Creazione - Creation in Miniature

The Virgin Queen - emiliacouture commission for Sybarite

2012-02-10T08:22:00.000-08:00

Here is the blog post of the year presenting my newest OOAK fashion "The Virgin Queen". If you are wondering what I've been upto until now I can reveal to you that I have been working on a wax prototype of my own 16" fashion BJD. I won't share photos of it yet, but if everything goes well I might have the first OOAK dolls out by the end of this year.

I love styling mix-and-match clothes and think you can never have enough of them. So, when I was asked to turn a period Reneissance gown into edgy fashion my first thought was to used all the wrong materials (leather and modern prints) to make it edgy, and the second though to take it apart. Instead of a one piece gown this outfit has separate neck and wrist ruffles made of fine lace, an overskirt and bolero of printed chiffon, a huge pleat petticoat, Elizabethan corset, panties and thigh high garter boots made of decoratively stitched leatherette. And as I wanted to give the outfit a kinky little twist, I sculpted a little padlock and turned the panties into a chastity belt. And I just had to name the outfit after my idol and inspiration: Elizabeth I.

For more photos see the flickr set.

Mother Eath - commission piece for Sybarite

2011-12-11T11:42:00.000-08:00

Emiliacouture proudly presents: Mother Earth, a OOAK fashion tailored for old Sybarite body.

This OOAK fashion consists of a hand painted sequin gown that can be altered to be worn either long with a cascading silk chiffon shirt or as an edgy short dress; either nesting a leaf gold "egg" at the model's tummy making the wearer pregnant or without it.

The sequins are layered is sculpted from that resembles a feathery armour and under the hand painted copper exterior of the sequins movement reveals crevasses of deepest black.

The gown's 2-tone silk hem is cut short from the front to reveal a pair of Alexander McQueen inspired platform sandals. These sandals use my Hokusai heel and are covered all over in leaf gold and decorated with golden straps with butterflies.

The outfit is crowned by an Isis inspired hand sculpted helmet, which is also covered in leaf gold.

The model is a Sybarite Raja repaint by me and the wig she wears in some of the photos is from Ilaria (Time of Doll).

For more photos see my flickr set.

Torn collection by emiliacouture

2011-11-13T04:59:00.000-08:00

Torn is a new casual knitwear collection by emiliacouture. The outfits are young edgy street fashions made for Numina Devon but fit other 16-17" fashion dolls as well. These fashions are extremely limited to LE5 wordwide. The outfits consist of a knit top and faux leather stockings and, if pictured, a faux leather belt.

Moro photos at flickr

The Horned Bride - commission piece for Numina Devon

2011-11-11T00:16:00.000-08:00

I was asked to create an edgy bridal gown for Numina Devon, which brought me to my roots as a fashion designer as I use to make bridal gowns to support my studies when I was still in an university in early 2000.

The Horned Bride is named so after the curious horned tiara of the veil, but you may interpret the name as you like, LOL. The outfit consists of a white halterneck gown with asymmetrical hem of cascading pleats, subtle beading and dramatic pleated collar; the previously mentioned horned net veil; lace gloves and a pair of lace shoes without heels that leave the poor bride fairly unstable.

The model is a OOAK Numina Devon (face up by me) in all her bald glory. Paul Pham's sculpting on her is so lovely she looks divine without a wig too.

More photos at flickr

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-28T05:57:00.000-07:00

I wanted to make something special for Halloween and nothing better for it than a surprise creepy crawly addition to my Insectopia collection: a Black Tarantula!

The Black Tarantula is a OOAK NuFace Erin doll flocked and repainted. Her hands have been blushed black almost up to her elbows. She wears a skin colour bodice with heavy black beading and accentuated shoulders; a high waist shirt sculpted out of black sequins; and a pair of over knee armadillo boots with vintage fur embellishments. Her head is wrapped in tulle netting veil hat.

More photos at flickr

Let Them Eat Cake - commission piece for Numina Devon

2011-10-23T13:40:00.000-07:00

I have wanted to make a dress with two bird cages for a petticoat for ages and when a customer asked me for a Marie Antoinette inspired fashion I knew I had my chance. I thought it was symbolically fitting as well, as Marie Antoinette was pretty much a bird in a golden cage. What comes to the famous phrase "let them eat cake", the French peasants had been accusing nobility of saying that for a hundred years before poor Marie Antoinette, but then again if does well describe the luxurious life or boredom this historical beauty had until the bitter end.

This dusty blue silk brocade outfit adorned with cream consists of a corset top, bird cage skirt with a period cape, blue lace undies and stockings and cream silk ribbons for neck and waist. I also added a pair of modern bulky pumps with a golden emblems for more period feel. The skirt was mainly hand-stitched and the bird cages are hand made too. The two birds are repainted doll house miniatures.

The model is a OOAK Numina Devon and wears a luxurious hard cap wig by Ilaria (Time of Doll).

More photos at flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/emiliacouture/sets/72157627961242812/with/6273919588/

Kleptomaniac - commission piece for Numina Devon

2011-10-23T13:36:00.000-07:00

My first commission work for Numina Devon is Kleptomaniac, a colour variation of the Kleptomania outfit from my first collection. The outfit consists of a gilded tweed vest lined with orange organza and rust tulle ruffles on the shoulders; a ruffled petticoat of orange organza wrapped in rust tulle; a golden sequin armadillo boots with garters and undies. The wig is restyled Sybarite Powder wig and the model is a OOAK Numina Devon painted by me.

More photos at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/emiliacouture/sets/72157627871395404/

Yaobikuni - emiliacouture Commission (dressed sybarite repaint)

2011-08-15T02:15:00.000-07:00

Yaobikuni is a Japanese legend of a young woman who gained immortality by consuming the flesh of a mermaid. With sushi restaurants serving endangered species and people in search of an eternal youth I thought this a very suitable theme (although some variations of the legend grant Yaobikuni an eternal life but not protection against ageing - to think of the irony: to grow old forever).

This Sybarite Venus has been given an Asian vibe by repainting her with acrylics and pastels. The face up is sealed with UV coating. She has a mermaid and dragon tattoo over her ribs with the creatures tails curling over her hips. She wears an asymmetrical black hard cap wig with phthalo green streaks. This wig is the first hard cap wig I have made.

The outfit consists of a "seaweed" coat of turquoise Tibetan lambskin tufted short and lined with white silk. The red calligraphy in the lining says "aimili" in hanzi and is my Chinese signature. Underneath the coat is a "water" dress of PVC and hot glue inspired by Gisele Bundchen's Dons Water Dress matched with a pair of sandals inspired by Hokusai's iconic great wave. As extra accessories I made a translucent mini version of a Hermes Birkin bag and painted a pair of toy sunglasses.

More photos at flickr.

Road Warrrior - commission dressed OOAK doll

2011-08-04T11:53:00.000-07:00

I was commissioned to make a Mad Max inspired doll and I must say it was a challenge. 80's punk isn't really up my alley, but I think I owned it in the end, even though I think it's more costume than fashion. Gosh it was fun though! :D

Nadja has been repainted with a Hisagi Shuuhei (character in Bleach manga by Kubo Tite) make up, given a mohair mohawk and some flocking, as well as nipples "bandaged" with white "tape".

