Tag Archives: DIY fashion

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True Collars

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So for this week’s entry I thought I’d keep my big, opinionated gob shut – or to a minimum so far as verbose introductions go – and my tutorial restoratively easy after my big print-fest and starry shorts of the not-too-distant past. However, to those helming and pricing high street fashion, know only this: To accessorise an outfit with an elegant collar is surprisingly awesome, to charge silly money for the privilege is bullshit! To see what I mean, and to let the numbers do the talking, please refer to the technically inclined and completely objective diagrams below:

Oh, and while we’re on the subject of value, you’ll be pleased to know this entry gives you two collars for the price of one, both of them as easy as falling off a log – and pretty much equally inexpensive!

The second outing’s in the direction of Zara with their £18 pink lace collar. £18. Really. The price of a quality top or dress and you get something like 1/50th of a garment! Ahem, rant better out than in, methinks! Now to cut to the chase…

 

Difficulty

True to my word, this has to be the easiest, least time-consuming venture I’ve taken on in a long time, possibly even in Chic Cheat history.

 

Time

Want to go pink and frilly? You’re looking at a half hour job, tops.

Looking to toughen up with studs and leather? Oi! Wot u lookin’ at? Realistically, 2 hours or so, depending on how good you are at stud insertion.

 

You will need…

For the a study in how to get “studdy”

Pack of 100 6mm studs (£3.50 with postage and packing from Ebay – seller ashkx007)

Pack of jewellery connector rings (99p/pack at Hobbycraft)

Lobster clasp (99p/pack of two at Hobbycraft)

Scalpel

0.5m stiff interfacing (I can’t remember what I paid for mine or even if I just scrounged it off my university for free back in the day. I just had it lying around, as I often do with these things)

Computer (like the one from which you’re presumably reading this entry) with a printer and Photoshop (or equivalent program)

Metallic gel pen

Masking tape (optional)

Fabric scissors

Sewing machine with a leather needle fitted

Leather or pleather (Editor’s note – if you want the real McCoy, fish it out of a leather shop’s offcuts bin, or better still, do as I did and pick a cut up jacket out of the reject bin. It’ll be useless to them but invaluable for shoe and accessory projects – mine lasted for three. I paid about £3 for mine, whereas a full leather skin sets you back around £20!)

 Iron and ironing board

 

For a flouncy flight of fancy

Pink collared shirt (I used a men’s shirt – £5 from a charity shop but you can strike it lucky and pay even less. They start at around £3 with postage and packing on Ebay)

White lace (I paid quite a bit for mine since I cut it off a garment, but you can find some on Ebay for less than £2 with postage and packing – search “White guipure lace”)

Fabric glue (starting at £2.79 from Hobbycraft)

Fabric scissors

 

So, without further ado, my little stud muffins (terrible pun, model’s own) here’s how it’s done…

Print out the pattern above, making sure it’s 22.5cm in length (Photoshoppers, check using the rulers function)

Cut out your pattern outline using your scalpel. Place it on your leather and use tiny amounts of masking tape on the edges to hold it in place. Trace around the outline using your metallic gel pen. Repeat this another three times so you have four pieces.

Cut out your pieces.

Iron your interfacing onto two of your pieces.

Divide your pieces into two pairs, both of which have one piece with interfacing and one without. Machine sew each pair together, using a leather needle.

Using your pattern, put each piece underneath it once again and use your scalpel to trace out the circles where the studs need to go. Prod four equidistant points around each circle (I would say corners but they’re circles we’re dealing with – you get the idea!) and make sure they all go through both layers.

Now to start putting your studs in. Use the holes you prodded to slip the points of your studs through. You’ll probably need to use your scalpel to open the holes and to help coax the stud points through – I should know, I did.

Place both of your pieces back-to-back with the edges completely parallel, and pierce two holes – one at the top and one at the bottom – to make absolutely sure they’re symmetrical.

Insert two interlinking rings at the bottom and four at the top – two on one side and two alongside the lobster clasp on the other…

…And you should have something that looks rather like this:

To get lacy…

Cut the collar off your shirt.

Cut your lace to fit your collar.

Glue your lace on.

Result!!!

 

Boom! Owned – and now you can make your own, too. Lucky you!

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Day 5 with… me!

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So, today it’s my turn to take over on the DIY Bloggers Fashion Week with my creative ode to the Spring/Summer 2012 shows. The fashion statement in question? Like Carly, I chose to sartorially say it with flowers, as it were, and looked to London Fashion Week for my inspiration. My entry is a hand-crafted version of Matthew Williamson’s floral printed blouse:

Image: Style.com

You will need

A white top or blouse (mine was a converted muumuu – £7, charity shop buy)

Screen printing kit (mine was by Artrain and cost about £3 from Ebay)

Iron and ironing board

Lots of plastic carrier bags

Sewing pins

Computer – with Photoshop installed – and a printer

Tissues

Water for rinsing brushes, also a tub of water for soaking and washing screens after use

Paintbrushes – ideally with a small, fine tip

Metal 30cm ruler

Palette knife

Fabric paints in the following colours(I recommend Pebeo opaque fabric paints, £3.99 at Hobbycraft and worth it because they’re not runny like many other fabric paints ):

Other fabric paint colours you’ll need, included with the screen printing kit, are:

 

Time

About 1-1.5 hours to trace each screen.

