Sweater: Vintage cotton dolman sleeve, Thrifted
March is here, and that means it’s starting to warm up here in sunny Nebraska. I love a light sweater for spring, and I also love the new/old dolman sleeve trend. It happens to be flattering on me, as well as being handy when you find a lovely vintage sweater and don’t want to look too terribly out of date. Once again, I really don’t know how to style this garment, but I feel like (my winter weight not withstanding) a pair of skinny jeans is the right direction. Perhaps that’s a little too 80′s, though. As always, let me know in the comments if you have any ideas for ways to style this garment.
Dress: Vintage Junior fashion dress
February’s vintage look isn’t really a look. I found this adorable shades-of-gray dress from the early 1960s, and it fits me like a dream. But I have NO earthly idea how to style it. I like the bright shoes, but I don’t know if red is the color. Perhaps a blue or turquoise would be better? I need more shoes. (Don’t tell my husband I said that.)
Ideas for how to style this dress? Leave me a comment!
Shirt: Cotton/Silk knit shell, Express, Thrifted
Skirt: Wool tweed, vintage John Meyer of Norwich, Thrifted
Boots: Franco Sarto
Wrap: Wool, printed in India, Thrifted
The first Monday of every month features an outfit from my own wardrobe. Every outfit either incorporates vintage pieces or is inspired by a vintage look. January’s look features my outfit for my husband’s office Christmas party. The skirt is a beautiful vintage tomato red wool tweed, and I was lucky to find the wrap, which doesn’t actually match, but coordinates really well.
Disclaimer: I am NOT a fashionista. In fact, I do a lot of blundering as far as dressing myself is concerned. However, I do have a very good eye for materials, and over the course of the last few years have managed to add some really lovely vintage pieces to my wardrobe. I don’t know how often I’m successful in wearing them, but I love them. Let me know in the comments if you think there’s a way I could better style any of my vintage pieces.
Time for another free pattern! This one comes from a knitting/crochet booklet I bought without part of the cover. There isn’t a copyright date on the front cover, the back cover is missing, and I’ve never seen another copy of it with which to compare. Based on the model designer and the style shapes, I’m dating it to the early to mid 40′s, although it’s possible it’s a late 30′s booklet. I can find no copyright renewals for the copyright holder or for the designer. That all out of the way, the pattern is an adorable knitted bathing suit. No gauge is given, but I can tell you that the Shetland Floss would be a fingering weight wool or wool blend. Download the PDF here.
This beautiful piece is by an artist, Helen Grant, who was regularly featured on the cover and inside Needlecraft Magazines from the early part of the century. It pictures matching mother and daughter dress styles, the patterns of which could be purchased by mail order. It is beautifully done, sweet and so characteristic of the time period. I think it would make a lovely embroidered item, decorations for stationary, or even framed art. Click on the picture to get a larger version.
It has been quite some time since I made this item, but a variety of factors inhibited me from posting about it. The short and sweet is this:
Kit and I went to the fabric store together to buy supplies to make her first-day-of-school outfit for her 1st grade year. She chose a couple of patterns that happened to be on sale cheap that day, and were very simple, so I bought them in two sets of sizes, to fit now and to fit later. Of those, we alighted on Butterick pattern 5022, item B, a jumper-style dress. We went hunting for fabric, and Kit chose bright guitars on a green background and purple with white dots. (You might recall that when I made her stocking I thought her choice of greens was… weird… but once I got them together, they looked great. Well, the same could be said of this experience.)
Some sewing, some adjusting, and some time later, here is Kit in the finished product:
She looks cute, and she loves it. I did some extra work to make sure there were almost no raw edges, and it’s made of quilting cotton, so it is very washable and is a nice, light and airy dress for her to wear on these HOT summer days!