She wears layers of black leatherette with tons of straps, buckles, metal eyelets and chains of different sizes. The outfit consists of a feather collar bodice, micro shorts, sort of a skirt, half a bolero with a biker zip sleeve and huge triple shoulder pads, garter belt, net stockings, arm lacing, leg brace with numerous straps and a knee pad, muzzle, goggles, a broken brick on a chain, and a pair of bulky boots.

More photos at my flickr set

Navy wool and steel - emiliacouture modern sofa set

2011-07-30T06:41:00.000-07:00

Emiliacouture modern 3-part sofa set made with navy blue wool and sanded steel.

The removable legs are aluminium.

The sofas are custom made for FR dolls and modelled here by Elyse.

Buried in Her Maiden White - emiliacouture commission for Deva Doll

2011-07-20T14:57:00.000-07:00

This commission was heavily influenced by the burial/wedding gown of Lucy designed by Ishioka Eiko for the movie Bram Stoker's Dracula. The original gown was a Victorial satin corset dress with long rouched hem under a Gustav Klimpt inspired sheer lace overdress. To maintain the same air I made a huge beaded double ruff collar, a beaded lace hat and puff sleeves wrapped tight around forearms with more lace and beading. However, to make this an original design I changes the silhouette into a empire gown made of pleated sheer silk chiffon and adorned the hem with more lace. The pleats are gathered below the bust line with lace and beading and for a modern twist I added a double buckled white leather belt I cut into a lacy shapes. The gown can be worn with or without the belt and changes it's silhouette and waistline accordingly.

My model and muse for this project was the divine Red Tian Shi, a Deva doll I've lusted for a long time. I was very honoured to hold her for the week it took me to create this gown for her and I'm sad to see her return to her home again. She was so inspiring to work with and poses with amazing grace, not to mention her enchanting Chinese facial features. I think this is the only fashion doll I've ever seen that actually looks Chinese.

It was also exiting to work in this project because it was Ishioka Eiko's costume design in the movie Dracula that got me interested in fashion and costume design in the first place. This is my homage to her talent.

More photos at flickr

Praying Mantis - The 5th and final doll in the Insectopia Collection

2011-07-14T14:05:00.000-07:00

I'm happy to present the 5th and final doll in the Insectopia Collection: the Praying Mantis. An predator that lures you in with her innocent looks.

The doll is a Nu.Face Erin completely repainted with artist acrylics and pastels sealed with UV coating. Her hair has been styled into two beaded buns wrapped in copper netting and her body blushed.

Her outfit consists of a gown of unique hand painted silk embellished with sequins and beads, a violet silk hose, a pair of thorny armadillo shoes painted gradient with metallic grades of green and pink, and she is crowned with a hand sculpted and painted hairpiece in the shape of mantis claws.

More photos at flickr

Shamisen - emiliacouture commission

2011-06-30T11:05:00.000-07:00

I was commissioned to make a lingerie robe to match Sybarite Slipper's fabulous corset.

I went for luxurious sheer silk chiffon, it's long pillowing hem and sleeves trimmed with thick lace weave. The robe is bound with a laced leather belt, with same silver eyelets as the corset, decorated with a removable kimono style obi bow lined with matching pink silk and embellished with hand applied beads.

The robe and Sybarite Slipper's lingerie is modelled by Inque wearing a Ilaria wig.

More photos at the flickr set

Cindertini - emiliacouture commission

2011-06-30T11:02:00.000-07:00

This outfit was based on the Christian Dior's classic 50's New Look, but modernised. I wanted to keep the classic feminine silhouette, but to clash it with all the wrong materials and what better than black leather. The vibrant stockings provide a necessary plash of colour to go with the "cocktail shoes" the glass slippers of our era - hence the name. ;)

The "Cindertini" outfit consists of a pillowing leatherette skirt made of 30 segments and a slightly rouched hem; the top is a sleeves corset with a generous cleavage topped with a kimono style black lace corset belt; underneath one finds a set of yellow silk hose topped with orange net stockings tied with red ribbons; the platform shoes in matching orange, yellow and red titter high on heels made of glasses filled with a playful red and clear drink with a yellow cocktail cherry on a stick.

The "Cindertini" is modelled by Sybarite Raja repaint wearing a OOAK hard cap wig by Ilaria (Time of Doll).

More photos at the flickr set

Wild Rider Adele - emiliacouture commission dressed OOAK doll

2011-06-09T07:45:00.000-07:00

FR Adele has been rerooted in 3 tone titian KatSilk mix and repainted with acrylics, pastels and gold glitter make up sealed with UV spray. Her hair has been gathered in a wild updo and held in place with a dark brown silk hairband. She has long applied titian lashes and a French manicure.

The outfit consists of a worn bronze leatherette strapless dress with accentuated hips, a sanded dark brown silk bolero with stitching and buckled straps, and a pair of high heel motorcycle boots in the same dark brown silk.

Wool and steel - emiliacouture modern sofa set

2011-06-09T07:41:00.000-07:00

I made new version of my modern lounge set. The same foam core and wooden frame, but instead of suede this set is upholstered with grey Armani wool, aluminium legs and the backs are covered with sanded steel sheets for an ultra modern look. The set is made in 6th scale for FR dolls. Models are OOAK Lukas and Nadja.

Ride Me - emiliacouture commission

2011-06-05T09:29:00.000-07:00

I was commissioned to make a Victorian riding habit and couldn't resist to add a kinky avant garde twist.

The "Ride Me" outfit consists of a pleated red silk skirt with a Victorian silhouette and black lace adorning it's hemline; white netting bodice with ruffled collar; black silk coat with golden embroidery; black leatherette corset; accessorised with a pair of black leatherette boots, a riding crop; mini saddle ornament and a mini tophat with embellished with feathers, netting and a tiny scull ornament.

The outfit is tailored on and modelled by FR2 Elyse.

More photos at flickr

Deboxfest 2011

2011-05-31T06:36:00.000-07:00

I usually just report my own creations here, but today's package had me so overjoyed I just have to share it here! I had just wrapped a tortilla and bitten into it when the doorbell rang. Of course I was into my wrists and elbows covered with sauce (never learned to eat them tidily) and I ran to wash my hands shouting "just a minute!". With growing excitement I opened the door and almost squealed with joy when I saw the postman holding a huge box with Angelic Dreams sticker and tape on it. I signed my name while my cat Neru was trying to escape from the open doorway and then carried my loot to the living room. I just had to call my friend Siama to work just to tell my package arrived! THE package that contained Victor, Lukas, Elise and the Only Natural FR2 fashion!

I couldn't finish my lunch from all the excitement but started my deboxfest immediately. The first box was the Only Natural. My first thought was that it's such a waste to pack the loose fashions in these huge boxes, but after I removed the shipper box I must say I was rather enchanted with the box. It's light and the paper feels luxurious and environmental at the same time. The print is glossy and soft black; the design very stylish. The lid was tight and little hard to remove, but revealed a wrapping paper with Jason Wu written all over it - I really hope the product itself has too. At this point I opened my laptop and decided to torture myself by writing every feeling and thought down before I allowed myself to peek inside the wraps.