About 12-15 hours for screen printing/ blending/ linear pattern painting

About 30 minutes for ironing and preparation

 

Difficulty

Very Hard

Don’t be put off but I found this a tricky one and I learnt quite a bit on the job. It might have been down to my choice of equipment (the method in my madness was to avoid forking out £50-80 for a professional screen printing kit and not having access to a printing studio – unless you count my bedroom!) A word of warning – screen printing’s a very messy business so take extra care to protect clothes and furniture!

The Video Tutorial

 

Result!

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On the dot

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Spotted: The best way to carry off appliqued dotty chic this season.

“Fashion rebels against the static; it is always in flux,” as Jane Mulvagh highlighted in Vogue’s History of 2oth Century Fashion book. To each trend, silhouette, fad and movement that dominated fashion through the ages, she asserts, “a reaction is (simply) inevitable.” A valid point though that may be, it seems to be much less to do with fashion as a reactive swinging pendulum, drifting from one excess to another, than about its inherent pressure of aspiration. It revolves around the creation of ideals delivered at an ever more frenetic pace through a melee of style advisor apps (Ask a Stylist et al), the scrutiny of blogging and, lest we forget, the dreaded haul vlogging phenomenon. How zealously fashion and style businesses compete for their products to get a place in such divinely influential liturgies of fashion – whether they be the scriptures of celebrity gossip, fashion blogs or a conspicuously spoiled brat with a webcam and too much time on their hands – to be recommended as the gospel truth of all that’s oh so now by the “experts.” Terry Eagleton pointed out in The Significance of Theory “Power succeeds by persuading us to desire and collude with it; this process is not merely an enormous confidence trick, since we really do have needs and desires which such power, however partially and distortedly, is able to fulfill,” so now you know. My sincere thanks for his use and acknowledgement of the word “distortedly” but I digress, since that may be the mentality fashion wants to perpetuate to keep us buying and consuming to keep it afloat, but here at Chic Cheat, I have other ideas, namely those of the recycling, reworking and customising persuasion. That’s right – stick that, academics! Looks like you don’t have to play the financially feckless fashion victim to be fabulous, after all! Or should I stay out of that debate, being at a disadvantage as only a part-time navel-gazer?

While we’re on the subject of ever-changing fashion, I spent most of my art education theorising on post-modernism and the idea that every possible style has already been done, but in a way that leaves an array of possible references and permutations that can be mixed together in different ways to create new visual messages. This gave me some meaty food for thought and the motivation to dissect the meanings of each look I explore as well as the clothes I cut and splice through to recreate them. This season has seen a resurgence of sixties trends, including jewel tones, bold Cardin-esque tailoring and an explosive, body-conscious take on polka dots. It’s out with the quaint, clown-like fare of fifties fashion…

… and in with the spotty sex appeal of the sixties…

…reiterated as a collaged concoction today – for us to celebrate in DIY-form.

Difficulty

Medium 

More on the painstaking and time-consuming side, this one, but a good technique and precision for circle cutting certainly helps.

You will need

A white dress with a mesh top

1.5x 1m white twill or a similarly stiff fabric

1m bondaweb

White thread

Ruler

Compass and pencil

Iron and ironing board

Sharp fabric scissors

 

 And your mission is, if you choose to accept…

Fold your twill in half, across the length and sandwich your bondaweb in between.

Iron your bondaweb in place on a high heat, one side at a time. Maybe I should mention that you need to peel the paper off the second time around – just sayin’!

Using your compass, pencil and ruler (as you may see, I used a patternmaster for mine but fear not for a ruler will do) measure and draw a circle 5cm in diameter directly onto your fabric and repeat this 50 or so times. Ensure you only do this on the twill that has bondaweb and another layer beneath it.

Using your fabric scissors, cut your circles out. I find it helps most to skim your scissors along the edge, pulling on the fabric as you go, to avoid nasty jagged edges.

Repeat this process with 150-200 smaller circles 2cm in diameter. This process may prove long-winded and hard work, so I recommend you stick the telly on or some of your favourite music, or perhaps even a DVD – here at Chic Cheat we like to take a liberal view of each reader’s approach, you’ll be pleased to know.

Time to finally stitch them on individually. It’s yet another painstaking phase but it’s thankfully on the home run. Stitch most of your larger circles in a cluster on the bust with the rest sprinkled sparingly around the top, and your smaller circles in a linear cluster across the middle of both sides of the skirt, graduating more sparingly outwards towards the top and bottom.

…And you should have something that looks like this:

A spot of stylish crafty chic to see you through the season!