Happy Birthday, Alice and her penman...Charles Lutwidge Dodgson

Lewis Carroll to us...... Happy Birthday to you.... January 27, 1832.

 Meeting the family of Alice Liddell in July 1862, Dodgson told the Liddell children a version of a story that later became an enormous success. Alice Liddell begged him to write it down,  and Dodgson eventually did, making a handwritten, illustrated book titled Alice's Adventures Under Ground, finally in November 1864.

His friend and mentor, George MacDonald, and his children, encouraged Dodgson to make it a real book.. In 1863, he  took it to Macmillan  publishing. The work was finally published 1865 as Alice in Wonderland, under the Lewis Carroll pen-name. What a stroke of genius to hire Sir John Tenniel to make those fantastical pictures !!

and did you know...all the Sir John Tenniel pictures are in the Public Domain. Read the fine print to be sure this is true worldwide, as it is in America and Canada. I think I shall wear my Tenniel-illustrated Alice in Wonderland dress.....today.


(1832-01-27)
 About a year ago I took a trip to the Oregon coast and inspired by all the beautiful earth....I made this coat......I was thinking that if Alice was a grown-up lady, if she was a bit of a tomboy....but rather sentimental and romantic.......she'd like a coat like this one that I made....perfect for girls and rabbits alike...so,
begins the adventure with a simple 70s coat.....
cut away parts that are not needed, and add lots of lace.








Pour out those cans of buttons and sew many on.




Make a pin of lace and vintage and a key with a heart.





Alice or the Rabbit?
or did you have another dream in mind?


the back has a french blue toile applique with a vintage shell button, long cotton fringe and blue edging, with lots of vintage lace.
The sides have tabs that close with antique abalone buttons......
to pull the waist in a bit....

the lining is sheer matching satin, and I added an inside pocket. The outside pocket is turned askew since it all has to do with new perspectives, anyway......

This pocket has lace, stitching in blue, lots of cotton fringe and a odd vintage googley button.


I changed the collar around so you can button it up......or leave it open........

January 25.....mom's birthday and some guy who wrote..

O my Luve's like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June;
O my Luve's like the melodie
That’s sweetly play'd in tune.
....................................................
and this little ditty, Auld Lang Syne....
Robbie Burns....

PLAID!

Here's what the writer of ,Tartan: Romancing the Plaid  ,Jeffrey Banks said..."....means the instantly recognizable Burberry pattern on the company's coats and scarves may look like a tartan plaid, but is in fact officially just "a check" because Burberry is actually English. In addition, a tartan pattern has to be made up of perfect squares. Technically, a tartan plaid can be turned 180 degrees and is exactly the same.

"You can take it and literally turn it upside down and it will look exactly the same, right side up or upside down," De La Chappelle said. A Plaid, on the other hand, can have stripes that clearly run in a specific direction. In other words: all tartan is plaid, but not all plaid is tartan.

But whether authentic tartan or simply plaid, the stripes and squares seem to have a lasting and universal appeal"



Some Vintage Plaid for the men.... 

Sweet plaid for the vintage ladies....

Children's vintage little 60s plaid jumper....

Fashion Design the movie kind....

I follow movie costume designers like other people love movie stars! One of my favorites died this weekend. Miss Theoni Aldredge passed from this life. She designed the wardrobes for a wide range of movie genres proving her enormous talent...
a short list:
Addams Family Values, Annie, The Great Gatsby, Moonstruck, Ghostbusters, The Rose, Rich and Famous, Semi-Tough, Network....

a few of her creations...Yes, the penultimate goth comedy...Addams Family Values....

The steampunkian Victoriana Charles Addams drew...translated in the second movie about my favorite fake family....

And look...the contrast is striking eh? The dark Wednesday in her turn-of-the-century inspired bathing costume contrasts very well with the sappy happy middle class "normal" girls in orange. Even if you don't know the story, you get it just with costume design.
And of course, Wednesday explains American History, Addams Family style.......

The Great Gatsby...aw...the 20s...Miss Aldredge won the Oscar for this magnificent effort. It set off a fad for 20s style clothing in fashion during the mid 1970s. (with a bit of help from some guy named Ralph Lauren)

Annie !
this bit has Carol Burnette, Bernadette Peters, and yes, that's Tim Curry.



here's a blurb from DePaul University Art Museum
" She received an Academy Award for The Great Gatsby in 1974, designed the original A Chorus Line costumes in 1975, as well as for Annie in 1977, 42nd Street in 1980, and La Cage Aux Folles in 1984. ...In 1984, she worked with Jane Fonda to develop more than 200 designs for the original line of Jane Fonda Workout Wear. She currently lives in New York City. "

Theoni Aldredge, I loved your work. thanks for all the Dreams!

the vintage Home Decor...