The product display is marvellous and finally the box with removable lid allows this fashion to be displayed in it's box without taking that extra box side space for the lid on a shelf. However, that's neither here or there for me as I cannot help but to always debox everything. For now, I'll try to contain myself and open the next box before ripping the lovely cardigan out of it's box.

The next box contains Engaging Elyse Jolie. I still stop to caress the box for a moment after removing the shipper. This one opens easier revealing a stunning raven beauty. The first thing I do is study her in artificial cold and warm, and natural light. The skin tone seems to match. I note how luxuriously long her lashes are, how perfect and natural the hairline is (I hate the round barbie hairline, but this has wonderful curves in it). The wide spread fingers on her hands bug me a bit, but I the other sculpt is better and I hope the skin tone matches with other pale dolls. She does look paler than other dolls, but after comparison to Erin I can say for sure the body and head both are pale skin tone. The fashion leaves me on fence a bit. The collars sit perfectly and the craftsmanship is impeccable, but the cut of this design isn't really flattering on her as she loses her beautiful waist wearing it. I'll see id some other doll will like the dress and Elyse will be wearing Only Natural soon anyway. I'd love to debox Elyse and have her wear it right away, but I still got 2 more boxes to open! Sweet torture! ;)

The next box says Lukas on the shipper and I'm happy to notice the box is smaller. It's so good IT is going for smaller boxes nowadays as those wider ones were noting but empty cargo space while the dolls are flown from China to US and then to Europe and Finland. Criminal. Not only the box size but also style has changed since last year. I love this new style with a removable lid. I made wardrobes for my boutique display from the Brides of Dracula boxes and now the FR boxes offer the same option.

I open the familiar FR wrapping paper and find Lukas staring back at me. His skin tone is tanned, which is the first time this colour has been used for a male doll (not counting the OOAKs from Jeffreys). Pierre is the closest but much more pink and Fransisco is slightly darker and more olive in tone. The hair on my Leading Man is silly, but I had expected that and I believe it's nothing hot water and tons of gel won't fix. I think I'll repaint him too, but the screening does look better that in the promos. I was able to pinpoint what makes the face so off and it's his left eye being higher than the right one. I really bought him just to get a tanned Lukas and I'm happy with my purchase.

The last but definitely not the least is Victor. I had high hopes for this hunk and I'm not disappointed. The topmop of a hair on him is actually rather fun, I adore the screening (don't know if I can repaint him after all...I may need another Victor before long!), the skin tone looks wonderfully deep and warm (if last years Frankenstein Darius would had been like instead this he would've been orgasmic!) and the trench coat, glasses and bag make me swoon. Thank you IT! I love this man!

One thing bugs me though. Obviously IT can still produce exquisitely detailed purses for men, so why not for women? I'm so happy to own a large collection of vintage FR purses, but I miss my purse fix with new dolls. Happily Elyse has her little clutch and I have the matching Renegade shoes waiting for her! I get neurosis if the purse and shoes don't match! LOL

So here they are: my Victor, Lukas, Elyse and her new fashion. It's time to start the deboxfest!

I love that Elyse is so easy to debox. All those parts sewn in and ribbons make be want to tear the box, so this rubber band system is perfect. The first thing I do is swap those hands, the joint are nice and tight. Very tight in fact as I get first hand experience of the squeaky elbow syndrome. I find it mainly funny. Doesn't bother me really and drives my cats nuts! ;D Her hair is nice and soft and I pin the table napkin on her head. It reminds me of Minnie Mouse. Next I unwrap the shoes. I must admit I'm not a huge fan of leopard print, but I like there and adore the fact the feet on the FR2 ladies are closer to natural size. I find those bound barbie feet on fashions dolls creepy. I've seen (and smelled) Chinese lotus feet in person and every time I look at tiny doll feet I keep thinking of the mutilated bones and the horrid stench. I unbound her knees and they are nice and tight too. I put on the jewellery and check her earring holes are in right places (my friend Marianne's Elyse had on earring hole is a weird place). Finally the purse (I love that it can be opened) and my Minnie Mouse is ready for her first shots out of the box! She is perfect.

Elyse strides to Agnes in a bar diorama: "Bitch, you're wearing my shoes!". Agnes looks the new rival from head to toe: "Hun, I'm not the one who thinks a table napkin is a hat. You work those mismatched leopard prints. Are they acrylic like your nails?". I got to keep these two ladies a well away from each other! O___o

Deboxing the Only Natural fashion I notice one of the shoes has the common issue that the heel has been glued into a wrong angle, but if this is the only quality issue I have to encounter I'm willing to let it go considering the ordeals people with "Flawless" Elyse had to endure.

I hate that the cardigan is sewed on the dress as removing those few stiches from a extremely fragile chiffon is nervwrecking and even though I got the yarn removed without breaking anything the needlemarks remain visible in the dress. Not smart packing at all. I'm very impressed by the cut of the dress as I didn't realise it had an open bra and skirt style cut in the back and full dress on the front. Fun and clever. I love to be positively surprised and speaking of which and nice pair of nude satin undies drops to my lap when I remove the dressing doll. :) Another pair of surprise undies awaits me under Elyses wrap dress. I'm happy to get some lingerie for the poor girl as I have tried all my FR and NF panties on Siama's Dasha and nothing could wrap around the lady's derriere. For the same reason both outfits could had used a hose.

Removing the dress reveals the exquisite decolletes and torso sculpt, the best part of this new body type. I really is something to behold. The breasts are perky, the collar bones and shoulders stick out in a couture hunch and abs are tight. My only complaint about the FR2 body is the elbows that don't allow the arms to be bend backwards and onto the hips to form that couture hunch pose and the rest of the body seems to have been sculpted specifically that position in mind. After some scary over forcing the joints I finally get my favourite pose from Elyse, but her hips look pretty weird while doing it. The lower torso joint is something I really need to get use to and right now I have a horrid urge to just glue it immobile. I wish the undies would at least cover the joint but they are both too low cut for the task.

Now that Elyse has redressed she takes another stroll over the diorama scene and to Agnes: "Hello again. How about I let you borrow this purse?" Agnes is take of guard by this suspicious generosity: "Oh, would you? I have been waiting for this back since your promos got out! I think we will become very very good freneminies!". And all is well in dollyland once more.

And ER Lana relives her youthful days by trying on the Engaging outfit.

Now for the boys. Victor's bag is orgasmic and even though Lukas' cannot compare to it, his rucksack is still a nice addition to my collection. I'm happy that Lukas' leather jacket is soft and not as stiff as those fiasco jackets on 2008 NF. The jacket cut still looks more like a shirt than jacket though. The sweater is dreamy thin and soft - I adore it and could had bought the doll just to get my hands on this gorgeous knit! The knit scarf works well in scale too. O'ou, but how to get that sweater off? No wonder his hair is such a mess! I wouldn't combine brown with grey myself, but the pieces will be divine mix and match items and the shoes might be my favourite homme shoes ever! Nice to get a new sunglasses design too, but I can't find any socks. Victor's glasses are so brilliant. IT asked us what we wanted last year and I requested glasses and here they are. Thank you! Happyyy! Victor is a dream and his funny hair is thick and soft. I think I'll give him a little haircut to lessen the mushroom effect, but I'll have a hard time fulfilling my repaint plans. His green eyes are too dreamy and Lucy is already eyeing him hungrily. ;)

All in all, this has been the best IT year for me since 2006 when I started collecting. I feared quality control issues after last year and what happened with the "Flawless", but this pacth has been A+ in my book. I can't wait o get Remi and Minimalist Dasha, and to start hunting for Auden and another Victor. Thank you so much IT and Angelic Dreams. You made my dreams come true!

