Lorraine Torrence Creative Clothing Class #1 - Repurposed Ready-to-Wear

 

For those of us sewists lucky enough to be located in Madison, WI, we now have a great wearable artist/quilter in our midst.  Lorraine Torrence, formerly of Seattle, WA has relocated to Madison and is now teaching at Gayfeather Fabrics on Willy St. in Madison.  I am enrolled in one of her classes entitled Creative Clothing and am keeping track of the projects I have made for this session.  

 

Our first assignment was to repurpose a ready-to-wear garment.  I chose this black Flax brand linen jacket that had been hanging in my closet for far too long.   This jacket had many interesting design features which went unnoticed.

 

 

 

 

I chose to accent the lower pockets in the peplum with white linen fabric and added stacked buttons to the center front, alongside the front flange.  I didn't care for the collar so I constructed a new neckpiece over the old one and accented the sleeves and center back with more of the white linen fabric.

 

One thing Lorraine impressed upon us was to always put something in the back of the garment that

relates to the front to pull the design together.

Lorraine Torrence Creative Clothing Class #2 - Threadwork Embellishment

Our second assignment for Lorraine's class was threadwork.  Since I knew I was going to be on the road for a few days I decided to do handwork on a vintage kimono that I had stenciled on in the past. 
I  used buttonhole thread and mother-of-pearl buttons to decorate the front bands of the kimono and accented a few other spots. 

 

 

 

Lorraine Torrence Creative Clothing Class #3 - Garment Featuring a Panel

For this project I added a panel of ikat knit fabric to a knit tshirt.  Since the ikat fabric was much thinner than the tshirt knit, I fused it to some Easy Knit to give it more body and to help it hold
it's shape in the center panel of the garment.

Lorraine Torrence Creative Clothing Class #4 - Garment Where Closure is the Featured Element

I made this red nylon raincoat out of Vogue Pattern 7663 by Marcy Tilton.  I love oversized features

as it's a great way to make a statement.  This closure is made out of a thick upholstery piping cord

which I covered in a tube of the matching fabric.  The long button holds the closure shut, along  with

black snaps sewn underneath.  I can't wait for it to rain!

 

 

Rachel Ellis Exhibit at the Phoenix Airport

 I stumbled on this fabulous exhibit at the Phoenix Airport featuring the work of Rachel Ellis.  She was ahead of her time, recycling curtains, shawls and other textiles into interesting garments.  [Please forgive the shine in the photos as I was taking the pictures through glass.]  If you double click on this photo it should enlarge so you can read the small print.
 

 Great ultrasuede binding and bound button holes in this garment made out of a mexican shawl

 

 

The purple coat was repurposed from some theatre curtains.

Digital Print Fabrics

The Phoenix Art Museum always has some sort of wonderful clothing/fabric exhibit at the Ellman Fashion Design Gallery and when I was there in March the exhibit featured digital print fabrics.

 

This gown was by Alexander McQueen.

                                                       

  Pieces of the garment printed on fabric before assembly (on right). 

 

 

My favorite garment was a very simple long dress (unfortunately I didn't get a photo) featuring images from a recent book by designer Charlotte Moss entitled  Charlotte Moss:  A Visual Life.  She took images from her new book and had them printed on fabric by Spoonflower and then had a dress made from the fabric to wear to her book signing - brilliant idea!

(www.spoonflowerfabric.com -- a website

 where you can design your own custom fabric and print only what you need)

Wow - who matched this print?

As a garment sewer I was amazed to find that this garment, by designer Trina Turk, was not only allowed out of the factory, but was featured in the March 2013 Saks Fifth Avenue March Fashion Catalog.  So much for quality control.  For $388 I would expect more.