Leaving for our little Victorian house in Tombstone in the morning for a few days, so I can make new draperies and for the new parlor and bedroom…because what do most designers do on vacation? Oh yeah…sew. 🙂
Corsetiere
Helldorado Days 2018
It’s October and that means Helldorado Days in Tombstone! This year, Helldorado is scheduled on October 19 through October 21, 2018 and the high point of the event is the parade to he held on Sunday October 21. First started in 1928 to publicize the town, Helldorado is held on the third Sunday of October and commemorates the town’s early years and especially that 30-second gunfight that took place somewhere close by to the OK Corral. We’ll be meeting with clients and otherwise working on some projects and having a little fun. See you there! 🙂
Fabric Safari in London…
It’s been a busy August between a buying trip to Oregon for all manner of vintage lace and fabrics and renovating No. 11 in Tombstone but we’ve gotten it all under control and turned our attention to our upcoming trip to London. With no costumes to bring with us this time, we’ll be travelling light (relatively speaking). We’ve created a bit of itinerary, focusing on some promising fabric stores along with some museums that we missed the last time. Of course, we’ll flying out on our favorite airline…
Some tentative stops on our fabric safari are:
- MacCulloch & Wallis, Ltd.– This one has admittedly mixed reviews and is priced a bit on the high side but you never know until you look.
- The Berwick Street Cloth Shop– The reviews are better here and it’s a short walk away from MacCulloch & Wallis so we might as check this one out too.
- The Silk Society– The name says it all…we’re always on the lookout for the unique and different and especially when it comes to silk. 🙂
- Kleins– Looks more of a generalist establishment but it may be worth hitting just because.
I’m sure there’s a lot more out there and I realize that the pricing is on the high side but we’ve always had the philosophy that if we come across the right piece for our clients, we’re willing to pay a little more. So with that said, it’s really more about the search and if we walk away empty-handed, that’s OK too. 🙂
Corsetry From The V&A…
While going through some postcards that we bought at the V&A Museum during our recent trip to the UK, I came across this beauty:
Corset, c. 1890 – 1895; V&A Museum (T.738-1974)
Here’s another view from the V&A website:
This is probably one of the best extant example of corsetry from the 1890s and it helped to create the wasp-waist silhouette that was characteristic of this period. Just for comparison is another corset from 1883:
Corset, 1883; V&A Museum (T.84&A-1980)
From a general perspective, there doesn’t seem to be much of a difference between these two corsets. At some point, we’ll take a more detailed look at corsetry so until then, enjoy these pictures. 🙂
Fabric Safari: London
We’re hard at work planning our next journey to London and part of it will involve looking for unusual fabrics, lace and trims. We’ve compiled a short of list of places and no doubt, there will be more added…
Here’s what we have so far:
- Liberty London
- MacCullouch & Wallis
- The Silk Society
- The Berwick Street Cloth Shop
- Joel & Son Fabrics
- VV Rouleaux
That’s it for now… 🙂