Sewing and fashion with a Japanese twist
At the Great Wall I made a new Autumn coat for my trip to China. In fact I only just finished it in time – I was sewing the hem while packing in the hours before leaving for the airport! But it’s a perfect travel coat – soft and fluffy… Warm but not too bulky.
My Sprout Patterns Bikini from last week came with quite a lot of extra fabric. It turned out to be very useful when I messed up one of the cup pieces and had to recut it… but there was still a load left. …What to do with it? I then remembered this pattern from Burda
Obon is the Japanese Buddhist Summer festival that usually takes place in the second week of August. Most companies have a couple of days off, some like mine take the whole week off! I love it! Not only is it a great to have a week off in the middle of summer, your friends probably
Who hates tracing patterns? Who finds marking fabric time-consuming? Who thinks preparation is the dullest part of sewing? Me, for one! It is however super important. Mistakes made in the initial stages cannot be corrected later. You can waste a lot of time and nice fabric by laziness at the start of a
This is a fabulous pattern – I knew the moment I saw it I’d be making it. I completed it a couple of months ago, but had to wait for the right occasion to wear it out. -A classical concert and dinner in Kobe – and I wish I’d taken more photos cos it was
A simple sleeveless shirt with a v-neck and a gathered front from the June 2018 issue. Perfect project to show-case a the sort of big, bold patterns I love but that always get lost in a more complex project. Super simple, easy-as-pie, cant-possibly-take-more-than-a-day.
I loved the look of this project from the moment I saw it; smart and professional but light and breezy. I was also intrigued by the “Colour-Blocking” use of the striped fabric – (do you call it ‘colour blocking’ when it’s all the same colour?)
BSM 2018-08-103 Red Umbrella Mini-Skirt This is a project from Autumn last year. I made it for my birthday trip to Arima Hot springs with my friends. The project The skirt comes from Burda Style August 2018, Swinging Sixties collection. Original is here. I loved the cool exposed zip and angled front skirt – a
Old Project Review – Full Skirted Dress, British Sewing Bee Book As summer is on the way I’ve been switching round my wardrobe this weekend. I dug around the back of my closet and pulled out all my summer clothes including this; my green swirly dress! This dress has a real special place in my
Pencil skirt With this project I actually started out with the fabric and then trying to find a suitable pattern for it. The Fabric Absolutely gorgeous pattern of trees and leaves in silver-grey and black. It reminded me so much of cherry blossom season here, of going to hanami picnics and looking up at the
