most of mine from thrift stores for 99 cents apiece)
• Tear outs from magazines

The result?

Doesn’t look like much, but I swear, it brings the room together like woah.

A few tips:

• Look at ads as well as editorials. You might have to creatively cut a logo out but some of them have great designs. Protip: using the Tom Ford perfume ads might be a bad idea. You know, in case your grandma drops by…
• And don’t be afraid to cut them up! That image of the chick holding cards in the upper left hand corner was originally a full page photo.

Oh and the total cost? Less than $15 (not counting the magazines, which I already owned!).

To start with, you need two men’s (i.e. non fitted) t-shirts. Any kind will do – like I said, I recommend buying one size up from what you would normally wear, if you were to buy a men’s t-shirt. If you want to buy it to dye, make sure you get something 100% cotton!

Now, take your waist measurement. I would add an inch or two to it, just for ease and comfort. You’ll want to cut across the top of the t-shirt, similar to this…

…while making sure that the total circumference is equal to your waist measurement. Depending on your waist measurement, the edge cuts will be closer or further away from the edge of the shoulders, and that will probably affect the end outcome a little bit. You’ll do this on both of the t-shirts. Then, you’ll line them up like so:

And sew along the dotted lines. The red lines are where you’ll also want to sew (after turning the dress inside out), to create pockets. In theory, anyways, the sleeves on a medium are far too shallow to actually use as pockets. I just leave them tucked in and think of them as architectural embellishments.

It’s a pretty comfy little dress – the only thing is that until it’s “broken in”, the seams along the bottom of the top t-shirt’s sleeves rubbed on my shoulders quite a bit. It created a sensation like my bra strap falling off my shoulder, but it wasn’t. Good luck, and let me know if you try it!

This is great for two reasons:

1: If you’re a compulsive magazine hoarder like me, this gives you a chance to give them a second life. Aside from, you know, just flipping through them to read the articles from magazines three years ago.

2: GREAT way to get inspiration…of course. If you’re feeling blah, not sure where your style’s been going lately, etc., an inspiration board can totally help. Inspiration boards can be made for any reason, and one can be made for a specific style – “Retro 50′s” or “Fairy Tale”, for example, but I was definitely doing this as an exercise in seeing what colors, patterns, silhouettes, and such that I tend to be drawn to.

This is obviously not the only way to make one, but here’s what I did.

Go get your magazine hoard. I had super-cool mags like NYLON and BUST and Venus, which made it easier to find the off-the-wall things I like, but Cosmo or Vogue will work just as well! If you don’t have a magazine hoard, you can probably find someone who does, or you can ask places like the library to give you their old magazines. If you’ve got a cool local place that sells them, it could be totally fruitful to see what they do with the leftovers at the end of the month – at Eccentrix, they just end up sitting in the break-room with the covers ripped off. They’d probably be ok with giving some away, and that’s a fast way to get a few.

Flip through the magazines. Any time you see anything you like, whether in an advertisement, photoshoot, whatever, just rip the page out. Set all of the pages in one spot – I had a folder that I got from the $1 section at Target AGES ago and stuck ‘em all in there. If you have one lying around I highly recommend it, because otherwise the pages slide all hither and thither.

Once you’ve exhausted the magazine resource, go back through the pages. If you look at a page, and can’t remember what it was about the page that spoke to you, put it aside – you might be able to use it for another inspiration or mood board, but for the purposes of this board (which, like I said above, is kind of a “where is my style going”, “what am I drawn to” exercise), it won’t be of use. Cut out the item or part of the picture you were drawn to. While you’re at it, you might think about what your absolute favorite part is, it’ll come in handy later. For some items, if they take up most of the page, you might want to just clean up the page edge and leave the rest as is, because you probably won’t tons and tons of the posterboard showing. You can cut the item/person/thing of note closely around the edge, or leaving jagged edges, or just cut a rectangle around them – whatever floats your boat!

Once you’ve cut everything out, get your posterboard, glue/rubber cement, any paints or paintbrushes you might need, and your folder of images. Will probably look like this:

The loose magazine page is one that I ripped out right before I started and hadn’t trimmed yet. Note the tunes! Tunes are important, they will set the mood! So pick something you lurve.

Now spread out all of your images, and start sorting them into large images, medium sized images, and small images.

Start with the large images first, pick out your favorites and start laying them out on the board. You’ll run out of space faster than you’d think – be prepared to  pick and choose! Once you’ve decided on a layout, rubber cement those pieces down. Oh, and by the way, be prepared for it to take up a large amount of space:

That big empty space in the middle? That’s where I was! This is about three-quarters of the way through it.