From the Ashes - emiliacouture commission

2011-05-19T10:24:00.000-07:00

A twin gown to the Dark Thoughts Japan charity gown, "From the Ashes" is a OOAK outfit for Sybarite by emiliacouture.

From the Ashed consists of mix and match pieces of sheer lingerie bodice; a voluptuous skirt in grey, light blue and violet tulle layered into a dusty lavender rouching; an asymmetrical silver sequin tailcoat with silver buckle straps; white leatherette boots and a matching top hat.

From the Ashes is modelled by Sybarite Queen B wearing a OOAK hard cap wig by Ilaria (Time of Doll).

*This was a commission piece and is already sold.

See more photos at From the Ashes flickr set

Comet Moth - the 4th doll in the Insectopia collection

2011-05-08T02:48:00.000-07:00

I find butterfly collections fascinating and extremely sad at once. The butterflies themselves being extraordinary beautiful, but having them pinned down and killed for their beauty, impaled and poisoned, is simply horrid. But, for my fashion design, that horrid edge and feeling of fleeting mortality is often exactly what I want to portray as what else is fashion than a passing phenomena.

Thus, I'm proud to present the 4th dressed OOAK doll in the Insectopia collection: the Comet Moth.

The doll is a Nu.Face Illusionist Nadja repainted and body blushed. I removed all her hair except the braids across her scalp and sewed an elaborate updo of new Katsilk braids. Comet Moth wears a lime green silk dress embroidered with sequins and netting, over a breast revealing maize yellow silk bodice adorned with sequins and hand dyed vintage fur (from my grandma's clothes), a vintage fur collar, matching stockings and armadillo netting boots, and a green gem ring.

*The doll is reserved.

The Golden Scarab - the 3rd doll in the Insectopia collection

2011-04-16T06:04:00.000-07:00

I'm glad to present, after a long wait, the third doll in the Insectopia collection: the Golden Scarab.

This OOAK doll was a Integrity Toys NuFace Colette that has been repainted and rerooted with a two tone Katsilk. Her hair is styled on combination of a updo and ponytail and embellished with tiny golden sequins. Also her hands and nipples have been blushed with gold and her nails are black. She wears a OOAK outfit by emiliacouture. The outfit consists of a babydoll dress layered with pleated metallic tulle and golden sequin netting, hem richly decorated with a selection of different shape sequins and supported by an elaborate brass necklace; next is a tailcoat of worn brass leatherette and a pair of matching over knee boots; last a golden ring with a square stone in shade of old gold.

More photos of the Scarab and other Insectopia dolls at the flickr set.

Snow Queen - emiliacouture commission piece for NF

2011-04-07T23:52:00.000-07:00

Snow Queen OOAK fashion by emiliacouture is a commission piece inspired by the story by Hans Christian Andersen and by Lady Gaga's Armani dress.

The sheer outfit consists of white catsuit and crystal organza dress and corset all heavily embroidered with beads, a satin cape embellished with feathers and hand painted snowflakes, the set is completed with armadillo shoes and a beaded crown.

Modelled by Nu.Face Nadja.

For more photos of the Snow Queen see my flickr set.

Emiliacouture Insectopia on Haute Doll May 2011 issue

2011-04-04T23:31:00.000-07:00

I'm happy to announce that my work was featured for the second time in the Haute Doll magazine that has merged with the Doll Reader mag. The 5 page article by the wonderful Jill Jackson tells about the inspiration and work behind the Insectopia collections and features the first 2 dolls in the series: Damselfly and Orchard Spider. To read the article get the May issue or view it digitally at: http://digital.dollreader.com/

Cracknutter - emiliacouture commission piece

2011-03-28T10:49:00.000-07:00

The idea for this piece started out as a beefeater uniform combined with a tutu in colour of purple and acid green. The working title was a "Beefeater on Acid", but the uniform evolved more into British palace guard, very classic Nutcracker ballet tin soldier look, hence the name "Cracknutter". ;)

The OOAK outfit consists of numerous mix and match items: an acid green tutu of finest silk chiffon with asymmetrical neckline revealing on breast, a deep purple faux snakeskin uniform coat with golden embroidery, a black vintage fur hat lined with acid green velvet and decorated with a removable feather pin and a embroidered vinyl chin strap, a set of purple sequin bra and high waist hot pants with garters supporting vibrant purple net stockings, a black vintage fur purse with golden chain embellishments, and last but not the least buckled over knee boots of soft black leatherette.

Modelled by Sybarite Queen B. *The Superdoll props (Ban the Hunt rifle and Cross shoes) not included.

This was a commission piece and hence already sold. I have some commission appointments open from June! Recerve your appointment now!

See more photos at the Cracknutter flickr set.

Dark Thoughts - emiliacouture Japan charity gown

2011-03-20T06:43:00.000-07:00

I'm happy to tell you that I'm much recovered and back on the saddle again. I cannot say that was able to take it as slow as the doctor ordered, as I did put in long hours working on my newest creation, but I did try to take a break every hour and mind my posture while working.

The horrors of Japan: the earthquake, the tsunami that followed, the fires and the unspeakable risk of nuclear destruction have left my mind lingering in Dark Thoughts. I channelled these thoughts into a black and alarm yellow gown and will donate the profits to help Japan. *The gown is already sold.

The "Dark Thoughts" gown is made for Sybarite dolls and consists of a translucent and long sleeved corset bodysuit with garters and closed from the back with a row of buttons, net stockings with wide decorative lace, black and yellow shoes, a voluminous and richly rouched tulle petticoat that consumed more than three meters of tulle, and a sequinned over skirt with two trails. These parts can either be mixed and matched or worn together as a full and luxurious gown. This creation is also the very first to carry the embroidered em'lia logo tag. The fashion is photographed on Sybarite Queen B who I temporarily flocked with a matching yellow KatSilk flock.

See more photos at the Dark Thoughts flickr set.

Taking a break

2011-03-04T23:54:00.000-08:00

It has now been nearly a month since I released the last doll I made for the Insectopia collection and many have been wandering what is taking so long with the third doll in the series. I did tell people I was taking a small break after my last doll was done, but as I didn't expect this break to become so long I never really told why. Of course it's good to let one's mind rest a bit between the pieces, but the real reason is that I had hurt my back already when making the first doll, the Damselfly. The two weeks I spend 24/7 sewing miniature sequins locked up my spine and muscles tight and the next week working on the Orchard Spider didn't help either.

