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Then in came the sewers…

Part two of my Sievers Adventure, this is a long one, so buckle your seatbelts and grab a glass of wine…

I had about a two and a half hour break from the end of the Inkle Weaving class, to the beginning of the Garment Construction Intensive.  Just a couple of hours to break down a classroom, pack materials away, eat lunch, and set up the classroom for nine students who would need cutting tables, sewing tables, mirrors, and all the detritus of garment construction equipment.  And by 1:30 in the afternoon, I was ready to go with the help of a very efficient Sievers’ Staff..

Sievers, unlike any of the other venues where I teach this type of class, offers a seven day optional version over the regular five day class, two whole extra days for participants to start another project, or really fine tune the one they have been building for the last week.  Most chose to move on to additional projects.  All but two of the participants stayed on, and one ended up staying for one additional day.

My first time participants of course made jackets.  There was basket weaver Jeanette, who also teaches basket making at Sievers, who in spite of being sick for most of the week, managed two complete jackets in five days.  She couldn’t decide on which jacket silhouette, so she made both.

jeanette2 [1] jeanette1 [2]

And there was Joy and Joanne, who shared tables, both excellent in their sewing skills as well, who knocked out a couple of lovely jackets.  They are on the left of the group photo.  Joy stayed on the extra couple of days and started making a gorgeous wool melton chocolate brown skirt, which I have not a single photo of, but she had enough for two skirts, and I did a swap and came home with one of the prettiest pieces of wool I’ve seen in a long time.

joy2 [3] joy [4] joanne [5] classsievers [6]

Eloise came all the way from Texas, and she regaled us with how she came by air, by land, and then by sea, which is pretty much what I did.  Sievers is the kind of place where you have to really work at it to get there.  Eloise presented me with quite the challenge.  She had many panels of handwoven fabric she had made over the years, mostly around 10″ wide.  She also wanted to create garments that were only rectangles, since the fabric was fairly unstable, loosely woven, and she couldn’t really back it with a fusible underlining because Texas, well, it’s hot down there.  That’s Eloise on the right in the group photo above.  But she made some very retro looks, sort of reminded me of handwoven clothing back in my day, and once we got her a dressform to work with, she had a blast.

eloise3 [7] eloise1 [8]eloise2 [9] eloise [10]

Linda was my fifth new student, also a fantastic sewer, and I was blessed to have a class that really had a good base foundation so they could run with the principals and concepts I gave them.  Linda took her handwoven fabric, and was the first person to try my new silhouette, the fitted jacket pattern that can break away into a princess seam jacket.  She did try a test garment first, and we tweaked the fit just a bit, and then she was off and running, using Welt Seams, and Hong Kong seam finishes for a beautiful interior.

linda5 [11]lindapiecing [12]linda [13]

Linda stayed for the full seven days and started in on a second project.  Which leads me into a side story…

Probably the biggest downfall of what I do is not having the ability to run out and buy needed materials and supplies.  We have to work with what’s at hand. When a student can only find quilt fabric to line a handwoven silk garment, that’s a shame.  There is only so much a Joann’s can provide, and there is nowhere on Washington Island, Wisconsin to get anything else.  However, I noticed that Sievers, in their lovely shop and gallery did have a large grouping of natural cottons and silks, which they keep in stock for their silk painting, felting and surface design classes.  I noticed that besides the usual fine habotai and chiffon, and the filmy jacquards and organzas, there were two I hadn’t noticed before, a spun silk broadcloth, and a gorgeous 15.5mm china silk that was meatier than any habotai I’ve ever felt. China silk and habotai are the same thing.  Joanne, the student, not the fabric store, had a stash of basic colors of RIT dye, primaries actually, and lived on the island so one day she brought to class what she had left over from a family reunion Tie dye adventure.

I dye yarn all the time, and paint warps, with MX fiber reactive dyes.  I almost never work on protein fibers like silk and never do yardage.  RIT has both fiber reactive dye and acid dye in it, so not only will it dye cellulose fibers like cotton and rayon, but it will dye silk and wool and even nylon.  I have no experience with RIT, but both Joanne and Jeanette did, so we all took the plunge, found a dyepot, and a couple of students bought silks to use for linings, and that started the ball rolling.  We didn’t have a whole lot of tools, the handle of the fly swatter worked to stir the pot, and towels served as emergency aprons, but we got some pretty amazing results.  RIT dye is my new best friend.  Within a half hour, and no fuss or mess, we had linings.  While I was at it  I tossed in nylon tricot and got a gorgeous navy (first photo on the left) and some of my white frogs (last photo on the right).

