Tag Archives: fabric

What’s in your front closet?

Besides shoe polish, stationery, my pocketbook, travel pillows, the basket for rogue socks, and a pile of shirts to be ironed, there were many bins of fabric in my front closet. How did they get there? Was there a party I didn’t know about?

Just kidding! How else to keep several compositions going without running to the basement every other minute?

The closet had to be mostly emptied this weekend because I sold a cute patchwork purse on Etsy last week and cannot find it. Anywhere. This in spite of the fact that I took over one of the boys’ rooms as a “store.”

I’ve looked in all the right places and all the crazy places. Pulled furniture from walls. Looked in attic luggage and under car seats (don’t ask). Looked using casual side eye and with focused attention using a flashlight. Nada.

And to make matters worse? I can’t help but keep a rough tabulation of my time at this point — something I generally avoid because the numbers tend to be depressing.

A very generous guess puts my hourly rate at about $5 / hour for this pouch — which was machine pieced, hand quilted, machine and hand bound. There’s a Chinese closure which was hand stitched on. That rate excludes shipping and handling time (– another hour minimum). With every hour of searching, the rate goes down. And down.

Good thing the buyer is my cousin!

I will be making another pouch. A different one, of course, because all my cloth work is one of a kind. A weird pressure arises because the one my cousin bought came out really nice and they don’t all — ya know?

If the search hadn’t been so thorough, here’s where I’d joke that the damn thing will probably turn up the the second I finish a replacement. But I won’t now because it feels well and truly gone. I am mystified.

Leprechauns, for sure. What else could it be?

Also, what’s on your fridge?

Choose color. Eat. Laugh.

It’s amazing what a dampening effect weather and disappointing news can have. Parts of Colorado got nine inches of snow! Don McGahn didn’t show up to testify and he’s not in jail!

It doesn’t help to be reading a book about a hapless, middle-aged failure whose failures would rank as astounding successes for me. K pshaws (he’s a champ), but still.

(Why continue reading it, you ask? Because it’s incredibly well-written and I want to know what happens).

A delicious homemade broth with ramen was a definite perk last night. We could walk there too, which was nice.

Another high point: a trip to a goodwill in a posh part of Denver where I scored some really good ‘cutters.’ The best one — a garment made out of African batik.

It’s a maxi skirt, so it’s a decent bit of yardage.

Also, I’m a sucker for stripes, so this beautiful cotton skirt grabbed my eye.

I photographed it on a quilt made for D (13 years ago?) to show the consistency of palette.

What colors draw you in, again and again? I’ve studiously tried to move toward a less saturated color wheel for years and not managed it. Tells you something.

This quilt represents probably as much success as I’ll get with choosing more subdued colors. It’s almost finished, PS.

This dress, while a 100% polyester, has just the kind of patterning that I love. Also, because it’s nearly sheer, it can easily be stitched on top of other fabrics. And check out the buttons!

So, what to do while Rome burns? Have a decent meal and indulge in colors that please you. Is that what I’m saying?

Maybe.

Guffawing over at twitter has its place, too.

Sea Island Indigo – at Rebellion Farm

Heather Powers’s hands

For days Two and Three of the Sea Island Indigo workshop*, we convened at Rebellion Farm, about 20 minutes west of my airbnb host in West Ashley.  Donna Hardy was not kidding that she had grown us a field of indigo, and we began by harvesting.
The straight-leafed crop in the three pictures above is Golden Rice, for which Carolina is famous. Indigo, below.  Right about the time I was taking this shot, fire ants were swarming all over my feet. They sting!! After a comic amount of swatting, I managed to get rid of them. Thankfully, only one managed to crawl above my knee.
We selectively harvested because some leaves were more ready than others.
Donna is also growing Sea Island cotton (above and below).  This variety has a longer staple and when woven, has the sheen and drape of silk.
I was lucky to be partnered for the day with fiber artist, Leigh aka Madame Magar (Charlestonmag.com article). After spending twenty years making hats, Leigh (below) is now designing funky, barely-constructed clothes and creating cloth-related installations.  I encourage you to follow the link and see what she’s up to.

Leigh tending the pot

Our gas flame was exposed to a little draft and kept going out.  For that reason, and perhaps  others, our batch was fussy, non-compliant.  This turned out to be OK because it meant we got to see how the experts make adjustments.

Aeration method: pour liquid from bucket to bucket 100 times. Some in the group went to 500! After Leigh and I reached 200, we stood in line for the blender.

finally made myself an etui

Notes: Shelley flings ‘garden snake’ off into the shrubs… black snake / smallish.

We got a pounding rain the first afternoon, which sounded incredible on the pole barn’s roof! Tomorrow’s post will continue at the pole barn.  You can read a nice narrative about the weekend here (Heather Powers’s blog).

 *  *  *

Sea Island Indigo Workshop took place September 18-21, 2014 in Charleston, SC.  A field of indigo was grown for us by Donna Hardy, on Rebellion Farm, in Ravenel, SC.  Fiber artist Kathy Hattori, of Botanical Workshops, flew in from Seattle to co-lead.

what is enough?

Sea Island Indigo’s workshop is allowing us THREE bags of fabric for the dye pot.  By that, I assume they mean the standard grocery bags.

Well, I am flying.  I am NOT going to check two bags.  So this morning I am balancing my squirrel-like packing skills (of which I am rather proud) with the greed to bring more (and more) fabric.  To my surprise, it was a great relief to put half of the cloth away… to name the feeling, ‘greed’, and put that away, too.  Setting aside greed allowed love to come in.

You see, I had collected a bunch of needle-resistant cloth for the rag quilting workshop.  Made sense…. it looks like sewing will be limited with this method.  But an awful lot of the tough fabrics I own are a tad gross in feel.  I find myself protesting, “NO!  NO! I’m only bringing fabric I love”.

Selecting fabrics you love is not at all the same, of course, as fending off greed.  Instead, it is governed by pleasure, aesthetic discernment, cultivated tastes, sensory delight… by all those irrational preferences for some colors over others, and in my case, by a slight mania for a good jumble of patterns.  When you’ve gathered a pile of fabric you love, sometimes looking at the stack is enough!

Raise your hand if you know what I’m talking about.

I will save my greedy impulses for food.  There’s gonna be some AMAZING food on this trip!