Quilted White Capelet Complete

These past two days I decided to work on the white capelet for my second look. Its been snowing outside and crazy cold so it just made sense for me to work on something big and warm to me. It took just about 2 days to get all the pieces cut, the quilting done and the shearling details applied. This capelet is made out of wool, is fully quilted, lined and has shearling details hand sewn into the arm slits as well as the collar. It is closed with a big, chunky, exposed gold zipper that I found at JoAnn fabrics in the size that I needed. It was in a new line of specialty zippers they have. For all my fashion divas out there and anyone that wants or needs zippers that have some edge and details, you know how big this is that they finally have a line in stores, that do not have to be ordered from halfway across the country! Needless to say I was pretty excited about this find! Here are some pictures of the finished capelet and some detail shots of the shearling.

Capelet Front                                                                    Capelet Back

Inside Shearling Detail                                                Arm Slit Shearling Detail

This look originally was going to be the capelet paired with wide leg trousers, but after seeing how the capelet turned out, I have shifted the design of the second piece that will go with it. Now I am going to make a high-waisted pencil skirt with quilted details for this look. I just feel that overall it will look more successful and more cohesive with the overall line. The thing that worried me and made me rethink doing the wide leg pant was that this capelet has so much volume and detail to it that putting it with another garment with a lot of volume would make a heavy overall look and would not compliment the proportions of a figure. So my plan for tomorrow to end off the week will be to figure out the colors and final design for the pencil skirt as well as begin (and hopefully finish) the construction of it as well. Here's to hoping I can stay motivated tomorrow haha! Well that's all I have for now. If I don't get a new post up by late tomorrow night there will be a new one up my Monday! Thanks for reading! :)

xoxo Hillary C.

Sketch #1 Came to Life!

Hey everyone! I am very excited to say that I am DONE with my first outfit!! This outfit took a little longer than the remaining ones should but that is because I had to spend extra time figuring out the patterns for it as well as all of the quilting and other techniques that I used on it. I decided to use a pleather-like material for the sleeve caps. It gives it a nice shine that contrasts with the rest of the matte fabrics in the look as well as gives more depth to the look. I am very happy with the overall result. It still needs to be pressed really well, but I think I am going to wait until I get back to Cincinnati in the spring to do so. I don't want to press it and have it look perfect just to throw it in a box or suitcase for me to move it! I will also be taking final pictures of each garment on a model in Cincinnati with whatever accessories I produce. Just to show you what it looks like now that it is completed though, 

here are some pictures!

                                      

Final Sketch & Completed Quilted Dress

Quilted Jacket Side Detail 

Completed Look: Bolero Jacket with Sleeveless Dress

Finishing this first look has made me very excited to start on the next. I am not completely sure which look I will choose to work on, but as of now I am thinking of maybe doing one of the dresses or one of the caped looks. Now that I have all of the patterns completed and I know that they all work together, I can really dive 

into any look I want.

I am also slowly beginning to change my mind from doing all knit accessories to go with the collection to doing mixed accessories from statement necklaces to clutches and purses to belts. I know it sounds like a complete 180 from where I began but I really like to go off of fabrics and materials that I find and use them to shape my looks and I have found some awesome things that are steering me away from knits at this point. Only time will tell! I want to get a lot more done on the actual garments before I begin the accessories and any embellishment details so we'll see what happens! Hopefully by the end of the week i'll have progress pictures up of my next look so make sure to check back!!

xoxo Hillary C.

First Outfit Progress

As promised here is a much better picture of the first dress of my collection. The color is much truer to reality than the last picture I posted and the details are clearer as well. I also posted a few pictures of the pant and blouse slopers, they are pretty simple but they are key to getting the fit of each and every garment that I am going to make correct. At this point I am basically done with the sloper patterns and I only have the sleeve left to do. I am hoping to get that done tomorrow or the following day (fingers crossed!)

                            Dress #1 Progress                                    Finished Blouse and Pant Slopers

I was feeling really motivated today, so I decided to conquer the bolero jacket that goes with the dress for the first look in my collection. This jacket is made mainly from the suede-like material that I used for the quilting on the dress and is completely quilted....which again took a long time, just as expected. I was able to get a lot done on it and completely machine quilted the front pieces, the back piece and the collar as well as assembled all of those them together.

                                                Bolero Jacket Progress                                            Full Outfit Progress 

In the next day or so once I get the sleeve sloper completed, I will quilt and construct the sleeve for it as well as finish hand-stitching the hem on the jacket and put the final touches on both the jacket and the dress. I do eventually want to put the gold studs on the quilting but I still have to find the right head sealed studs that I want. Ultimately, I don't want them to be flashy and bright yellow gold because I think that will take away from each look, instead I am going to try to find a more tarnished gold-like color that will add detail and interest without being distracting. That will come much later however, and most likely will even be the last 

thing to go on each and every garment.