I thought a week of rest would do the trick, but it didn't. With the pain and immobility growing by the day I finally went to a doctor, who send to a chiropractic and it turned out I had 2 facet locks on my spine, which explained the blinding pain quite well. In addition the nerve pain has caused all the muscles in my back and shoulders to cramp. The chiropractic opened the facet lock, but the overall damage would take months of physiotherapy to heal. Instead of working on my art project 24/7 I now have a regular schedule of physio, swimming and pilates to keep me occupied. I should be able to work soon, but I'll need to take it slow. I apologise to everyone if this will delay the commissions scheduled for this Spring, but you will be notified of changes in the time table if any when your appointment time arrives.

Now, before you say anything, I know it's not healthy working like I do, consumed by the inspiration and forgetting everything else, but that's what I live for. I'm afraid that trying to slow down the process and giving myself time to rest will take the fire out of the inspiration and it'll just die out, but naturally, in order to continue my work, that is exactly what I'll need to learn how to do. Damselfly and Orchard Spider were both born in a spur of inspiration and I forgot myself so totally it was almost like they forced themselves out of me without my conscious effort and now I'm paying the price. Of course I'd prefer not to be in such pain, but on the other hand, I would do it again. I'm really happy how these two turned out.

And to give you hope of things to come, here are some sneak peeks of the material testing for the remaining 3 creatures in this collection. And don't worry too much about me. The worse is over and I'm getting back into the saddle already. Just need to take it easy!

Orchard Spider - the 2nd doll in the Insectopia collection

2011-02-07T01:51:00.000-08:00

I'm proud to present the second doll in the emiliacouture Spring 2011 haute couture collection: the Orchard Spider. This new OOAK Insectopia doll is a Fashion Royalty Vanessa rerooted with 3-tone fiery natural reds; repainted with artist acrylics and pastels; and UV sealed. She has a blushed Nu.Face body with freckled decolté and nipples covered with metallic green. Her nails are black and the colour has creeped up her fingers to enhance her alien charms. Her hair is gathered to an high updo adorned with black sequins.

She wears a OOAK ball gown of hand painted leatherette, daffodil yellow tulle petticoat and lime green silk chiffon hem. The hem is embellished with eight elongated black sequin spider legs and her hand painted armadillo boots repeat the same pattern. The green hem of the ballgown can be slipped away to reveal an avant garde cocktail dress.

For more photos of the Orchard Spider and the Insectopia collection click here.

The Orchard Spider has already been sold to a private collection. I will now take a few days break before staring work on the third doll, the Praying Mantis. She will be the most challenging work yet to come as her gown will need hand painted silk and that is a technique I haven't used for a decade! I will keep you posted with the process.

I'm also been encouraged to put my work to ebay, but I'm very nervous about selling there after all the horrible stories I've heard on doll boards. The first two dolls in the Insectopia collection were bought "blind" by my most devoted patrons even before the dolls were made so auction wasn't an option, but maybe, just maybe, I'll consider putting one of the three dolls to follow on ebay. Selling by email has been very convenient so far, but it always breaks my heart to tell those who come too late that the doll they love has already been sold. I wish I had enough of dolls for all interested, but these dolls aren't really suited for factory production. Speaking of factory production, my business partner has now found a factory for emiliacouture and they are making the first sample for us as we speak. Hopefully the first, very limited, test edition will come out this Spring! It's a casual piece of ready-to-wear that you may already have climpsed on my flickr last Autumn ;)

Insectopia - Spring 2011 Haute Couture Collection by emiliacouture

2011-02-02T10:17:00.000-08:00

Emiliacouture Presents:

Damselfly - the first doll in the Insectopia collection!

Insectopia is the emiliacouture Spring 2011 haute couture collection with the fantasy theme of insect inspired avant garde creations. The collection will feature 5 OOAK dressed 12" fashion dolls: the Damsefly, the Orchard Spider, the Praying Mantis, the Atlas Moth and the Golden Scarab. All the creations will use labour intensive haute couture techiques such as sculpted hand stiched cuts, rich embroidery and hand painted fabrics.

The first doll in the collection is Integrity Toys Giselle as the Damselfly. She has been repainted with professional acrylics and pastels and UV sealed, her long hair has been restyled into two buns to represent the bulging eyes of a damselfly and adorned with metallic teal netting and sequins. She wears a OOAK atelier creation in teal taffeta consisting of a breast revealing corset, a high collar mask, a rouched mermaid skirt with a long trail, long sleeved shirt of metallic netting and a pair of silken armadillo boots. The fashion has been heavily embroidered and hand painted. The 4 different tones of miniature sequins create a gradient effect and the clint of insectile chitin armour. The Damselfly has already been sold to a private collection.

For more photos of Damselfly click here.

Here are sneak peeks of dolls yet to come:

Orchard Spider

Praying Mantis

Atlas Moth

Golden Scarab

Keep posted for the next doll in the series: the Orchard Spider Vanessa!

Emiliacouture Handspeak gloves for Fashion Royalty

2010-12-17T04:18:00.000-08:00

On this Tuesday I realised how many extra hands and how few Handspeak system dolls I had. There was no way I needed as many pairs of hands, but then I remembered a BJD artist who turned boring sculpted high heel parts into fabulous shoes. Why now make gloves out of all those extra pairs of hands! So, here is HfG Agnes modelling her 4 new pairs of chic gloves custom made to match her favourite shoes and bags.

I started by giving all the hands a quick acetone swipe to remove all grease and dirt left from touching them. This also makes the vinyl more receptive for the paint. Then I painted the hands with several layers of artist acrylics especially making the fingernails area thick with paint so that the talons won't seem through. The next step was to add detailing: seams and "hand-stitching" essential for luxurious leather gloves. Then some more detailing with glued on ribbons and tiny metal buckles, and a final finishing touch by spraying the whole thing with couple of layers of UV coating for a nice matte effect.

After several enquiries to sell these I have decided to I accept commissions, but I do recommend to try this at home. It's simple, easy and fun and you can let you inner fashion designer go free! Happy Christmas everyone!

Here is Agnes posing with her new gloves

tailor made to suit her favourite shoes and bags!

See more photos at the flickr set.

"Tribute to Alexander McQueen" collection revealed!

2010-10-07T02:53:00.000-07:00

The emiliacouture autumn 2010 collection for Sybarites is dedicated to the memory of my favourite fashion designer the late Alexander McQueen, who’s brave, provocative and avant garde fashions always inspired me. The collection setting is an editorial version of a Victorian asylum and all the pieces have been named after mental disorders: Narcolepsy, Autophagia, Kleptomania, Oneirophrenia and Delirium.

Narcolepsy

A multicoloured striped chiffon halterneck dress with the skirt part inspired by the shape of oleander hawk moth, a wool corset jacket with asymmetrical half sleeves, lilac net hose, leather ankle strap platform shoes and hat with a silver airplane ornament, bubblegum of pink mohair wig on a chignon.

Model: Sybarite Slipper

Autophagia

A brown wool and gold leaf jacket with asymmetrical sleeves, Alexander McQueen inspired white leather dress with a brown boa scale patterns and matching pair of McQueen armadillo shoes and a wild blond mohair wig.

Model: Sybarite Inque repaint

Oneirophrenia

A black and white silk chiffon skirt with a distorted checker pattern, silk blouse with golden buttons and a large rosette of black organza ribbon decorated with a golden skull, black lace corset, black and white lace hose, black leather driver’s gloves and strappy platform shoes, an avant garde black tulle wrap hat with a golden airplane ornament.

