Project Runway & my new Giant room divider

Project Runway - I promise to be brief - They were still in Paris. The challenge was to make a couture dress. Michael was a bit out of his element. Uli & Laura did dresses that were their typical style. Jeffrey made a yellow plaid gown with short skirt in front and streamers down the back (picture Gwen Stefani dancing around with Japanese schoolgirls in the background) Kayne did a gold lace corset-top gown with ombre chiffon skirt. The judges thought it was too much and they felt that Kayne lacks taste. I thought the dress was alright. The gold lace may have been glitzy, but the idea of seeing the construction through the lace was interesting and I thought the skirt was really nice and flowy down the back. Vincent made a backwards dress (Thank you NeeeeenaGarrrrrcia for saying what I was thinking) Some snooty designer that I don't know judged them in Paris, then they went back to NY and were judged by Heidi, Nelly, NeeeeenaGarrrrcia and some other designer that I don't know. Jeffrey won again (I don't know if I can bare the smugness we're bound to be hit with from him next week) Vincent got the boot! Yeah, that was the only highpoint in kind of a boring episode.





So, in a previous post, I showed you the old drying rack that I used as a mini room divider and a display for some of my favorite fabrics and linens. Last week we went to a great antique sale, and I found a much bigger drying rack. This one has 4 sections and is over 5 feet tall, plus it's on wheels. So, I couldn't pass it up and bought it to use as another room divider. My room is a large 22x22 ft room with no walls, so this rack will help break up the livingroom area from my bedroom area. I put it behind my couch and I hung 4 barkcloth drapes over it, 1 in each section. At first I wasn't sure how I liked it, since it was so big. But now I think that it is perfect, and I'm very happy with it. This is actually the first thing that I've bought for my new room. I had just started my strict Summer budget when I moved into the room, so I didn't allow myself to buy anything until now.
Above are two photos of the divider. That's my wicker couch which is falling apart. I have several blankets, comforters and spreads on it to make it a little more comfortable. Behind the divider is my bedroom area.

Oh, and the Crocodile Hunter, how very sad . I am a ginormous fan of him and his show. My favorites were the shows set in his zoo, where you get to meet the regular zoo crew and the animals and see the daily running of the zoo. What a great life, to grow up in a zoo, and to leave that legacy and love of animals and the environment to your children.
http://www.wildlifewarriors.org.au/


OK, now I have got to go get some work done. It's Thursday and I don't have next week's update done yet. I wasn't feeling well for a few days, and now I'm just being distracted by other stuff. Time to crack the whip and get to work!

Bye for now, Carol

Dried flowers & Vivien Leigh

Well, it Saturday night and I'm here in the woods. We had rain and strong wind last night. So when we went to the shore this morning, we found that the wire to the cottage had blown down, and there was no electricity. A call to the electric company went in, someone sat on hold for quite a while and was finally told they would get someone out as soon as possible to fix the wire, but they were very busy with alot of calls and it may be a day or more before they get to us. The wire was hanging down right in front of the door, so I couldn't even go inside.

Being here, instead of being at the shore gave me time to get some work done this morning (editing photos of a few suits, jackets, dresses and hats) Plus it gives me time to do another post here. This will be a crafty post.
I had mentioned in a previous post how pretty my hydrangeas were at the beginning of the Summer. So I cut a few heads and set them out to dry. Last year I did a few, but they faded to grey and were very fragile. This year, after they were dried just enough, I sprayed them with some polyurethane to seal them, and they've held their colors a little better. Not as vibrant as fresh flowers, but still very pretty shades of pale blues and greens. I just have them tucked in a pretty bowl on the bottom shelf of my planter for now, I'll think of something to do with them later.

I also pulled some of the individual flowers off of the hydrangea heads and pressed those in a book along with some wildflowers that I also picked. Every Spring, I see those bags or boxes of seed mixes that promise you an easy garden filled with thousand of wildflowers, and I'm a sucker to buy them every year. I didn't get thousands growing out there, but I did get some pretty dainty little flowers that made me want to pick them and press them. I ended up with a bunch of the individual hydrangea flowers because there are so many on a head. To the left is a sample of some of the flowers. I have them stored within sheets of paper inside of a box, waiting for a crafty idea to use them comes along.




The vintage clothing themed altered book project that I am part of is still chugging along. We are just halfway through now, 6 done, 6 more to go, finishing in February. The book that I worked on this month had a theme of 'Silver Screen Goddesses' So I chose Vivien Leigh. I had always loved that photo of her standing under the flowers and thought how cool it would look to glue dimensional flowers onto it. So that's just what I did on one page, using silk flowers though, not dried ones. On the other page I chose a thoughtful photo of her and another were she has a slight smile. I also cut out 2 quotes about beauty, which happened to be in this book. Both pages were topped with a soft green tulle.



Have a Happy & Safe & Dry Labor Day weekend!
Bye for now, Carol

Claire McCardell from Vogue 1952

I was going through some old Vogue magazines, looking for images that I could copy to use in my ongoing Vintage Clothing themed altered book project. I love the old Vogues (I am very anti current Vogue) I have a few from the 1930s, some from early 40s and some of the early 50s. I prefer 40s fashions, but I think of the Vogues that I have, I like the 50s ones the best. The 40s are during the War years, so the fashions are kind of basic, and there's nothing from Paris. The 50s magazines are filled with great images and lots of well known vintage manufacturer and designer names.
I came across one issue that had all of these Claire McCardell dresses. One was an ad for fabric, then there was a 2 page ad for Claire, and then 2 others were in the regular layouts. You don't often see so many images from one desginer in a single magazine, so I thought I'd copy them to share here. The photos are from the December 1952 issue.

The photo to the left and the 1st one below are from a layout called 'Print News in Cotton' photographed in Chile by Rutledge. The dress to the left is a print designed by Claire and called 'Alameda' It is from a line of fabrics by Everfast cotton called Panagra. The print was also used for a promotion with Panagra South American Airlines. The skirt of the dress is made of 4 long balloons and originally retailed for $60.
The dress below is an olive cotton print, also from the Everfast Panagra collection. Retailed for $40

The next images were from a 2 page layout ad for 'Panagra Cottons by Everfast' Both dresses designed by Claire, sunglasses also by Claire and jewelry by Olga Tritt. The 1st dress retailed for $30 and the second (love the drapey shoulder treatment) was under $50.

The final image was the 3rd part of the Everfast Panagra promotion. The stripe is called 'Santiago' and it is a 2pc dress with adjustable neckline, retailing for $40. It also includes a list of store where you could buy McCardell dresses.









Please click the images for larger views. Read a history of Claire's fashion career at History of Fashion and Costume
I put 'scanned by dandelion-vintage and copyright Vogue' on each image just so that no one would copy them to use as logos or other commercial use. Sorry, I'm just paranoid about image theft after an 'eccentric' website owner stole the backrgound image from my site and used it on her site, claiming that she just happened to make the same exact image that I made myself 6 years ago. The images do belong to Vogue and are posted here for Vintage Enjoyment only.