Cool Idea! Up-do Accessories!

OK, so yesterday I showed you The Giant Pouf. Today, I want to share this other idea I got from the photo shoot.

We had a model all dressed and ready to go and when I went to put whichever headpiece I had assigned to the dress on, it just didn’t work. We tried all sort of different pieces and it just wasn’t coming together with the dress and the hair. Frustrated, we called over the hairstylist to enlist her creativity.

We showed her our previous ideas, which she too dismissed. She looked through all the products, gently shaking her head, just as we had done. She asked me, “You got anything else?” I did, but they were things that were incredibly simple that I had kept packed up. I mean, after The Giant Pouf the plain things seemed sort of….dull.

I pulled out the few remaining goodies in my arsenal of hair toys and the hairdresser made a beeline straight for The Annabelle Headband exclaiming, “Ooooooh! This one!” However, we had already tried a ribbon-styled headband on the model and it just did not work with the look, which we all started protesting to her at the same time.

“No! Not as a headband! Like this!” and she immediately started twisting the headband into the incredible bun she had created, leaving the small, beaded accent toward the top of the up-do.

Check it out:

I simply adored her take on the headband and the idea of pinning pretty ribbon into a detailed up-do like this. I’ve seen flowers and sparkly pins and such pinned in, but never a ribbon. I simply had to share!

So what do you think? Do you love this idea or what?

Local Loveliness

I was touring around Etsy yesterday TRYING to find something cool for The Candyman for our second anniversary, which tradition says is cotton. We are following tradition. I don’t want to get something predictable, like a t-shirt. Or clothes of any sort. I want something cool and yet it can’t be over $50 (budget, budget budget). I found this killer Dias de Los Muertos quilt wall hanging thing, but it was WAY over the limit. *sigh* Any ideas would be more than welcome…

Anyway, I started shopping under the “local” function and ran across a very cool vintage shop cleverly called ReInVintage. It has 15 pages of things that I simply love. Perhaps you will too!

For the brides:

Early 1900’s iron, rope and silk purse. $88

 

Vintage white gloves with scalloped edge detail. $24

Vintage kitten heels. $30

Pour moi:

1930’s Black, yellow and silver dress with suede waistband. $385

(I ‘d wear it sans petticoat)

 

1950’s De Lisa Deb Heels, $64

(And yes, I think I just might wear these with that dress! Though in reality, prolly not unless I want to cut my toes off to fit into them!)

Vintage handbag, $28

(Perfection!)

I just love when I can shop (window or otherwise) local, don’t you? What’s your favorite local haunt? Share the link if you are so inclined! I love exploring new finds. Of course, local does not have to mean Charlotte in this instance. Share your local love worldwide (that’s right, T30SB is in 150 countries! WOOT!).

Fantasy Land Friday

Fantasy Land Friday

Where I can pretend I’m always planning my wedding…where there are no budgets, locale limitations, opposing religions, or back-talking in-laws.

Where back-fat is an unknown, shoes are always comfortable and the fondant tastes like buttercream.

A place where there are no choices, only the perfect.

The Dress.

The hairpiece.

The Shoes.

The Bag.

The Jewels.

The Bouquet.

Sigh…I love Fantasy Land Friday, don't you?

Happy long Labor Day Weekend, y'all. I can't believe summer....ZOOOM - there it went!

It's Dior, Baby.

Last time I went to see my parents, my mom and I went out and about in their little Southern horse town. Main Street, USA, has a strip of small stores of mostly over-priced goods and services for the equestrian tourists who visit the area. It’s cute and it’s fun though and my mom and I hit up the antique mall to dig around for TruLu Couture goodies.

We had wandered the whole store (it’s pretty big, lots of little consignment vignette-based interior boutiques) and followed the 25% off signs to a small room on the upper level, accessed by a low-ceilinged, tight staircase. I found a hat that I wanted. It was totally overpriced at $79. I left it there and we went back to our shopping.

The problem is that I couldn’t stop thinking about that damn hat. Why? Because it was vintage Christian Dior. DIOR! The hat was in such a state of disrepair that I could not justify $79 for it, nor 25% off $79. Still, I couldn’t stop thinking about the damn hat. So when I saw my parents this week, I asked my mom to go back to the shop with me to see about negotiating a better price.

Imagine our dismay when we couldn’t find the hat. Boo. I did some more digging and saw some hat boxes further back on a shelf, nearly inaccessible because of all the shit piled on the floor.

The first box was this odd purple chenille number. Pass. The second box held this baby:

I found out (after a little help from Google) that William Silverman was a hat designer in the late 1950’s. The green Russian tulle is in pretty good condition and the flowers are pristine. Definitely will take this apart and make it into something else! I got this for about $18 (25% off $25) and I thought it was a good deal.

We found the original hat I was looking for too! It was just hiding. Check it out!

It’s in pretty bad shape. The leaves and smaller flowers have been attacked by silk eating moths, but the larger flowers have been spared. It’s stained. Clearly repairs were attempted, shown by the large stitch taken right through the label. But it’s DIOR!

Then I found yet another hat amongst the pile of boxes:

Another Dior hat! Score. This one is in better shape than the other, but still needs a little tender loving care. I don’t think the flowers are silk, but I could be wrong. The center little puff balls are pale blue and I think they are wool felt. We’ll see after I start with the clean-up process.