Now sift through the medium pieces and do the same. This is where consciously thinking about what element of the photo/page you’re most drawn to comes in – you won’t want that element to be obscured. Last come the small pieces. Be prepared to end up end several layers in some spots – I think I had three or four in at least two places, and I actually ended up almost completely covering one photo because I decided I liked others better! I used the smaller pieces, including several roses I cut out from this month’s BUST issue (right before the Mother’s Day article), to break up the negative space left over between the large and medium pieces, and tie it together somewhat. Here’s the result:

Inspiration Board - zoomed out

Inspiration Board - detail shots

Apologies for the not-so-great pictures – it’s really hard to take photos of a shiny object, as it turns out. For larger pictures, look here and here. And I really need to get a camera that doesn’t leave a timestamp on photos! Sigh. Anyways, it ended up a little warped because I left it on a shelf (with some overhang) before it was fully dry. Warning for those using rubber cement: it, apparently, takes FOREVER to dry! I finished this Friday evening around 6:30, left it sitting overnight, and put it on the shelf the next day at noon. Ten hours later it was warped. Lame. Also, for the other klutzes out there: How to Get Rubber Cement Out of Clothing.

Oh, and I have plenty of leftovers for the next time I want to do something like this:

Maybe I went a bit overboard with the page-tearing, hmm?

In other news, I quit my job, but have several prospects lined up (and an interview that I’ll be heading to in a little less than an hour as well). Wish me luck!

First off, we’re going to start with a black and white image. Totally black and white, no shades of gray. You can use this method with most photos, but some level of detail will be lost (there are several tutorials online on how to make a stencil in photoshop, here’s one). I’m just using a simple nautical star, as you saw.

You’ll trace the image on to your freezer paper.

Then cut the image out with the x-acto knife.

Do this with all of the stencils you’re using today (if you’re using only one, congratulations, you’ve saved yourself some time, skip to the next step!).

Now put some cardboard in your shirt or item to be stencilled, so that it doesn’t bleed through to the other side. Take your stencils and trim them as needed if you’re trying to fit several in a tight spot, and then arrange them on the shirt or whatever in the way you like. If you ripped something while cutting, it’s not a big deal – just arrange it how it’s supposed to be. Then iron it, on the medium setting (or it’s the medium setting on my iron). The wax on the other side of the paper melts and stick to the fabric, which makes it a lot easier to prevent bleeding – one reason I much prefer this method over cardboard, even if cardboard is reusable.

Now you’ll put some fabric paint on a paper plate or whatever surface you’re using, and dab the brush in it. You don’t want to get too much paint on there, because that’ll make the stencilling uneven and make bleeding slightly more likely. Just do this until you get everything covered, trying to make it as even as possible.

(side note: this shirt wasn’t actually a very good example, the fabric has a slight ‘slick’ texture that makes stencilling a little harder and bleeding a little more likely – as you may be able to tell. )

When you’re done, just pull the freezer paper off. It shouldn’t leave a residue or anything. Let the paint dry, then heat treat it by tossing it in the dryer or ironing it from the other side. This’ll help prevent fading.

Using this method, you can get REALLY detailed results. Here’s the best one I’ve ever done (on my uber-ponx vest, ages and ages ago)

Oh yeah. Mad skillz, I has ‘em. Using this method you can even sometimes use ‘islands’ in your stencils, if you iron them down properly.

Anyways! I think that about covers everything. Questions? Comments? Rotten fruit?

no talking in the library!

The pencil skirt is from Target.com, $14.99 on clearance and about $20 with shipping, it arrived the 30th.  Although I was really confused because it came in an Amazon.com box with a Target sticker on the side – I didn’t see the sticker and was like “umm…I didn’t order anything from Amazon…what?!”. The shirt is the DIY’d button up from Old Navy. Stencilling tutorial coming tomorrow probably. That backpatch is from my very first Clash shirt ever. *sniff* It’s getting a bit ragged.

kind of funny since the only place I actually went was to the mall to hang out for, like, two hours with some of my friends. It was quite entertaining – I don’t go shopping much any more (offline at least), and after nearly two years of the crazy hair I don’t know if I’ve just become completely oblivious to the stares or if I just wasn’t paying attention, but Alicia found the amount of stares highly amusing. Apparently, while we were eating, a woman was walking by and stared the whole way, craning her neck eventually…about to turn a corner, she looked away from me, then paused, took a few steps back, and looked again. As if it was an optical illusion. Heh.

Also – I touched up my hair (which is a pity because the bottom had FINALLY faded to pink, sigh) and got it cut, in case you can’t tell. It’s not too different in the front but muccccch shorter in the back.

I’ve done a LOT of sewing the past couple of days, and pictures will definitely be up before the end of the weekend. In the meantime, to tide you over…

he doesn't quite understand "sharp objects" yet...