I am hoping to have this outfit completely finished by my birthday on Thursday so I can take a day off and not feel guilty about it haha. That just means I will have to try to get it all done tomorrow before I go to AE Spa to give a presentation on trends and colors for winter for their 20th year celebration. Wish me luck! I'll be posting soon!

xoxo Hillary C.

First Dress Almost Done!

Okay, I know last post I said I was going to make the leggings for my collection first, but when I sat down to begin making the final patterns for them so I could then cut the fabric out I just was not in the mindset to do leggings. This happens a lot when I sew, if I'm just not in the mood to sew something then I won't. Haha I know it kind of sounds childish in a way, but for me personally I know that if my mind is not fully 100% into something then it will not get done as quickly, as successfully or as smoothly as it otherwise would if I was into it. This is exactly what happened when I went to start the leggings, however I did find myself inspired by this awesome suede-like material that I bought, so I decided to make a piece that used that fabric instead. 

The piece I chose was the dress portion of the bolero jacket look. I used a black jersey to give me the drape I was looking for in the upper portion of the dress and the suede-like material for the bottom, quilted part which gave me the weight that was needed to hold the quilting. I bought a metallic gold thread to do the quilting in. I thought it would give a nice modern pop to the stitching without being too distracting. The quilting I knew would take a lot of time, and it definitely did not disappoint in that aspect, but the final result in the dress is exactly what I was looking for, which makes the time spent well worth it for me.

Close-up of quilted detail w/metallic thread

Here's a sneak peek of the dress, I know it's not the best picture in the world, but it will get the point across for now! Its not finished yet (I still have the neckline and armholes to finish off as well as do a final stitch on the elastic waistline and steam press it) but overall I am really happy with where it is at this point. I think the proportions turned out really well and I cannot wait to see the completed look with the bolero jacket. 

Tomorrow's project I am hoping will be to work on the bolero jacket for this look. It is going to be a ton of quilting again and quite a bit of pattern work as well so no promises on me being in the mood to tackle all of that, but I will definitely be looking on something haha. Make sure to check back tomorrow and I will post about the progress I make on whatever I end up working on as well as a better picture of the dress haha!

xoxo Hillary C.

Collection Update

I hope everyone had a fantastic holiday and new year, I know I did. It was not as productive for myself as I had hoped, but at the same time I didn't completely expect it to be either. I think it is time to let you all know what I have managed to get done since the last post and where I am at with the line currently. 

I have managed to figure out what fabrics are going to be in which looks and I am working on the final, full color and detailed illustrations of them. This was one of the last steps that I needed to complete before I could start figuring out fabric amounts and actually cutting the fabric. I realized that I needed to get some additional yardage of the stretch legging fabric and luckily I found not only the black I needed, but a brown as well that works perfectly with my color scheme and will help to add a little more variation and depth between all the looks in the collection.

Additional Fabric for the Leggings

I have also started (or at least tried to start) draping the bodice pattern slopers out of muslin. These slopers will be used to create all of the other final pattern pieces for each garment. Using the sloper as a starting template will allow each garment and look to fit perfectly, as well as identically on a model without having to start from scratch on every single piece. Here is where the "or at least tried to start" comes in. I was using an old dress form that my mother has had for years to drape the blouse sloper this morning and everything went well, until I took the draped pieces off the form to true them. When I laid the patterns flat on the table I quickly realized that the dress form shape was slightly off, which is often the case with older dress forms that were made with different body standards and ideal shapes. In the case of my mother's dress form, the back and shoulders slope forward slightly, which isn't a huge problem when you are just fitting a garment on it, but is a big pain when trying to create slopers off of it. The back of the sloper I made ended up being about 2 inches longer than the front. After seeing this, I decided to go and buy a new dress form to create the collection off of so all my seams, patterns and garments will fit properly. When you look at the old form next to my new one, you can definitely see the difference in shape.

 This purchase was definitely a good one. I got a pretty good deal at JoAnn Fabrics on it, and with a coupon my mom had it was drastically discounted. I know that it will definitely be put to use and will be well worth the money. This small sized form is my second dress form, I have a medium sized adjustable one in Cincinnati as well, and having the two different sizes will allow me to work with models of different sizes which is always a plus. The new dress form is also adjustable which is perfect for me because this will allow me to shape the form to be the exact measurements of my model's body. With this form I can now go back and re-drape the blouse sloper for hopefully the final time. I also am planning on finishing up the pant and skirt slopers within the next day. From there I will alter these slopers for each look and cut the fabric to begin sewing. 

Everything can not go completely smooth or else people would get bored so I was expecting some delays, but I definitely did not expect it this soon haha! Well, moving forward within the next week I am hoping to have the first garments of my collection COMPLETED! I am pretty excited about this and will definitely post pictures of not only the completed garments, but of all of the completed slopers as well! Lots of new posts and progress to come, so make sure you check back!

xoxo Hillary C.