Model: Sybarite Inque repaint

Kleptomania

A green wool and gold leaf vest over layered burgundy tulle skirt, Alexander McQueen inspired golden sequin over knee armadillo boots with buckled garters, golden wing hair ornament and a blond mohair wig on a chignon.

Model: Sybarite Inque repaint

Delirium

An asymmetrical punk evening dress of grey, black and red chiffon with tartan and houndstooth prints with thick asymmetrical burgundy tulle petticoat and decorated with silver and gunmetal chains, skull and crosses, a matching hose and McQueen armadillo shoes of black leather, gunmetal sequins and red glass beads, McQueen inspired butterfly hat.

Model: Sybarite Slipper

emiliacouture on Haute Doll

2010-10-06T12:59:00.000-07:00

I have some exiting news - the November issue of Doll Reader magazine is out and emiliacouture "Tribute to Alexander McQueen" collection is in the Haute Doll magazine and on the cover of Haute Doll as well! So all of you who have patiently waited for this since last May, the emiliacouture Autumn 2010 collection for Sybarites will be out tomorrow!

To read the 6 page article get the magazine or read the digital version (see pages HD10-15).

Decay - the third doll in the "Until Death Do Us Part” collection

2010-09-24T05:05:00.000-07:00

A strange plague might haunt the world but nothing stops a wedding. Aunt Rosemary was feeling a bit downwind during the ceremony and collapsed only to bite the bride on an ankle. They wanted to take her to a hospital, but she wasn’t going to miss her own wedding reception. When it was time to cut the cake, she didn’t quite find it to her taste, but the caterer was good and the groom was great! Some brides gorge themselves on wedding cake but this one ate the whole wedding party.

Presenting “Decay”, the third doll in the "Until Death Do Us Part” collection. This doll addresses another "fun and trendy" topic of our age: zombies. We are so gorged with TV violence and gore that the real thing leaves us unfeeling. What zombies really symbolize is the fragility of our modern social order. We are only three meals away from a total chaos where our civilized pretence is trashed and the savage within in revealed.

A resculpted and painted Tonner's Alabaster Antoinette has been given a body blushing with a gory bite mark on her ankle and blood spatter all over her face body and clothes. She wears and Marie Antoinette style mohair wig embellished with golden bows and a matching OOAK gown of beige lace and chiffon over a bustle. The hem of the gown has been torn and stain dyed. The gown is accessorised with a pair of Atelier sculpted and hand-painted white leatherette buckle shoes.

I am accepting offers by email (emiliacouture(at)gmail.com) until the 1st of November.

Behind the Until Death Do Us Part collection

2010-09-24T03:21:00.000-07:00

The idea for collection of four dolls was born right after I won the Couture Doll Design Challenge (CDDC) competition on January 2010. I had enjoyed my time with CDDC, to be honest it consumed my life so utterly I actually postponed my graduation because of it. However, being given a theme and creating commercial fashion week after another for a half a year did take it's toll. I wanted to rebel, do something very non-commercial and unorthodox. Then Tonner's Alabaster Antoinette was launched and I knew exactly what to do with it. I bought four on preorder and wrote down all the ideas that had swarmed in my head.

The dolls took months to arrive, during which I finally finished my final thesis and, shaken by the suicide of my favourite designer Alexander McQueen, I created the "Tribute to Alexander McQueen" five piece collection of OOAK avant garde fashions for Sybarites. The collection should be published in the November issue of the now integrated Doll Reader / Haute Doll magazine.

The designs I had made for the "horror dolls", as I called them then, were not drawings or fashion sketches, but short fragments of stories. Originally the underlining theme was suppose to be just plain horror, but as I realised I wanted each to have an elaborate gown it occurred to me to make it a wedding collection instead. The holy matrimony was just the thing to push these everyday horrors to another level and I was enchanted by the idea of making a beautiful gown and then destroying it with wear and tear. At this point the collection got it's name: "Until Death Do Us Part", which has always held a sinister ring to my ear.

Perhaps it was the suicide of Alexander McQueen and the loss I felt that made me address the issue of suicide in particular with these dolls. The first doll "Honour" was just about to take her life in the storyline and the last doll "Shame" has already done so. These two are the different sides the same coin. Honour escapes her prison and saves her honour by her choice; Shame falls into a despair that consumes her body and soul. The difference lies in the people they left behind: Japanese culture has historically embraced suicide as an honourable deed and the remnants of this paradigm are still visible in their modern culture; the Western culture and religion condemn it and leave the close ones of the deceased feeling responsible - a stigma they may carry around the rest of their lives.

The second doll "Hunger" also has suicidal tendencies. She is a young girl who falls in love, and marries, a vampire as is "fashionable" in the TV nowadays. However, the story doesn't get a romantic happily ever after ending, but far more real one. It is also a potential ending to any girl who in real life falls for a guy with the "I don't know whether to kiss you or kill you" pick up line. I think the trend of romanticising danger is not a healthy one, though admittedly it is not the first time murderous rebels are idealised in the media.

The third doll addresses another "fun and trendy" topic of our age: zombies. We are so gorged with TV violence and gore that the real violence and horror we witness in our everyday lives leaves us callous and unfeeling. What zombies really symbolize is the fragility of our modern social order. We are only three meals away from a total chaos where our civilized pretence is trashed and the savage within in revealed. It doesn't have to be zombies; it can be war, hunger or pestilence -or even global warming. The bottom line is when there won't be enough resources to go around it will be the survival of the fittest.

These gruesome creatures were never meant to be commercial and I did want them to shock, but I must say I was still surprised by the intensity of some reactions they raised. It was only natural people found them sad and disturbing, but I never believed they would get banned from internet forums and such. The important message is that domestic violence, suicide and other taboos do not seize just by keeping them wrapped away. We need to be able to talk about these issues openly, or the victims of the crimes will only feel more alone.

Hunger - the second doll in the "Until Death Do Us Part" collection

2010-09-24T02:12:00.000-07:00

"I don’t know whether to kiss you or kill you..."

It’s the love story of our age: girl meets boy, nice and polite with an old world charm - a vampire. He vouches never to bite her and no sex before marriage. Come wedding night and the bride disappears. She wanders the empty halls of a huge house her wedding gown sweeping the floors in blinding sunlight – bitten and week with blood loss.

Presenting "Hunger" the second doll in the "Until Death Do Us Part" collection by emiliacouture.This doll is a commentary of the "I don't know whether to kiss you or kill you" romantics of the current vampire trend and the example it gives to young girls looking for love.

A resculpted and painted Tonner's Alabaster Antoinette has been given a body bushing with three bite marks, and a mohair wig embellished with vintage jewellery pieces. She wears a OOAK ensemble of a floor length gown of white silk chiffon. The hem of the gown has been gently stain dyed and the top is a weave of silk ribbons. The gown is accessorised with a pair of Atelier sculpted and hand-painted blue shoes tied around her ankles with silk ribbons.