1. The first step is to construct the underskirt. I used satin, you can really use whatever you want as long as it’s opaque. Figure out how long you want it to be (I made mine a little above knee length) first, and then cut out the fabric. I used my favorite method for making a circle skirt which is this:

2. Since I was using satin, I immediately serged the edges, which if you have a serger and are using satin I HIGHLY recommend. That stuff frays like nobody’s business. Then, you’ll cut a piece of elastic a few inches shorter than your waist measurement, and a piece of fabric that’s about 2.5 times the width of your elastic, and several inches longer than your waist measurement!! This is important, because I was a ditz and made it only an inch or two longer than my waist measurement, and now it will only fit over my boobs if I’m not wearing a bra, and won’t go over my ass at all. Just sayin’. Keep it in mind. Then you’ll fold the fabric over, stitch along the edge, turn it inside out (or not – I just sewed wrong sides together since the bottom of the elastic is under the skirt anyways, so I saved myself a step), and put the elastic through it. It might take a while. I’ll wait.

3. Now, you’ll pin and sew the long tube you just made to your circle skirt and stitch! I just left the hem of the skirt serged and didn’t officially hem it because a. I am lazy and b. it’s under a freakin’ pound of tulle anyways, so nobody knows but me.

4. Here comes the fun part. THE TULLE. Woo-hoo. Okay, you’ll cut out two pieces of tulle TWICE as long as your waist measurement and several inches long (depends on how many tiers you want to do – I did three tiers, so I my top two tiers were 7″ long and the bottom was 8.5″, as you saw, this resulted in a skirt a little longer than knee length). There can be several variations from what I did at this step – if you’d like, you could do three times your waist length for a really poofy tullemonster. Or sandwich in a layer of lace betwen the two layers of tulle for some added fanciness and opacity, or just do another layer of tulle. And of course it’s possible to vary the length of the tier. At any rate, now it’s time to run it through the sewing machine on a basting stitch – I used a 4mm stitch. Leave longggg trails of thread at the end. Now go look at one of those ends, and tug on each of the threads. One of the threads should start gathering the fabric when you tug on it. Tug and tug and tug some more, even out the gathering as you go, until the gathered edge of the tulle is as long as your waist measurement. Set this aside for now, someplace where the damn cat won’t get ahold of it and break the threads, undoing your hard work. Luckily for me, he only got the last four inches or so.

ALTERNATELY: If you are a lucky lucky person who owns a ruffler foot and knows how to use it, just fiddle around with the settings until you get a setting that gathers to the needed amount (i.e., can take a 10″ strip of fabric and turn it into a 5″ strip of ruffled fabric). Or you can do as I did, which involved having trouble with the ruffler foot, swearing loudly at the sewing machine, and grumpily resigning yourself to hand-gathering. Whatever works.

5. Now, take the length of the last piece of tulle that was cut cut, pre-gathering, and double that (we’ll call the resulting measurement x). Cut out two 7″ by x” pieces of tulle, and do the basting stitch along one edge again. Now, you’ll gather it to the original length of the first piece of tulle. This would probably be a good time to put on some Buffy or something, because it could take a while. Once you get done gathering it, pin it and sew it to the bottom layer of the first tier.

6. This time, you’ll take the length of the second tier pre-gathering and double it (measurement x). Cut out two pieces of tulle that are 8.5″ by x”, and baste one edge. Gather it until the gathered edge is the same length as the pre-gather length of the second tier (this will take a WHILE – I reiterate my suggestion to put a dvd on or something), and pin it and sew it to the bottom layer of the second tier. Confused? Hopefully this will help:

Now you’ve got a nearly constructed skirt – all you have to do is sew up the side of all three tiers, and then pin the top gathered edge to the foundation skirt you made, right under the waistband. Sew that all up, and then bam! Put on your petticoat and twirl around!

She likes pink and black, and the Clash as well as Joe Strummer (a lady of taste!), so here’s what I did:

The image is stencilled (I think I might do a stencilling tutorial…hm) and the rest is freehanded. I was going to make her a roll-up soft case for her knitting needles, but I didn’t have enough fabric for what I intended to do, so I wrapped it in what I did have, so she can do something with it.

My productivity for the day was this:

not a very good picture, but the best not-a-close-up I could get. Here’s a close up:

that shows the color a lot better. And here is one of me wearing it. Note my absolute failure at de-purplefying and re-pinkifying my hair. le sigh. also the cigarette smoke from Matt, my photographer.

The fascinator took a LOT longer than I thought. That fabric rosette? was a bitch and a half. I tried using the gathering foot on my Rocketeer and I’ve never had a problem with it before, but it would just. not. work. I’m not sure it was meant to be used with two layers of material (which kind of sucks because I had been contemplating biting the bullet and just making a crinoline/crinoline-esque skirt, but I’ll be DAMNED if I am gathering that much tulle by hand!). So I basted it by hand and gathered it that way (and about halfway through realized I could have just basted on the sewing machine…), and then kind of randomly tacked down bits of fabric to make it look a little more flowery and a little less tubular. The rosette took the longest time out of all the components, but jeez, I’d say I probably spend between two and three hours on it. Lots of hand-sewing. I’ll be wearing it tomorrow so you can expect more pictures then!