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Back to Linda…

Linda brought a beautiful handwoven fabric that had areas of inserted rags from old cotton shirts, some plain weave areas, and some more densely woven rag sections. She combined the sections in a strategic way making use of the lengthwise and crosswise grain.  She had no lining to coordinate with it, and lining was a critical part of the construction process in my vest pattern.  And so, the middle photos above showed a by the seat of your pants mix of primaries that got us a lovely dark shrimp color on spun silk broadcloth that made her handwoven fabric sing.  Not only that, after listening to my lecture on closures, Linda decided to break the band pattern apart and include in-seam buttonholes, and she did all the calculations herself.  I was so proud and excited…

linda1 [19] linda2 [20] linda3 [21] linda4 [22]

And now we come to my beloved regulars, most have taken this class at least 10 times.  They all know and love each other and since many of them are built similarly, they even share patterns.  Cindy started it by making this knit top from a Today’s Fit Vogue pattern.  Almost everyone in the class tried it on, including our beloved Cindra, who keeps Sievers running like a well oiled machine!  Check out the matching job on the back of the top, Cindy did that all by herself…  She has been taught well…

knittop2 [23] knittop1 [24] knittop3 [25] knittop4 [26]

Ginnie then made the dress version, and everyone tried that on as well.  It is Vogue 1477 and still in print I believe.

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Cindy then started in on a handwoven fabric she brought, using a pattern she had from a past class but we added a sailor collar.  And she did the bound buttonhole all by herself. You can see the final jacket in the group photo below.

cindy1 [30] cindy2 [31] cindy3 [32]

Ginnie brought half her stash, she is also an amazing garment maker, and jumps from one project to another, because she can finish them all up at home.  Fit is the most important to her, and she uses this class to get things right from the start.  In addition to the knit dress above, she made this lovely top from fabric we bought together in a NY fabric buying trip a few years ago.  Then she started in on a Marcy Tilton Pattern out of a rich blue Bengaline.  Marcy Tilton Vogue patterns are sort of a lesson in Origami, they are a hoot to construct, but a nightmare to alter for a full bust cup.

ginnie2 [33] ginnie1 [34]

Terry brought the most exquisite handwoven linen, with large areas of huck lace, which proved to be challenging once the fabric was cut.  Stabilizing the edges with a fusible wasn’t really an option for many reasons, but she persevered, using my tunic pattern, and came up with a beautiful fine linen overshirt.  She then moved on to a piece of Harris Tweed she bought in Scotland, and we dyed a jacquard silk lining to match, but there seem to be no photos of either on my camera.  She was starting in on a vest from the wool tweed, similar to the one Linda made.

terry [35] terry1 [36] terry2 [37]

And finally, Barb, who also came by air, land and sea, from NC, wove an absolutely gorgeous bamboo fabric to make a fall coat.  In previous years, Barb has made heirloom Christening gowns from her handwoven linen with coordinating linen bobbin lace which I taught her how to do.  This is the first time I think she has made herself a garment from her own handwoven.

The coat is beautiful, but the lining she brought was pretty much what she could find at Joann’s.  She bought some of the 15.5mm china silk and we dunked it in some RIT, and the results made everyone squeal in delight.

barb1 [38] barb2 [39] barb3 [40] dye5 [41]

I actually brought along something to do in the evenings, besides knitting.  I had a lovely Candiss Cole handwoven silk shibori vest from many years ago, hanging in my closet.  I don’t wear vests much, except for warmth in the winter, but this one was long and decorative and as much as I loved it, I found I really wasn’t wearing it.  But of course, I adored the fabric.  Silly me, I didn’t take a photo of the original vest but I cut it, just above the armholes, used the front yoke sections to fill in the sides like pocket details, and the back yoke into bias strips for a waist finish.  I had a handful of dust left when I was done.

skirt1 [42] skirt3 [43] skirt2 [44]

And here is the group photo of the 2016 class of Sievers’ Achievers.  I’m wearing the skirt in the photo.

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I leave Friday for central Pennsylvania, and the Susquehanna Guild.  Stay tuned…