WIP: Magic Lupine

 

In between my secret projects, I've been knitting on a third Lupine shawl, this time in a coveted skein of Tosh Merino Light in the colorway Magic. Lately, I've been exploring more of the sparkly, Lisa-Frank-tastic style of my '90s youth, which means splatter-dyes and neon and everything funky - which has been fun, and also sort of complicated in weird ways.

I was a pretty serious kid, and even though I did have a sticker book to rival the best of them - I had sparkly, fuzzy, and scratch-n-sniff stickers, organized by type and motif in a Lisa Frank dolphin sticker book, thankyouverymuch - I didn't ever feel like I was cool enough to really participate in trends or fashion in general, so in a small way, I'm attempting to reclaim that experience a bit. (Okay, the current '90s throwback nostalgia is helping too!) It wasn't until I started going to fashion school that I admitted that I even cared about fashion, since my experience of it had been so fraught with feelings of exclusion and inadequacy - some of which was handed to me through media portrayals of beauty and worthiness, and some of which came from an internal sense of perfectionism and self-criticism. Either way, fashion was a very negative thing to me for much of my life, and I'm still sorting through a lot of my beliefs about and experiences of it.

So in my daily making & fashion life lately, I've been trying to explore and challenge those things that we all hear and internalize in childhood, which are reinforced over and over again throughout our lives: you have to be pretty to pull off short hair; being skinnier is always better; women can't have body hair, because it's gross; your hips look big in that dress, and nobody wants that, right? And what I'm finding is that I'm not just enjoying the opportunity to play with fashion and beauty that has felt off-limits to me in the past, I'm also finding that a lot of it feels authentic in ways I didn't expect, which is pretty fucking cool.

 

 In other news, Monsieur Squishy is still on a twice-daily dose of rattie antibiotics, but remains more or less his cranky self. He has become somewhat more personable during his convalescence, but I think his true opinion of us has changed only slightly: Lumberjack and I are still his annoying humans, but now we are his annoying humans who also give him tasty yogurt twice a day.

Good boy, I guess?

Happy Wednesday, friends!

<3

Cory

Local Love: Sassafras Boutique

  

This week, I went down to Sassafras, the Seattle boutique where my friend Katy works, to hang out and put together some fun, springy outfits to share on their Instagram. Sassafras is a shop that houses both retail and work spaces to showcase and support the work of local designers, and it's super cool and inspiring to hang out in a place where Seattle fashion is thriving.

And the company was top notch, too! In addition to being a sparkly unicorn of friendship and positivity, Katy is an NYFA grad, talented designer, and savvy businesslady - so of course I jumped at the opportunity to chill with her. We had such a great time going through the racks and pulling tons of beautiful, fresh, and funky pieces to play with - and this was one of my favorite looks from the day!

The dress is the Madison Dress, by BOHO Republic, and I might have to take one home with me this spring: it has that classic '50s silhouette with some major vavoom in the waist/bust ratio area, but with the easy fit of a fuller silhouette, cleverly nipped in by a shirred waist - so you can look adorable and eat all the tacos you want, which is a) a necessary part of being a fancy lady, and b) sometimes a seam-busting challenge with true vintage pieces.



The other thing I'm wearing - which I did take home because I loved it so much - was this pair of tagua nut slice earrings by Diana Fakhoury Designs. I've been feeling a major Megan Draper moment in my fashion sense lately, probably because of binge-watching Season 7 of Mad Men in my spare time, and these earrings were just the right amount of mod and swingy to indulge it.

I already posted pictures of them styled with my outfit from today on my own Instagram feed, where I would love for you to follow me. If you want to. If you're not too busy eating tacos.

Big thanks to Katy for the awesome day and photos, and to Sassafras for having me! Happy Friday, friends.
<3
Cory

Reimagining Clothing: Plain Wool Cardigan

 

Slowly, over the last ten years or so, I've built up a wardrobe made up of mostly thrifted, vintage, or free items. The only items I don't thrift are jeans, shoes, and undergarments, because it's difficult to find the level of comfort and fit I want unless I buy them new. Goodwill and Value Village are the source of most of my wardrobe staples - and it's pretty amazing how much quality clothing you can find, very inexpensively, from places like these. And because the garments are so inexpensive, it's an easy way to try out trends or silhouettes without a huge investment - not only that, I like the idea of giving new life to clothes that might otherwise have been discarded.