“What?!”, you say. “Why by vintage?! I can get a new one for $60 at Wal-Mart!”

True, you can. Also true is that the $60 machine from Wal-Mart will most likely have trouble sewing through two layers of denim. Recall the post where I mentioned my vintage sewing machine sewing through four layers of leather with no problem.

That, my friends, is just one reason to buy vintage. Older machines, like many things “back in the day”, were made to be repaired, not replaced. There are several machines which have all-metal gears, which lets them sew through just about anything you’ll need to sew through. They’re usually cheaper than new machines if you can find them in the right spots, and you’re also being sustainable by buying something that a. would have been thrown away normally and b. won’t be thrown away for years if cared for properly, unlike a lot of the “plastic wonders”.

Now that we’ve got the benefits down, here’s more information:

Vintage machines are NOT more likely to break down if you get the right one. If a machine with all metal parts is taken care of properly (yes, you will have to oil it from time to time) it can last ages. Hence why these machines I have are running better than the plastic Brother I was given for Christmas 2-3 years ago. They’re also REALLY easy to fix on your own and most of the time just need some lubrication in the right spots. If you are willing to put two hours tops of reading information about fixing the machine and then doing it, you can fix a good amount of the problems you will run into. Parts can be an issue, but unless the machine in question is very rare, it’s less of a problem finding parts and more that they might be expensive. They don’t have a lot of fancy stitches but really, I never end up using even the embroidery cam stitches except for very rare occasions anyhow. People want fancy stitches but unless you KNOW you will be doing something other than just straight stitch and zig-zag, don’t waste your money.

I would recommend anything from the Singer 400 or 500 line (these come in a beige casing and have the model number on the front, above the stitch length selector), any of the Viking 6000 lines, hell if you can find a Singer 15 (the machine in your link looks like a S-15) or Singer 15 clone for cheap, snatch it up. Older Kenmores are good too. I believe that plastic machines weren’t commonly made until the ’60s, the Viking I have that’s from around 1977 is mostly metal though. Anything from the 50′s is a pretty sure bet. Places to check include Craiglist, garage sales, and thrift stores. The Salvation Army here gets new ones on a weekly basis, and they’re never more than $40 (most of them have the cabinet too). It might be different depending on the location though. But either way, it’s hard to find even the best vintage machines for more than $200 and you can NOT find a plastic new machine for the same price that is anywhere near the same quality or durability. One of the reasons they started making plastic machines is because you can keep the metal machines going for generations (obviously) if you take good care of them. Which isn’t good for business, haha.

Machines that I have:

1953 Mercury Sewing Machine

Faceplate of Mercury machine

Like the caption says, this is a 1953 Mercury machine. A Singer 15 clone (the S-15 machines are very similar in body style and sometimes decals). $25 off Craigslist. I can’t find a cabinet to put her in I named her Sylvia!

Vintage Viking 6440 Colormatic

Like I mentioned before, this is probably from around 1977. One of the reasons I named it Vivienne. (You should know why! ) It has several built-in stitches, cams that give it more stitches (both functional and embroidery), and has a low-torque function that is awesome and makes it possible to sew through some pretty thick stuff. This is the one I fixed my handbag with. I found it on eBay and paid around $50 with shipping, for it and lots of accessories/most of the available cams. It didn’t have a foot pedal and the foot pedals normally run $85ish, but at that time there HAPPENED to be one on eBay for $25 w/shipping. Meant to be, right?

Singer Rocketeer 500A

This is a late 50′s/early 60′s machine. These are GREAT machines! No belt, gear driven, so it can sew through damn near anything. This was $35 off Craigslist.

Machines that you should watch for!

Singer Slant-O-Matic 503A

This is a machine I used to have, that I sold on eBay. $20 at the Salvation Army, WITH a cabinet. The Slant-O-Matics are in the same line as the Rocketeers and are also great machines.

Singer 400 machine

Singer 400. Same machine as the Rocketeer in a different casing. The 400 series style is more like this – any of them are great, they’re all the gear driven ones. The 300 series looks similar, some of them are black, and are also worth buying, I think they may be only straight stitch machines, not sure if they use cams.

Bernina 830

Bernina 830. If you see any old looking Bernina machine, it’s worth buying. The 830 is just particularly coveted.

I hope my post has been of some helpfulness! Vintage sewing machines are SO worth it, even if it needs fixed up a bit after being purchased. These machines have already lasted 30-40+ years and will probably last a lifetime if cared for properly. The benefits of a vintage sewing machine far outweigh any small shortfalls.