The coolest thing was that I got all three hats for $85! It was sort of funny though because I started doing the negotiations in my head on the way to cash wrap, focusing in on value of the item, the state of disrepair, the store’s mark-up and my mom was sort of chattering away to me the whole time. I told her I needed to negotiate alone and I realized that I needed that in my job too. I’d send out any other staff members so I could focus on my deal. I probably could have low-balled the lady and gotten another $5 to $10 off the price, but what I paid was pretty fair.

So excited about the hats!

This quick little trip home made me realize something: I’m not as alone as I sometimes feel in this endeavor. While I was there, my dad showed me photos of vintage goodies from local shop that I might be interested in. He just stopped in because he wanted to help me find vintage stuff. There was a bag with some vintage crocheted trim and a scrap of vintage eyelet fabric that my mom gave me. It‘s stuff that a lady from her sewing circle brought to her for me. Why? Because my mom told all her little old Southern sewing circle ladies to bring her vintage stuff they didn’t want. The Candyman got me a really expensive dress form for my birthday. My parents gave me one of their laptops so I could get out of the house to work on occasion (or at least out of the corner of spare bedroom). There are blog friends who have purchased and promoted TruLu Couture for me. My cousin sent me AWESOME goodies from Lina G’s for my birthday that can be made into glorious lovelies (these, I think I’ll keep for ME!).

So while I may be working by myself, I am certainly not doing this alone. For this I am so grateful, but clearly forgetful of in times of distress or when I’m simply overwhelmed.

Thanks to everyone for all your support! I am one lucky girl. I mean, with all that AND Dior? Come on!

Happy Weekend.

{Vintage Fur Stole} Product of the Week!

I have a feeling I might get a little back lash for this post/product, but so be it. The item in question is a fur stole.

My 2 cents on fur:

I don’t think animals should be raised purely to slaughter for the sake of fashion. This kind of “manufacturing” simply doesn’t fit into our contemporary society. I wouldn’t want to wear fur in that way and I don’t support it. I do however, believe in recycling, up-cycling, refurbishing and reusing. And I am carnivorous. It is my hope that all parts of the animal end up in good use — including skin and fur. Vintage furs are out there in the world. I can’t help what has already been done. I can’t undo it. I can, however, redo it. 

For the record, the ASPCA does not believe in vintage fur. While I generally stand behind them on many issues, there are others I don’t. Vintage fur is one of them.  I like the idea of using second hand fur. The material lasts for generations if handled well and the use value of fur is really good in northern climates. Fur is WARM!

OK, now that that’s out of the way….on to the Product of the Week!

Vintage Fur Stole

OK, so I found this fur collar at a flea market along with some other collars and cuffs for a steal. The pelt was in relatively good condition: it was pliable, no cracks or tears. There was one little crinkly spot, but I bought it anyway.

I’m not sure what this fur is, and neither did the seller. We think it’s mink. Or rabbit. I don’t think it’s fox, but it could be. I have a vintage fox fur jacket and the furs are nothing alike, but I’m not a furrier. All I know is that it’s definitely animal (it wasn’t lined when I bought it) and it’s definitely pretty!

So I lightly oiled the inner pelt to make it as soft as possible. There are recipes online that include natural oils (olive, flaxseed, etc.) that you mix with a mild acid (like vinegar) to condition leather and skins. I’d never done this before so was super nervous. However, it totally worked! No weird smell afterwards and I got it as soft as possible, methinks. The one little wrinkle can still be felt, but I don’t think it deters from the overall piece.

Now this collar had clearly been ripped off of something else. It still had an odd sort of binding tape sewn to it that I was fearful of removing based on the delicate nature of the piece. I left it there.

I completely re-lined the fur with a super-soft felt batting, just to give it a little more dimension and softness. Then I lined it with a slub weave, satin-back matte gold silk that matches those darker areas of fur. 

The clasp is a vintage rhinestone brooch that I still have to clean before I add it on. You can see the little pin holding it on in the below photo. 

I’ve got some hang-ups on this piece though. The edges were not trimmed well and I needed to preserve as much of the fur as possible. As a result, some of the outside edges  feel wonky if you run your hand across the underside of the stole. I don’t like how the lining isn’t laying completely flat either, because of those wonky edges. Honestly, there’s nothing I can do about it and it’s not noticeable when the piece is on. However, my highly critical self is wondering if it’s sellable.

To a regular consumer, I bet it’s just fine. Most people think my concerns are too hairsplitting anyway, so I’m trying to keep that in mind. And I can totally see this on a fall or winter bride – someone who has or wants a bit of vintage flair to their wedding ensemble. I like it because it’s not one of the big white puffballs you see everywhere on the interwebs.

I’m considering it for a give-away, but that vintage rhinestone piece is sooooo beautiful (and it wasn't cheap), so maybe not.

And did you notice my lovely model? That’s right, I got a dress form from The Candyman for my birthday! And this is a no shit, kick-ass dress form. I actually DIY’d my own body form out of duct tape (check out this tutorial from Thread Bangers) but it just stood in the corner and stared at me, mocking me in it’s inadequacy. The Candyman really came through with the most awesome and generous birthday gift. Here’s a full length shot:

Ooooh, and from this angle, I just noticed that wonky edge. See it just above her left boob? You can’t see it straight on or looking down on it though. Hm. I’m also noting that my bottom book shelves are actually sagging under the weight of all my books. And yes, those are my cake toppers poking out from one of my pattern drafting folders.

OK, so loving my dress form. I’m kind of loving the fur stole. I need feedback though, people. Should I sell it or consider it for a give-away since its not 100% perfect or what? Or am I over-analyzing, yet again?

Help.