Despite the low cost of much of my wardrobe, I try to only keep items that I really love - and up until a few weeks ago, I was thinking that it was time to modify or let go of this cream wool cardigan. It has a flattering shape and color - but it's also really, really boring, and I never found myself reaching for it in the morning. At the same time, it's a great cardigan, and it seemed a shame to get rid of it.

So when I was thrifting a few weeks ago and found this stained, too-big Lands End cotton cardigan with a super cute enamel detail, I decided to spend the 6 dollars to see if I could poach the elements from one cardigan to make another cardigan more wearable. A few minutes in Illustrator, and here's what I came up with:



I'm hoping that the addition of graphic, colorful details will turn this warm but boring sweater into a wardrobe staple.

We'll see how it goes!

Happy Monday,
Cory

Photoshoot: Bad Religion Jacket

Standing on the floor of a crowded concert, there is this moment when the world feels as if it has turned to black and white: when the room is dark and hung with smoke, and the crowd is moving like a many-limbed animal, and the lights of the stage are so bright that you can't keep your eyes open.

 

The floor and the air and your chest pulse with sound. The air is heavy with heat. And when the right notes hit, you can feel electricity humming through your skin.

 Afterwards, you walk outside into the night air, and the cold of it shocks your lungs. Noise still echoes in your ears like radio static, and color has settled on the world again: the golden backlit hot dog stand outside the venue, the shimmy cobalt dress and spindly black heels of the girl hailing a cab, the smeared red and blue and green of sirens and traffic lights on the wet pavement.

  

And in the ebb of darkness, your calves aching from dancing and the roots of your hair damp with sweat, you nod wordlessly to the mop-headed strangers ducking out of the venue door as you wait for your friends to appear. Their eyes are black with the recognition of that same feeling you're feeling, out here in the dark:

tonight we were here, you and I, and we were cool.

Details

Photography: Cory Ellen Boberg
Model: Marisa Rockett
Bad Religion Jacket: Designed & constructed by Marisa Rockett

FO: Ballgown Presentation

Today I presented my three ballgown designs to the director of NYFA. My presentation has been several months in the making, and I'm very excited and proud of how it turned out! The director will be choosing my gown in the next week or so, but in the meantime, I wanted to share my designs and some of the process behind my presentation.

  

For my presentation, I wanted some very specific things: slightly oversized boards that were still manageable to handle; a clean background, preferably white; carefully reproduced prints of my original illustrations; a balance of consistent and individual elements between the three description boards to tie them all together while also maintaining some distinguishing characteristics. I wanted my presentation to be simple but designed, hand-worked but professional.

I ended up making the presentation boards out of rigid, canvas-lined 9x12" paper boards and bookbinding tape, which allows them to be free-standing. I did each illustration by hand with Copic markers and pencil, scanned and edited in Photoshop, laid out in InDesign, printed professionally on 80-pound cover stock and cropped to fit the boards, and mounted with Glue Dots.

The description boards have the title of each gown printed on the background, with each description mounted on a complementary colored cardmaking paper. I used the same natural brown cardmaking paper for the background of each swatch, punched holes through it with my unthreaded sewing machine, and hand-sewed the swatches on with matching thread.

Overall, the whole process probably cost around $200, which is actually pretty reasonable considering that the gowns themselves are priced around 11K each.

The Designs



Clara

Clara is the most romantic of the three gowns, named after the main character from the Nutcracker, which was the first ballet I saw as a little girl. The silhouette is drawn from 1930s, and the overall feel of the gown was inspired by old Hollywood glamour and vintage lingerie - think Elizabeth Taylor's iconic slip in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and slinky bias-cut gowns by Madeleine Vionnet.

This gown is very true to my aesthetic; everything from the shade of soft pink, to the fluidity of the silk crepe back satin, to the lace details, is reflective of my first fashion loves -  the girly and the pink and the fluttery. I'm quite taken with the back; the gentle bloused shaping and the way the lace falls from the buttons along the spine. With its elegant shape, classic color, and finely wrought details, Clara represents everything I think a ballgown should be.



