One of the many helpful bits of feedback we received from you during our recent survey (thank you so much for filling it out; your feedback was incredibly helpful and we’ll share more information on what we learned with you soon) is that you want to hear more from me personally. And I’m more than happy to oblige! Since you also indicated that you come to us looking for inspiration, I thought it might be fun to show you some of my Pinterest picks from the week as well as to post links to things that have interested or amused me. I’ll try to do this every couple of weeks or so. Here we go!
Pinterest Picks
I love the color palette and print mixing in this outfit. Also, great proportions! The longer blazer with skinny cropped trousers balance each other out and keep this outfit looking fresh and current.
You could make a dress similar to the one in this photo by using our Class Picnic Blouse as a starting point!
I know, I know, enough with the culottes already! But isn’t this outfit stunning? I love the long jacket. It really gives the impression of long lines and can balance out a pear-shaped body. (I use this trick all the time, myself.) I think this is a really elegant solution to day-to-night dressing, too. I’d happily wear this to the studio and then out to drinks or to the ballet in the evening. And if the realization hasn’t hit you already, I hope it will now: culottes are not just for your grandma anymore!
Our many-year-old bedding bit the dust recently. It was so desperate I had to sew together a big tear on the duvet cover and cut off part of the flat sheet just to hold us until I could find time to get new sheets. Then the stars aligned (thank you, Christmas gifts!), and I splurged on a set of washed linen sheets during the sale at Restoration Hardware. I must tell you: they’re incredible and worth every penny! Linen is a totally different sleeping experience and a wonderful luxury. Anyway, I pinned this photo because I like how the white sheets are styled with textured throw and natural flax duvet.
Did you happen to notice this corduroy School Days Coat in the Flickr group? The yoke is smocked! Brilliant and so, so pretty. Very clever, Tamara!
If you’d like to follow me on Pinterest and see what I’m pinning during the week you can find me right here.
Other Links
- Have you heard about the book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up yet? It’s on my hold list at the library. I thought of it again when I read this piece about eliminating clutter from our houses and keeping only those things we really need which bring us joy. Living in a one-bedroom apartment, this topic is always on my mind. But it seems like we’re all thinking more about reducing clutter and simplifying our lives. I’ll talk lots more about this soon.
- Speaking of minimalism, I posted a link to this article about kids clothing on our Facebook page this week and it generated a lot of discussion. It’s interesting to read through everyone’s contributions to this topic!
- What are your feelings about wearable technology? This article neatly summarized all my pet peeves with the new devices designed specifically for women. Give me the plain old sleek-looking devices over the “fashionable” ones any day! (I guess blue rhinestones just aren’t my style.)
- I’ll admit, I love Eileen Fisher, too.
- You may already know, from my regular column in Sew News, that I’m not a fan of trends and fads. But social media has turned the world of trends on its head–in good ways and bad.
Have a great weekend!
What a juicy post, lots to read through on my next tea break. I did the same thing as you when we got a larger bed to accommodate bedsharing with a long-legged husband and growing kid, and I can assure you that different washes of that bedding are equally nice (and after a few washes they start to feel pretty similar to one another).
I love your Pinterest picks, though they remind me of one of the drawbacks of LA’s combination of very mild weather and car culture — you rarely get a chance to wear all those great layers, because you don’t spend that much time outdoors in cool weather. People in places with strong seasonal shifts or generally cooler weather seem to have such great wardrobes.
The clutter issue is a really interesting one. I strongly associate clutter with depression so whenever I get stressed out, cleaning my house is an important first line of self-care.
The one thing I dislike regarding children’s clothing is seeing little girls dressed like a mini grown up. I like children’s clothing to be modest and I like seeing little girls dressed as little girls! This doesn’t mean they can only wear dresses, but that clothing is appropriate for their age with no hint of sexuality at all.
From the article about technology: “to alleviate a kind of female anxiety that especially afflicts those tethered to children as if to a house-arrest anklet.” WHAT??? These people are nuts.
Love all the thought-provoking stuff here!
Regarding minimalist children’s fashion: I think it is beautiful. But I also think it is important for kids to develop their own sense of style. I haven’t chosen outfits for my kids since they were old enough to have an opinion (my girls were 2 and my son still really doesn’t care haha). They have lots of input over what I make them. The clothes they choose to wear have to be clean and weather-appropriate, but beyond that, I love that they choose their outfits! How else are they going to develop an individual sense of style? I want them to be themselves, not mini versions of what I consider stylish.
Man, I loved that article about Eileen Fisher! Aside from the fact that nearly every memory I have of MY mother is of her in shapeless natural linen, I think it explains why so many folks sewing today with quilting cottons frequently feel dissatisfied with their final garments–which is to say, they love the *idea* of them, but don’t actually wear them all that often. We love the colors and fabrics, but in everyday life, I need a closet where everything goes with everything else and it’s all perfectly appropriate for every occasion.
