Wednesday, December 23, 2009

brought to you by the letter N



In order to get the organic cotton materials the colors that I wanted, I ended up hand-dyeing everything in the collection. Well, that is after the eco-friendly dye-house that was going to do it, somehow managed to ruin every fabric I gave them. Hmm, still not sure how they did that.
Thankfully, I had better results. The cotton took the peach really well, and in these folds it somehow almost glowed orange in natural lighting. 

Monday, December 21, 2009

studio snapshots



More shots of the work-in-progress when I was creating what I like to refer to as the monster-gown. I ended up having to cut each and every one of those petals out, and I was going to use those scraps on another dress, but they ended up as some really cool swiss cheese curtains instead! Also, yes, the machine I prefer to work on is a very cheap basic home-sewing machine. I know it's silly, but I prefer them. Mainly because if and whenever they ever break, I can usually repair them myself instead of having to call in a service guy, which is kind of nice. 

Tip: I also just posted a couple of samples up on Etsy, which will probably go fast. There will likely be some more after New Years.

Thursday, December 17, 2009

Go Janeane!!

Hooray, it's finally been announced, and I will obviously be rooting for fellow-Portlander Janeane Marie. She is not only a very talented designer, Janeane happened to be my very first intern and helped me out last year right after I won and still lived in Portland. 

I have known this secret for awhile. I actually somehow had a strange feeling when they were filming, and so I played Detective and realized that Janeane was MIA during that month, which was a huge clue that she was probably there doing it. I emailed her, and sure enough it was true! (FYI, to any designer that leaves to do the show: have a friend log into your Myspace and Facebook accounts while you're away. It helped me throw off my suspicious friends...just a little.)

I am very excited for her. She's so talented, and I have my fingers crossed she'll go very far. Yay Portland designers! Janeane, hold on to your hat: this is where things get crazy and every person you've ever met in your life comes from out of the woodworks. ;)

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Tuxi Dress

I think this was probably my favorite of the collection. A tuxedo married into a dress, brought to you by the letter M. (That's what those layered, folded things are).

Monday, December 14, 2009

lookbook




Wow, multiple posts in one day! :)
Here's more from my SS10 lookbook. Enjoy!


bridal-whipped


I finally finished two wedding dresses I had been working on for nearly a solid 4 weeks. This one in particular, totally consumed all of my time. I was working around the clock, consecutive 16 hour days, 3 weeks straight with a couple of all-nighters to ensure that I got done in time. Of course, my big mistake was initially grossly underestimating the time it'd take to finish. I was able to do my PR finale wedding dress in 2 days, and that somewhat misguided my estimation here.

It came out beautiful, but I have to say, it is one of the LAST custom wedding dresses I will be doing for a very very loooong time, if not ever. It killed me, kicked my ass and put me severely behind schedule for my next collection.  I will likely have some ready-to-wear styles available in the future, but no more customs. I still have not fully recooperated, but it's a nice feeling to put that behind me and move on to the collection I've barely started. A collection which, after all this petal-palooza, makes me long for simple clean lines, minimalism and very light embellishments.