Honour - The first doll in the "Until Death Do Us Part" series

2010-09-12T08:22:00.000-07:00

“Honour”, the first doll in the “Until Death Do Us Part” collection, addresses the delicate issues of arrange marriage, domestic violence and the old samurai code of honour. These are not the safe horrors of Halloween, but something much more serious. Domestic violence is a tragedy that touches many lives, but it is a taboo – just like suicide. However, things will not change through silence and secrecy, so I want to use this art form to bring the matter forth.

An arranged marriage to an older man with wealth and power. From a poor family, all she could offer was her youth, beauty and virginity - which was exactly what he was after. On the wedding night she resisted, revolted by his touch, and he forced himself upon her. Imprisoned to a lifetime of misery she makes the choice to save her family honour.

Tonner’s Alabaster Antoinette (17” vinyl doll), her face resculpted and painted, her body blushed and fitted with double jointed knees. She has bruises left by violent hands on inner thighs and a black mohair hair in a Japanese updo embellished with beads and vintage jewellery pieces. She wears a modern kimono inspired OOAK ensemble made of pale green vintage kimono silk, beige chiffon rouching and luxuriously thick black lace. The outfit has been partially hand-stitched and is fully lined. She holds a Japanese tanto dagger and wears a pair of hand painted red lacquer shoes with golden detailing and red cords around the ankles.

“Honour” will be sold by silent auction. The auction period is 12th-19th of September and the bidding starts from 300usd. Layaway option is available. If you wish to use layaway include your payment plan to your bid. Send you bid to emiliacouture@gmail.com before midnight on 19th. Thank you for your interest!

More photos at the flickr set

www.emiliacouture.com

2010-08-23T23:43:00.000-07:00

My new website's beta version is up and running at http://www.emiliacouture.com now. This will be one of the first steps in building my own line of doll fashions. In the website you can join the first-to-know list to keep posted with the new designs. There will be an opportunity to commission a very limited number of those Alexander McQueen armadillo shoes for Sybarites in the near future and I'll be testing to make them in Fashion Royalty as well. So join the list and be the first to know!

Irezumi - Yakuza Tattoo

2010-08-22T12:49:00.000-07:00

I did a yakuza tattooed FR Homme doll a couple of years ago and found the world of these notorious Japanese tattoos fascinating. Today, I got an inspiration for a new yakuza tattoo and had an extra FR Homme body around to use as canvas. I bought a Hot Toys Goemon Saizo head to complete the doll. I think this tattoo came out better than the first one as I researched lots of ukiyo-e and yakuza symbolics in order to create it.

My first yakuza tattoo doll

The new yakuza body tattoo from front and rear

Shoulder details, an octopus and a snake

Carp details on his thighs and side

On the left is the first yakuza tattoo I made. A dragon as the character is a leader of his clan and dragon symbolises power. On the right is the new yakuza tattoo. A tiger for fearlessness as the character is an assassin for his clan. I think the new one is technically better too. I'm pondering whether or not to repaint the old one as the dragon looks rather silly really.

What do you think?

Sneak peeks of the Tribute to Alexander Mcqueen collection Vol.5

2010-08-06T01:03:00.000-07:00

Sorry to torture you some more, but there is still no word when the Doll Reader article will be out so I still cannot release the full designs. But I just had to share something with so many people emailing me about the collection. So, here are the shoes. *All made for Sybarite dolls.

Until Death Do Us Part

2010-07-03T23:52:00.000-07:00

This is what I'm currently working on

- a horror doll series Until Death Do Us Part.

The collection consists of four dressed Alabaster Antoinettes

who have been heavily resculpted, then painted and

mohair wigged. These are not the final pieces yet as

their hair still requires some styling and

I haven't even started working on the fashions.

The four fashions will be a bridal collection,

but I can't reveal more at the moment

as I haven't really designed it yet

as the concept is mainly based on the dolls

and this time fashion will have to come second!

Sneak peeks of the Tribute to Alexander Mcqueen collection Vol.4

2010-05-29T06:36:00.000-07:00

This is a sneak peek from the tribute to Alexander McQueen collection featuring the last and 5th piece in the collection. I have just sent the photos of my 5 piece collection to the Doll Reader magazine and your wait is almost over! I'll keep you posted when the magazine comes out and you may see the full photos.

Sneak peeks of the Tribute to Alexander Mcqueen collection Vol.3

2010-05-21T07:18:00.000-07:00

Here is another update on the Tribute to Alexander McQueen collection. Sorry to still keep you in suspense, but it shouldn't be long now. The deadline on 1st of June is soon upon us and the interview for the Doll Reader magazine takes place tomorrow evening. I still have quite a lot of work to do, but I'm confident I can finish in time.

This is what I'm working on right now. For me McQueen is all about creative use of prints and I've been meticulously aligning the striped fabric for the 4th collection piece. The fabric is a really bothersome silk crepe that slips away from the sewing machine all to easily so I'm been hand stitching alot, but that's what couture is all about, right. ;)

Keep posted for more!

Sneak peeks of the Tribute to Alexander Mcqueen collection Vol.2

2010-05-18T05:17:00.000-07:00

Here they are: the fresh sneak peeks of the Tribute to Alexander Mcqueen collection. The third piece of the collection is now done and I've added some details to the first two as well. Sorry to torment you like this but I'm sworn to secrecy until the Doll Reader Magazine comes out! ;p

Sneak peeks of the Tribute to Alexander Mcqueen collection Vol.1

2010-05-10T02:11:00.000-07:00

As you probably know, if you've read the earlier posts, I'm currently working on a small collection that will be a tribute to the memory of Alexander Mcqueen. The collection will be made for Sybarite dolls and launched on an exclusive article on the Doll Reader Magazine. The first two outfits of the collection are now finished so I wanted to give you a little sneak peeks.

Keep posted for more sneak peeks as the collection develops.

Ephydriad by emiliacouture

2010-04-26T07:56:00.000-07:00

I was working on my "tribute to Alexander Mcqueen collection" on Saturday morning and making stockings out of smoke blue fishnet fabric when an inspiration hit me. I had bought the fabric simply for the netting part, as that's sort of hard to come by in Finland, but I felt is was a criminal waste that the edge of the netting was covered in elaborate embroidery. Before I noticed I had abandoned my current labour and I were pinning on the fabric on my Sybarite Inque. Suddenly it was past midnight and I had very Avant Garde blue and white gown on my hands. I hadn't eaten the whole day, not even noticed the hours past, the gown was just born.

On Sunday I added some beading and made a patina silver toned metal mask similar to the one golden one on the Amazonian Warrior gown I made for CDDC #3 embellishment challenge. The new gown had a very similar feeling to this first OOAK couture gown I thought I'd make it the second piece in the mythological series and named it Ephydriad. Ephydriad is a general term for water nymphs in ancient Greek mythology. I think I'll be making more of these couture gown inspired by myths.

The Ephydriad gown is made from smoke blue fishnet embroidery, fine vintage wool lace, laced with matching blue silk ribbons, embellished with an pearl choker worn as a belt and as a final detail the weird metal mask that functions as a common factor of the series. The cream boots are from Facets by Marcia.

More photos at my flickr.

CDDC Article in the current issue of FDQ

2010-04-19T09:52:00.000-07:00

Exiting news! The article about CDDC featuring my photos is finally out and I just received my copy! It was a weird tingling sensation to see my work as a proper print for the first time. So get your own copy of the Fashion Doll Quarterly magazine and check it out!