...and just as you have suspected, I have a lot to offer......
here's a sneak peak of what's coming to the etsy store...
and Heads up, soon, on my funkomavintage  website, I'll be offering New. New things I find in my vintage travels....like...Margaret O'Leary sweaters, and all manner of things that aren't vintage...but totally with the funkoma look.....which is?
Which is rustic, classic, heritage, nautical, antique, midcentury, steampunk, romantic...tarnished and tattered....and just generally clever.

1929 cast aluminum The End of The Trail Mission bookends.

Mission style, Arts and Crafts, Craftsman and Prairie style art, architecture and home decor all are influenced by each other , and have a lot of similarities. They all celebrate handmade, handforged, hand-assembled and handcrafted as a political rejection of industrialization.


With the rise of mass production in the middle of the nineteenth century, with the filthy factories and mind-numbing inhuman work conditions that stole families from their rural lives, many philosophers, intellectuals, poets, writers, artists, craftmen, witches and healers decried the blossoming Capitalism.

William Morris, John Ruskin, Rosseau, Oscar Wilde,  Gustav Stickley, Walter Crane, Rosamund Marriott-Watson, the Roycrofters, and so many more challenged the "profit over people" ideology that is Capitalism. They knew that without beauty, without art, without leisure, without respect for the working man and woman, life is banal and brutal.

It is these thinkers that inspired the back to the earth movement of those times, and the bohemians of the 1920s, the union movement, the grow-your-own, the beatniks, and the hippies....
Young people that think they might have invented Handmade, like on etsy, are so funny!
It is those historical bohemians, that coalesced into an identifiable movement almost 200 years ago in reaction to the destruction of the slow and small lives that most humans had led since time began.
The Slow Food, artists lofts, handmade, farmer's markets, buy local, think small, and the support small business ethos began 20 decades ago, and for the same reasons it still resonates and has become popular again, and again.

I could go on for pages and pages...on this era of design and philosophy.....and I think I shall ! It's my favorite ....from the mid-Victorian through the 1970s.....but especially from 1890 to 1939.

Aluminum history...... 
The history of "The End of The Trail"....

 American-born artist James Earle Fraser, sculpted The End of the Trail for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco, California.
Placed in the Court of Palms at the entrance to the Expo. Fraser’s statue was a fantastic success and he was awarded the gold medal for sculpture. It entered the public mind and many reproductions, and near-repros followed for decades.

Of course, America's greatest export has always been the romantic Wild West! The Indian's life has been changed forever with the movement west. Long gone were the open ranges and they were relegated to reservations and shipped to cruel city environments.
 

The End of the Trail created a desire for more sculptures to be cast in bronze, but the United States entered into World War I, and bronze became very scarce. Many artifacts from the Exposition, such as plaster sculptures were tossed into a mud pit at Marina Park.

A few years later, the citizens of Tulare County, California, rescued The End of Trail in 1919 and placed it at Mooney Grove Park, near Visalia, California. In 1968 it was finally cast in bronze, and the cast sculpture was placed back in Mooney Grove Park.

The beatnik...

and the Paint By Numbers made in "spare time"....

Mrs. Parker

Constant use had not worn ragged the fabric of their friendship.

if all I had to do..
if all I wanted to do..
all day,
I'd read and quote Dorothy Parker.

I finished this embellished broken pin.....it had lost 2 of its pink rhinestones, and that left just the holes in the brass stamping......
so a hole must be filled, and I filled it in with brass loops from which I hung brass chains....which is so me..
if it's droopy and falling....I love it.
I hope you do too.

on etsy, thatyountvillegirl......
 It's Queenly.....
a Brass heraldic shape, white enamel, and a brass key......all with patina.
The locket is also enameled with white, and a tiny rose with green leaves...and an oval pearly bead.

Mrs. Parker....
from PoemHunter.........
Born in 1893,  at 23 years old  in "1916, Parker sold some of her poetry to the editor of Vogue, and was given an editorial position on the magazine. In 1917 she married Edwin Pond Parker II, a stockbroker, whom she later divorced. Edwin was wounded in World War I, he was an alcoholic, and during the war he became addicted to morphine.

From 1917 to 1920 Parker worked for Vanity Fair. With two other writers Robert Benchley and Robert Sherwood, Parker formed the nucleus of the Algonquin Round Table, an informal luncheon club held at New York City's Algonquin Hotel on Forty-Fourth Street.
Other members included Ring Lardner and James Thurber. Parker was usually the only woman in the group."

"Alan Rudolph's film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994), starring Jennifer Jason Leigh, Campbell Scott, Matthew Broderick, depicted the life of the author and her friends around the famous Algonquin Round Table."

Surprise ! the 20s mostly.....