Solyaris

Solyaris came to me in one big whoosh of inspiration one day shortly after we watched the 1972 Tarkovsky film. There was a particular scene where the main character was standing still in a field shrouded in mist, and I realized that the color palette would be absolutely stunning in a gown: veiled purples, soft beiges, and infinite shades of smoky green.

When I revisited a photo of a glorious Dior gown from the 1950s, suddenly it all clicked into place: a fitted bustier-style bodice worked in watercolor floral silk georgette, organic beading details, and a full tulle skirt with an oversized bow. To set off the deep square back and provide some extra stability to the gown, I added a delicate gold chain with a clasp at the nape of the neck. I love the ethereal feel and extravagant silhouette of Solyaris, and since it was the first gown I illustrated, it holds a special place in my heart.

Trinity

Trinity is probably the most stylistically daring gown for me; it's a much darker, texturally interesting design than I usually gravitate towards, but somehow that has made me love it all the more. It was a challenge to design, and as I did, I often thought of Alexander McQueen, gothic horror in the Enlightenment period, and the Manhattan project: the shadows of anxiety around progress and innovation; the necessity of darkness to the experience of light.

For this gown, I drew inspiration for the silhouette from Victorian revival fashion from the 1970s. Black silk velvet seemed like an appropriate choice to set off the light, crisp feel of the red plaid taffeta. With a heavy beaded trim that gives the sleeves and hemline swing and substance, the interplay between textures and color gives Trinity a sense of drama and movement.

________________________

Thank you to everyone who's stuck around since my hiatus - I hope that you enjoyed seeing my designs, and I'll be sure to share when the final gown is chosen. I love all three of these pieces fiercely for very different reasons, so it will be a little hard to let go of the two that aren't chosen, but it's a really exciting prospect to make my ballgown a reality!

Fashion Illustration: Vintage-Inspired Plaid Dress #3

 

Next up on my Line & Proportion illustrations, I'm going to illustrate a design using cut paper, with Town & Country Style on a Rectangle Figure Type.  I'm going for preppy, Ralph Lauren-esque style, so I chose a classic red plaid for the dress.  It was surprisingly tricky to find the right plaid - I ended up having to special-order it from an internet scrapbooking company!  It made me realize how lucky I am that the scrapbooking and card-making hobby industry is as robust as it is: although I was pretty picky about the scale and color of the plaid, I was able to find it in the end, and had even less trouble finding leather-textured and velveteen paper.

I need to experiment a bit with it - I'm hoping that it will read as sophisticated and not third-grade-collage-y! - but I'm hopeful that I can make it work.

Illustration #1: Exotic Style, Triangle Figure Type

Illustration #2: Romantic Style, Hourglass Figure Type

3 Projects

 

1.  Line & Proportion Notebook

This week, I've been holed up on my couch - once until 3 am! - tearing examples of pleats, sleeve plackets, silhouettes, and colors from a pile of Vogue and Harper's Bazaar magazines. The pages above are for a Fall moodboard and a page on Tucks & Gathers, and I have approximately a billion other pages to complete.

Leafing through these magazines, mostly from 2010-now, is really interesting as a study of trends: in the past few days, I've found out that it's nearly impossible to find an example of a sailor collar on a contemporary garment, and that models Karlie Kloss and Laura Stone work a lot, and that the rest of the US must wear a lot more wool jackets and coats than we Northwest folks do, because the pages of Vogue are absolutely littered with them.

So if you stop hearing from me, it's probably because I'm lying in a pile of Vogues, page protectors, and thousands of little pieces of cut-up magazine paper on my living room floor, alternating between cackling maniacally and softly cooing at Dolce & Gabbana ads.

 

2.  Tailoring Techniques

I was halfway through my Tailoring Techniques class when I started the fashion show last year, so I jumped in last night to work on one of the final techniques I need to get it signed off: a patch pocket with a flap.

There's something really wonderful about the methodical care of tailoring: pressing seams with the heat of your fingers; gently pulling a basting thread to ease a seam; topstitching just a thread over the edge of the pocket to secure it. It reminds me that it's okay - and even desirable - to take time to do things correctly, and to enjoy the process, not just the result.

