Garden Path - Photo Shoot

Craving bright flowers after a grey New England winter, this is what I made:

I don't believe that I've ever shown the back of the jacket, which is similar in design to the fronts:

You will notice that I do not have a hat in these photos. It did not arrive in time for the photo shoot, but I will show you the hat next week. I have not found the right purse yet. I also did not have time to iron out all the flowers (this is seen better in the close-ups below) before the photo shoot - rest assured, that has been done since!

I ended up with 20 insects and 1 arachnid on the garment! I probably could have done more, but no one likes an insect invasion of any sort. Here are some close-ups of the insects, starting with the one butterfly - my children's favorite:

A dragonfly, a ladybug (there are three total) and two bees (there are six bees total):

A cricket (one of three):

Another bee, a group of three ants (there's another group of three somewhere) and the spider:
A closer look at the spider:

Here's a better look at the small trim, and how it fits into the whole scheme of things. The large flower border is suspended by beads between two rows of the narrow trim, which are then in turn, suspended from the body of the jacket by beads. The beading is holding all the border, trims and body together. You can actually see the blouse through the spaces between the border/trim/jacket - that's not jacket lining!

I am very pleased with how this ensemble turned out. I took a chance with the unusual color combination and the bright flowers that the ensemble would actually look decent. Now I know there are those of you who think my stuff is bit like a costume and very over the top. That's fine, I'm not saying my work isn't, in fact I think it is a bit, too. Let's face it, this isn't every day wear type of clothing. Note that I do sew things for every day wear, but this is my artistic outlet, the chance that I have to put my heart and creative resources into making something spectacular.

That said, if you put the coat and color combination aside, the skirt and blouse are wearable and more modern looking than they actually are - the patterns are from 1953. I'm not saying they walked off the Paris runways yesterday, but in different fabrications, you've basically got a sleeveless blouse with collar band and front tucks (seen that design element anywhere recently?!?) and a pencil skirt.

For the purpose of showing that a 1950's ensemble is remotely wearable today, I probably will not model the ensemble with a hat or purse and possibly not the gloves. I'm not sure about those. I may try to find a matching set of earrings and necklace. The necklace could possibly be reworked into a pair of bracelets to wear instead of the gloves. Although, I actually like the earrings (worn with this outfit only, of course!):

At the moment, the ensemble is in California for its debut show at the Pacific International Quilt Festival in Santa Clara, CA. If you're in the area, please stop by and take a look - click on the link in the Now Showing list to go to the website for further information.

Parting Shot: Behind the Scenes. My children, as always have done a good job with the photography. Each child gets a camera to use, this time my daughter was using the Canon Powershot A590 and my son was using the larger Sony Alpha DSLR. Here's just a sneak peek as to what goes on behind the scenes: