Happy Halloween!

Apparently, one year when I was pretty young I told my mother that Halloween was my "High Holy Day." I'm not even sure if I knew then what a high holy day was but celebrating it to the max has definitely resolved itself into a personal tradition. Now that I work in a costume shop, I knew that this year I had to pull out all the stops.

For the first time maybe ever I decided to go with something scary:


Remember this? It's a literal mash-up where author Seth Grahame- Smith inserts a spooky zombie tale right into the original text of Pride and Prejudice. HI-larious! Here's how my costume came together:

1.) Bought a pattern for a Regency period dress. Ripley helped.

2.) Made the dress.
3.) And then...... I pretty much destroyed it.

Before:
After:
I got to learn a little about distressing costumes during our recent production of Sweeney Todd: it's really fun! For Sweeney I got to get into the heads of the characters... think about how they lived and how their clothing would wear and show age. In this case, my "characters" only real motivation was "braaaaaaiiiiiins..." so I got to do whatever I wanted. (That's brown and red rit dye, lots of tearing, some sand paper and some brown acrylic paint.)

Then for the make up:


I know pretty much NOTHING about zombie make up so my friend, Maggie, agreed to help me out: she'd taken a stage make-up class in grad school and was excited to get out her kit again!

The key ingredients for awesome zombie make up? Liquid latex (for the peeling effect) and fake blood. This stuff was edible and tasted minty! Fortunately for anyone I hugged hello during the course of the evening, it also washed out with water.

All that was left was for me to find some brains... and maybe a wealthy husband.

(Check out the rest of my halloween photos at my flickr! And lots and lots of halloween photobooth photos, too!)

Theater Magic

So I learned a little something about theater politics while working on The Sound of Music (our most recent production at Drury Lane.) Because the show was so huge, the costume shop rented a package of costumes: hypothetically, there should have been a couple of each costume for each of the principal characters so that we could fit the closest to our actors. Unfortunately, the package we rented was in a pretty horrible state of disrepair. In addition to the crappy previous stitching blunders, in turned out that we were short a couple of key items. Here was the issue: props are props even if they are fabric... even if it's fabric that has to match the costumes. Anyone seen The Sound of Music? Remember the curtain clothes? Of course you do. It's a story staple. BUT: curtains= props and curtain clothes= costumes. WOOPS. We ended up spending a LOT of time and money to buy the fabric and make the clothes ourselves. (Also? There is NO WAY Maria could have sewn those outfits overnight. SRSLY.)

There are a LOT of children in that family. Especially since they're double cast for our production. DIRNDLES, you guys. Weeep.

Also in that scene is a reference to fabric that is given to Maria for her to make her own dress. Guess what? The dress, we had. But the bolt of fabric? Not included in the package. Enter: Nora, textiles superhero.

RIGHT??! One of those things I'm kinda proud of. :0) Just a little bit of theater magic.

Sew Your Own Hoodie Class in Action!

** Yeah... I spend most of my time at Lill St. Here's another blog entry for them!**

We're already a couple weeks into the fall semester and my Sew Your Own Hoodie class has dived headfirst into their projects! Here are some photos of the students making paper patterns from their favorite hooded sweatshirts! After the paper patterns are done, we'll use them to make design/size alterations so that each seamstresses hoodie will be a one of a kind masterpiece!

The Inaugural Run of Lill Street's New Bullet Steamer!

*** Yet another blog entry done for the Lill Street Textile Blog! Yay Steamer!***

Just yesterday, the students in Screen Printing with Thickened Dye class got to be the first to witness our brand new Bullet steamer in action! Huzzah!

Printing with dye is a lot more tricksy than printing with ink; instead of sitting directly on top of your fabric, dye needs to be chemically bonded with the fibers. Dye powders are mixed with a thickening agent (sodium alginate) to make it print-able but, once the fabric is washed, the only thing remaining attached is the color. Your fabric ends up as soft as it was before you printed on it!

The shiny, new bullet steamer comes into play after you're done printing but before you wash your fabric. All of those chemicals that make up the sodium alginate tend to cause the colors to bleed when you submerge your fabric in water... but with the steamer, the chemicals are STEAMED out! Here's a little slideshow about how we did it in class:

In order to protect our images, we wrapped our fabric in newsprint.

The fabric is fully encased so that it doesn't end up touching other parts of fabric or the metal steamer insert!

Then we rolled the wrapped fabric around the insert so that the paper won't touch the inside of the steamer silo. (Water condenses inside the steamer- but if our fabric gets wet, the colors will bleed before the chemicals have a chance to evaporate!)

After 35 min in the steamer, we remove our fabric and machine wash it in cold water with some tide and a color-catcher. Throw it in the dryer and done!

We will be doing tests throughout the session to figure out the absolute best condition for the steamer to do it's job.

In order for students to be able to use/take advantage of the new steamer, you will have to take a dye printing class (check out the winter catalog, when it becomes available, for next sessions classes) or the upcoming Steamer Basics Workshop: Saturday, October 1st, 2-5pm. Hope to see you there!

--Nora

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Inspiration from Marimekko

(Slideshow of Marimekko's Factory Process.)

The textile/design company Marimekko has been a source of beauty and vibrant color since the 1950's. Despite being located in chilly (and monochromatic) Finland, their inspirations evoke lush natural themes: florals, landscapes, and color palates that are more likely found in a summer garden than in snow.

(Slideshow of Iconic Marimekko Patterns.)

The company has had it's ups and downs over the years but, thanks to some keen business minds and a persisting partnership with Crate & Barrel, Marimekko is at it's height of success. Check out these two video peeks at their factory processes!

I totally want the job of throwing the ink into those giant printing machines! It's like screenprinting to the MAX! Let's print some yardage!



We may be at the height of summer now but I have a feeling that keeping Marimekko's joyful outlook on life will be especially handy come February in Chicago!

***(This post can also be read on lillstreettextiles.blogspot.com !)***

Tour of Chicago Silk Screen

Yesterday, the employees of Chicago Silk Screen were nice enough to give some Lill St students a tour of their facilities. One of the oldest screen printing business in the city, Chicago Silk Screen is downright fascinating. Did you know that practically everything is silk screened? Plastic buckets, glass bottles, and a lot of those giant vinyl banners! And each of these objects requires it's own special screen.

Alan Shust, CSS production manager and our wonderful tour guide, took us through their process.

This is a room-sized camera englarger used to create the films needed to burn the screen. Before digital printing became popular, this is how all films were created. CSS has two of these devices which can make films 4' x 6' and larger!

Stretching a giant aluminum screen! That little device is a "tense-ometer" so that they know that the screen is stretched properly.

The team at CSS coats their screens a little differently than we do at Lill St: because they are preparing screens that will be used to make thousands and thousands of prints, the screens need extra emulsion. It was fun to talk shop with the pros! Here, Fransisco is coating screens used to print styrofoam coffee cups!

The screens are then burns on this beautiful Vacuum UV light table! (Swoooon...)

And rinsed in the washout station (we should BE so lucky!)

CSS also has a department that takes the used mesh out of old screens restretches them.

Stretching wood screen must be SOO much easier with that pneumatic staple gun!

The basement... where silk screens go to be reborn!

All in all the tour was FASCINATING. Thanks so much for the employees of Chicago Silk Screen for being so hospitable and thanks again to Alan Shust for being such a fantastic tour guide! If you have any printing needs, we highly recommend these guys! (Check out more photos from the tour at my flickr!)

Printing Wallpaper with Jennifer Angus

In just under a month I will be headed to Maine to take another class at Haystack Mountain School of Craft! This is the second class I have been lucky enough to take at Haystack; the first was a totally amazing knitting class with Janet Morten. Haystack is one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen- practically hanging off Maine's coast, the weathered wooden classrooms and dormitories create an artistic haven that fosters community, creativity and inventiveness. I am SOOOO excited to be going back! The class I will be taking this summer is a Screen Printed Wallpaper class taught by artist Jennifer Angus.

Screen printing wallpaper is an idea that I have toyed around with for a number of years. Note: I said an idea. Although I've wanted to try it for a while, I've never managed to make it happen. I feel like wallpaper and textiles are very much related to one another. Both are decorative emblems of domesticity. Historically and contemporarily, wall paper and textiles have helped shape the individuals relationship to the home. I think that textiles and walls are both able to create a certain sense of coziness- you wrap or enclose yourself in them, you embellish them, you make them part of yourself.


It is these feelings of comfort that Jennifer Angus challenges.
"In her work, bugs are pinned directly to museum and gallery walls in patterns that reference both textiles and wallpapers. A common theme runs through this work: the interplay of the feelings of comfort experienced when viewing familiar patterns and the realization on closer inspection that the comforting familiar is actually made up of insects, something most people feel apprehension for. " (FiberArts Magazine)


Through her many installations, Angus explored themes ranging from the odd sensation of Victorian bug collecting, to colorful Kimono fabrics, to oriental carpets: all with the aim of creating conflict between beauty and uncomfort while also drawing the viewers attention to social and ecological truths.


Swooooon.

I have already started brainstorming what kinds of wallpaper I'd like to print while I'm in Maine. Have I already said I'm excited?? I AM SO EXCITED. (Click on the links for more information about Jennifer Angus!)