 

3.  Line & Proportion Illustration: Vintage-Inspired Plaid Dress #2 

I did my first illustration for this project a while back, and decided that I wanted to try different illustration techniques for each of my designs; I started with colored pencil and ink, and planned to illustrate the other three with Copic markers, paper cutouts, and watercolors. This is the second technique, Copic markers. The fabric is a check rather than a plaid, on an Hourglass figure with a Romantic style. It took me three hours of watching Dollhouse to fill in the check pattern, but in the end I'm really happy with it. It almost has a watercolor-like look, but it feels slightly more precise.  And this is a dress that I would definitely wear if it existed, which is kinda fun!

Welcome to new readers from Untangling Knots' recent post on Seattle knitters - if you haven't read it yet, I highly recommend checking out the other bloggers she mentions, as they are super great.  Thanks for reading, and happy Friday!

Thoughts on an Outfit: Stripes & Layers

  

A couple of weeks ago, I finally caved and bought new pants that fit my slightly skinnier butt.  And oh man, there are few better feelings in the world than the one that comes from wearing clothes that fit!  I'm still working on my daily uniform, and I've settled into a nice groove wearing jeans, layers that usually include draped tops and vintage knits, and kickass shoes.  It's comfy enough to work or play in, but it still feels intentional and put-together.

I will say, shopping for clothing since losing weight has been a jarring and conflictingly wonderful and terrible experience.  On one hand, probably 75% more items fit me correctly, which is pretty great.  On the other hand, the inherent privilege I've been experiencing as a smaller-bodied person is unsettling.  Why does the size-6 me get to wear jeans that fit and the size-10 me didn't?  Why does our culture feel the need to pathologize larger-bodied people when clothes don't fit them, instead of simply working to change the clothes so that they do?  Why can't the fashion industry be more transparent and non-judgmental about clothing sizing & fit?  And why the hell is it fair that my smaller body gets a free pass on dealing with these issues?

I felt comfortable and beautiful as a size 10, and felt in many ways that being visibly satisfied with my body as a larger person was political - like, I'm here, I take up space, and I'm not sorry.  Although I like my "new" body, I'm not comfortable with it yet.  It's pointier and smaller.  I have weirdly prominent collarbones.  My face looks different in the mirror.  I haven't quite gotten used to looking down and having less of me there.  I'm also not sure how to feel about the fact that, consciously or unconsciously, I made myself smaller.  Even though it wasn't a choice so much as a side effect, it still feels as I'm tacitly approving of and conforming to societal standards - and pushing back against many of my core values - simply by existing in a smaller body.

I expect that it will take time to figure out all my feelings on the subject, but in the meantime, I'm practicing being kind and patient with myself.  (Thankfully, wearing cool shoes and eating Theo ginger chocolate are non-optional aspects of this process.)

Jeans: Madewell High Riser Skinny Skinny Jeans

Shirt: Thrifted

Camisole: My own design

Cardigan:  Thrifted, vintage Halle Brothers

Shoes: Fluevog Coffee Breva (2011, no longer available)

Necklace: Love Nail Tree

Inspiration Library: Magazines, Catalogues & Quarterlies

  

Since taking Portfolio at school last quarter, I've become a lot more mindful of different types of media as sources of inspiration.  I already had a pretty large collection of knitting magazines and books, so in the new year I've been making it a priority to expand upon the genres in my library that are less represented: photography, history & fashion history, and graphic design in particular.

After I graduated from college, I got lazy about reading.  I equated choosing not to pursue higher academics with choosing not to care about academic subjects at all, but in the years since, I've come to find that I loved and missed those subjects a lot more than I previously thought.  It's taken me a long time to warm up to the idea of jumping back into scholarly reading on my own, but I've finally started seeking out - and enjoying - dense reading materials once again.

So as a result of my rekindled interests, my favorite media to explore lately have been catalogues, magazines, and quarterlies, particularly when they have an intersectional bent.  It's especially interesting to look at the fashions of my favorite sartorial period - immediate post-war to 1962 or so - and then contextualize them in history and culture, and then think about how they are problematic as shit, and then consider how to appreciate them without accepting or endorsing their shittier aspects.  (Still haven't figured that one out - it's a puzzle!)

I started collecting vintage pattern and clothing catalogues as a passing interest - a Frederick & Nelson catalogue from a professor here, a 1985 issue of Vogue Knitting from a friend's destash there - and somewhere in the meantime, I amassed a small collection of them.  Then, a few days ago my friend Sparkle sent me a big, fabulous addition of Vogue sewing pattern magazines and vintage clothing catalogues in the mail, and I realized that my collection is not so small anymore!  When I take the time to page through these magazines and catalogues, I see inspiration hidden everywhere - perhaps not as literal interpretations, but more as seeds of great design that are sometimes encased in '80s backassfugly details and styling.  (Case in point: huge matching angora neck ruffles and sleeve cuffs on perfectly lovely fitted blouse? Um thanks, but no.)

I've also been checking out contemporary magazines and quarterlies at my local bookstores.  Vestoj in particular gets into critical fashion theory, which is an absolute relief to find after crankily consuming contemporary Vogue for years.  The mainstream fashion industry so often leans on tired cliches of exoticism and normalized sexual violence in editorial and advertising content, which is waved away as insignificant by the industry because, well... "it's fashion," as if that explained anything.  It's a breath of fresh air to see fashion being treated like any other medium: significant, complex, reflective of culture, and worth discussing in broader terms.

Not to limit myself only to fashion, though - here are a few current favorite publications of mine.  They are all very pretty, and range from light-hearted explorations of indie design and culture, to gorgeous, challenging selections of writing and visual art.

Vestoj - fashion through an intersectional lens

Lapham's Quarterly - thematic selections of literature, essays, poetry, and art from history

Kinfolk - "discovering new things to cook, make, and do"

Uppercase - "a magazine for the creative and curious"

Sooo that was a very long explanation of what I'm reading and thinking about lately.  If you have any recommendations of magazines or quarterlies that you find beautiful, interesting, or inspiring, I'd love to hear them!

Modeling Future Beauty

This past summer, Seattle Art Museum featured an exhibition called Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion, a stunning collection of garments from designers ranging from Issey Miyake to Yohji Yamamoto.  I checked out the exhibition in late July and was incredibly inspired by the innovation and artistry of the clothing; I love the complex conceptual and architectural elements of Japanese fashion, so it was really amazing to see so many pieces in person.

As a grand finale to the exhibition, SAM invited my school, New York Fashion Academy, to present a runway show inspired by Japanese street and high fashion.  Although I was swamped with preparations for the wedding, I was itching to participate - so, when my friend Nicole Hood of Samara Clothing asked me to model for her capsule collection, I jumped at the chance.

 

The shoe rehearsal was the Tuesday after the wedding, so I was still a little dizzy from a magical weekend with my friends, family and brand spankin' new husband!  It was a blast, though, to hang out with all the designers and their models, many of whom I recognized from the April runway show and earlier model calls.

Shoe rehearsals are a standard preparation for fashion shows; they give models a chance to walk the runway in the shoes they'll be wearing, hear the music, and plan any choreography or posing.  I know I was happy to have a chance to walk those steep marble steps in heels before I did in front of hundreds of people!

The day of the show was surprisingly relaxed backstage.  Nicole directed hair & makeup, coordinated our accessories, and gave us some last-minute direction about posing and attitude.  Her collection was three looks with a smart, sophisticated feel - appropriate for office and evening alike.  I loved the color and cut of my dress, and it fit me perfectly, which is a rare, wonderful thing for me.  I also tried on the shorts from her collection during a fitting, and holy damn were they cute!  (Needless to say, I'm ordering a pair.)  

It was my first time modeling for runway - other than subbing for absent models in jeans and flats - and it ended up being a great experience.  The audience was overwhelmingly gigantic, but had a great energy that made the whole thing very exciting.  Once I was out there, I hammed it up and had an awesome time!

Seattle photographer Bret Doss was kind enough to photograph both the shoe rehearsal and the actual event, as well as to provide the photos for this post.  He's always an absolute pleasure to work with - friendly, engaging, and a magician behind the lens!  (Lumberjack called me as soon as Bret's runway photos were posted on Facebook, and I won't go into details but I believe the word "foxy" was involved.)

Thanks to everyone who made this event happen - the behind-the-scenes folks at SAM and NYFA, my friends and fellow designers, the sweet and friendly models and dressers, the photographers, and the audience who made our event a success.

Happy Monday!