Adorn yrself....and be Charmed, I'm sure

So I'm back to putting it all together.....
I pick up little charms, bags of one lost earring...bags of broken jewelry, and all manner of beads, things, tinies, and what-have-you........
all for making jewelry...
Chains and keys.....especially .....and I love 50s earrings because the beads are so pretty....lots of Czech glass and lots of crystal beads.
I bought some lead-free trinkets and fixings too......I hate to say I told you so...(no, I don't) about that cheap Chinese crap......
So...
From trusted merchants I bought a few new findings and charms..but I am really only interested in making new from the old.....
The world is so full of magical things...we should all be as happy as kings.......or queens.RLS


Angel wings are pretty common in handmade jewelry right now and I couldn't resist buying a pair. I love little boxes, little lockets, and tiny cases........
Mark soldered the wings to the back of this shadow box......I love the way it "carmelized" it....and I love how it isn't glued together...nothing wrong with glue (I'll use a lot of that!)......
the Ruin of it........decay and used are themes that run through all my art.


Shadow box buddha necklace

Vintaged patina with heavenly wings, a locket box with a free swinging buddha charm......We can muse about...the freedom of flying, of floating free, with the key to unlock it all.

Suspended from a vintage chain, this hand-soldered box is attached to wings, and holds a buddha.

Faceted rosary beads, silver rings and weighted with an antique barrel skeleton key.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
100% copyright, design, writing and images....
these are one of a kind necklaces I make from the random tiny things in my jewelers drawer...so each is quite unique...


Jungle Safari......Victorian Safari.....shoot the animals with a camera ......not a gun.

Sparkle Tiger!

Metal tiger charm necklace with a sparkle star. Simple....

The lion is king....here he's hanging with a tiny brass oval locket.....and an old brass key......

Hey Harris, you're Scotch!

I finished the second Harris Tweed purse..tote bag. finally. stupid holidays!

Now that all the frivolity is out of the way...I'm back to sewing and general trouble making. The normal.

A fine collaboration combining  funkomavintage and thatyountville girl...........
This is another of my commitment to living the Vintage Life. To re-use and recycle. To spread the gospel of Heritage, of Quality, of more natural fibers, and to honor small industry like The Harris Tweed industry.

I can't decide if the lacy side or the pocket side is the front. Oh well. I'll leave that up to the owners...the lucky giftees, and the lucky buyer.  I love the lace and the tweed together....Very Miss Marple, no?

I had to add fabric to make it measure 16" across....that way it is roomy enough to hold an iPad or Kindle, whatever they are.

Look! the pocket is a pocket.

Inside, the lining is a strong cotton upholstery fabric in an old-fashioned floral. It buttons closed with a little flap...Oh did I mention that the button is one of the 2 original buttons that used to close the Jacket? well, yes.

I really agonized over "What to do about including a Harris Tweed label?"
Well, I have a printing press...so I just duplicated the original label and sewed a copy on the bag.
I was Mortified! when I first cut the jackets crosswise across the middles. aarrgggh!

I learned a lot while designing them and making them, and the next ones will be only slightly different. 

Clicky here to go see it at  thatyountvillegirl on etsy.

A short history of Harris Tweed......


from good ol' wikipedia....
Harris Tweed (Clò Mór or Clò na Hearadh in Gaelic) is a luxury cloth that has been handwoven by the islanders on the Isles of Harris, Lewis, Uist and Barra in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, using local wool.

Traditional Harris Tweed was characterized by subtle flecks of colour achieved through the use of vegetable dyes, including the lichen dyes called "crottle" (Parmelia saxatilis and Parmelia omphalodes which give deep red- or purple-brown and rusty orange respectively). These lichens are the origin of the distinctive scent of older Harris Tweed.

About 1830, a London merchant received a letter from a Hawick firm about some tweels. The London merchant misinterpreted the handwriting, understanding it to be a trade-name taken from the river Tweed that flows through the Scottish Borders textile area. Subsequently the goods were advertised as Tweed, and the name has remained ever since.

With the industrial revolution the Scottish mainland turned to mechanisation, but the Outer Hebrides retained their traditional processes of manufacturing cloth. Until the middle of the 19th century the cloth was only produced for personal use within the local market. It was not until between 1903 and 1906 that the tweed-making industry in Lewis significantly expanded. Production increased until the peak figure of 7.6 million yards was reached in 1966. However the Harris Tweed industry declined along with textile industries in the rest of Europe. Harris Tweed has survived because of its distinctive quality and the fact that it is protected by an act of Parliament limiting the use of the Sovereign's Orb trademark to tweeds made in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland.



Here's the one I made the MIL......

Oh yes, there will be many many more to come...from vintage jackets. I've got designs drawn for making a smaller purse or tiny tote, and another style of jacket from the left overs.
I adore this fabric...and I can't let any go to waste. ...so even the scraps will become flowers and leaves.

Click here for a gorgeous Harris Tweed site...lots more info....and a pop-up map that takes you from outer space and slowly pans down to the tiny little islands of wooly paradise.
I  Love It!!