So glad you shared this one!
Living in the middle of San Francisco, wearables are practically a requirement. If you don’t perennially, you definitely have a friend that works for Apple or Google. Me? I’m waiting of the Apple Watch to finally be released. With all the walking/biking/bussing I do in this City, one less thing to do is great…even as simple as pulling out my phone! I have to ride my bike across the City to pick-up my daughter from school, competing in 4-lane roads of traffic for my bike to be noticed. All while using WAZE to re-direct me from the worst traffic of all. A watch that signals my wrist when to turn, without risking glancing down at my phone and getting hit by a car door who just didn’t notice me? Ugly is fine…it’s a safety issue at some point. Plus, it’s San Francisco…technology is to us as Fashion is to NYC! Not to belittle the point…I would like some lovely wearables, but this is coming from a woman who can get dressed to the Nines, then put on a neon green vest with reflective strips *over* that, just to be seen!
Oh, that article on minimalistic children’s clothing! Not balanced, in my opinion! For one, I think the big box stores are definitely pushing their own styles on our children. Girls clothes are mostly pinks and purples. Our children are being marketed to big time by companies like Disney. The clothing is often immodest or has sassy sayings on the front. Not to mention the sexualization of girls beginning at such an early age. If girls are brought up without this being the norm, they are then really free to choose their own styles. My 7 year old was sobbing when I ran out of fabric for her (last minute) piano recital dress because she does not like the dresses at most of the big brand stores. She doesn’t like pinks and purples and she hates princesses and bling. Even the new sub-category of “tween” is making little girls into early teenagers when they are still little girls. To me, that is the agenda that should be called into question.
Hey Rachel, I couldn’t agree more.
I think I’m an outlier on the ‘dressing kids like kids’ thing — what seems to be accepted as some kind of absolute fact of what it means to dress ‘like a kid’ feels very recent and constructed to me. Mine is the first generation in my family to wear any significant amount of knits. My mom wore clothing that was different from adults’ chiefly in that it a lot shorter, so certainly it was not really more ‘modest’ — I think children were read at the time, in the 40s and 50s, as kind of inherently sexless so it didn’t matter if their shorts and dresses barely covered their bottoms. But they played very hard in cotton and wool clothes and leather shoes with laces and buckles. Very few knits as these were still chiefly handknits. I grew up in jeans and tshirts and obviously nothing bad happened to me as a result of wearing cheap, disposable clothes. I don’t really like segregating my kid and giving her ‘kid food’ or ‘kid clothes’ — she’s a person, too, and she deserves to get the good stuff. It’s ok if she spills something, we have cleaning products.
The comments have had me thinking a lot more about this, especially Sarvi’s. I am kind of changing what I think to not actually knowing quite what I think any more, but here are some general and rather lengthy musings…
I think there has always been a construct of sorts for what is ‘children’s wear’, matching what were behavioural expectations. For example, in the days when children were to be seen and not heard did they wear more ‘adult’ fabrics, with the expectation that they were mini adults? I don’t know, but I get a feeling that how we think of, engage with and treat children now is more inclusive for embracing their ‘childness’.
In the last two generations there have been massive developments and changes in the types of fabric that are available. As a lover of more recent vintage clothes (tautological?!) some of the fabrics for 60s/70s frocks are awful. I don’t think lovely jersey was available like it is today, or other useful fabrics like waterproof coating, thermal or serious outdoors fabric etc. Or some of the interesting fabrics I’m interested in using now, like the kind of stiff scuba stuff. The downside of this is that is how they’re manufactured and the environmental and social issues, the upside that there are alternatives and choices available now for all clothes, including children’s wear that were not previously really available.
What I’m eventually coming to, is that I would probably rather my crazy daughter was wearing a waterproof raincoat to go jumping in puddles in the rain, as opposed to a heavy wool one. It will be less heavy for hear and easier for me to care for. I would love the wool one. The daughter prefers to wear t-shirts and leggings as she can put these on herself. Thank you jersey and lycra. I prefer cotton, linen and silk. I am making her a tasteful navy linen class picnic blouse with piping and contrasting neon pink top stitching. I bet she will prefer her quilting cotton ‘space dress’ made with fabric I knew she would love, but I would not choose for her to wear, if that makes sense. I suppose as much as I love the tasteful design led look, it is not always the most practical, and it is not always to the taste of my children. So I’m sitting somewhere of a halfway house. I like her having ‘kid’ clothes because she likes them. I like her having gorgeous fabrics because I like them.
I have to say, I have an extremely sleepless baby, and having this to muse on during the night feeds for the last couple of nights has made it a little more bearable, so more please!
That’s such a great point about the changes in materials available, and kids’ desire for independence!