The Latest Gossip - Tribute to Alexander McQueen

2010-03-25T23:36:00.000-07:00

Alexander McQueen's death struck a huge blow to the world of fashion. He was an icon and my favourite designer. After his death I lost my interest in fashion design for quite some time - though fatigue from CDDC might have played it's part too. I noticed now that instead of my usual routine of viewing all the runway shows on internet I hadn't seen a single one. Nothing just felt worthwhile as who else could design like that?

But now it is time to get back on the saddle. To honour my fashion icon I have designed a 5 piece collection for Sybarites to commemorate Alexander McQueen. I do not attempt to copy any of his designs exactly (well, maybe those armadillo shoes), but instead attempt to make something that could had been a part of his collections. It is a huge challenge and the final works shall be featured in an exclusive article on Doll Reader magazine. I'll keep you posted with the work, but you'll have to wait for pictures until the magazine is out. ;)

Welcome to Rue du Savonner!

2010-03-13T02:05:00.000-08:00

A new site for my photostories is now up and

I'll post the new episodes one by one as I convert the old ones to Comiclife

and make new ones.

Hope you'll find them entertaining!

Here is the cover of the first episode for you:

Test with Comiclife Software

2010-03-10T09:19:00.000-08:00

This is my first attempt at using the software Comiclife. I used my oldest photostory - Delicatessen - to get some practice. It's not much of a story anyway, just diorama shots with no real plot line, but it's short and simple, thus easy practice. The software is really easy to use and I think I'm hooked. I'm actually consider converting all my stories to this format.

Sorry if the texts are too small to read.
The blog format seems to crop the bigger pics by itself from the side.
Click the pics to see the larger format.

Open for commission

2010-03-09T01:28:00.000-08:00

My schedule is open for commissions. Please contact me with email (emiliacouture (at) gmail.com) to get an appointment from my list.

The commission works I do:
- Fashions, shoes, bags, jewellery
- Furniture, 6th and 4th scale
- Repaint or enhancement
- Reroot, haircut and stylish
- Skin tone swap as seen my the previous post. Requires two dolls for better results as colour may be worn from the body in time (testing in progress), so send me pale and dark doll and I'll swap the skin tones the other way around! Full facial repaint recommended.
- I could do a doll house too but the shipping will cost fortunes. ;)

Tanned Lukas

2010-03-07T23:19:00.000-08:00

I was hoping that there would be a tanned Lukas for me in the new FR collection, but the boy was as pale as ever. Simple solution: had to make one myself!

I removed the flock hair and swapped the Lukas head into a Pierre body. Then grained pastels with a coarse sand paper to make a mixture matching the Pierre skin tone and powdered the head with it. Couple of layers for smooth and even results and seal spray. Then the face was ready to be repainted again. Simple thing really. Now making my poor Pierre head paler is going to be a challenge! ;)

Since I had to sacrifice my white haired Lukas to do this I gave him white hair again and tried to repaint his face to resemble the original screening. Now he's back, but with a nice tan. I have nothing against pale dolls, but I love variation and it was time for Lukas to get some colour!

Do try this at home! ;)

One additional photo of my Lukas with a wig:

Photostory: Valentine's Day Special

2010-02-26T04:33:00.000-08:00

I made a special romantic photostory especially for Valentines day, but forgot to post it here until now.

It's a must-read for those who are rooting for Amaury and Marcas to get together, but I won't reveal the details.. ;)

Here are some sneakpeeks for your enjoyment:

You can read the full story here at my flickr.

Making a Stonewall

2010-02-23T22:44:00.000-08:00

Hi. It's been a while. After winning the Couture Doll Design Challenge I've been experiencing a sort of a creative dry season, but finally it's beginning to pass. Moving to a new city certainly didn't help as we have accumulated quite a pile of stuff and being rather penniless students we had to carry the whole truckload ourselves - luckily we have such a wonderful families they came to help out.

Anyway, yesterday I finally got an inspiration to make something new for my diorama that I had neglected since Summer. My hubby had printed me some photos he took during his study-trip to Paris as huge backdrops and the way the backdrop meets the floor bothered me. So, what I wanted was a an ancient looking stone wall to cut the view in half. I chose blue Styrofoam as the building material as its light, easy to paint and has much smoother grain then the white Styrofoam. To decide the perfect height for the wall I used one of my FR Homme. As the dolls are rather tall in 6th scale I actually asked my hubby how hight did the usual stonewalls appear to him - as I'm so short my view wouldn't help much! ;)

I used a ruler to cut half way into the Styrofoam and then just hit the sheet against my knee to brake it. This way you don't need anything to protect the surface you're working on (lazy).

I used a regular pencil to sketch the stone-pattern to the Styrofoam. Instead of actually carving the Styrofoam its much easier - and much less messy - to use pencils or etc to force the lines into the material.

I used chains and other stuff I found lying around to beat the Styrofoam to give it uneven rock-like surface. You can add more texture when ever you want as long as its before painting.

After the stone-patterns were done I edged them deeper with a chisel. Instead of just cutting the lines deeper I also used the chisel to press the cracks into the rocks and sort of round the edges so the stones seem more loosely piled.

I made a couple of deeper set rocks by cutting the rock loose and pushing it deeper to the sheet. Then I cut off the excess material. Again, this is much less messy and gives a better effect than carving off a piece.

And now to the painting phase: I used regular acrylics to mix the paint for the wall. There is no point of using the more expensive acrylics used for doll faces to paint scenery, so I recommend any old stuff used for poster painting etc. that comes in a good sized tube.

Dilute the acrylic paste with water so even the tiniest cracks are filled with colour. I started out with black base, but in retrospect the contrast might be too much giving a sort of comic book effect instead of realism. I recommend starting with dark grey or brown depending of the colour scheme you want your wall to be.

Below you'll see my wall painted all black. This took about 3 layers to get this coverage. Naturally the less you dilute the paints the more they cover, but then it's going to be hard to get that thick paint into the tiny cracks of the wall.

Dry brushing is a method of highlighting the texture and creating artificial shadows to a miniature item. Tap your brush gently in the paint and then dry it by brushing a paper. Then decide the direction of the light and brush down from that direction, touching up all the highest places of the texture.

The effect to one layer of dry brushing.

Then, one by one, mix lighter shades and repeat the dry brushing. You'll get the best results with 4-5 layers. Remember to keep both your paint and brush really dry and test the brush on paper before each stroke.

Wall after 5 layers of dry brushing. As you can see the contrast is rather strong so it's better to start with a lighter shade.

To add a more natural effect and a bit of age to my wall I wanted to give it a touch of moss here and there. For the moss I use green flock - the same stuff I use for doll hair, from restoredoll.com) and ordinary wood glue (Elmer's will do fine).

The method of flocking the wall for moss is exactly the same as flocking doll hair. Depending from the thickness of the glue layer you'll either get a hint of moss or real patches of it. I started out just tapping the glue gently on the wall and added the first layer of green flock. Then I repeated the treatment in places with more generous amounts of glue to get thicker patches of moss.

To give a final effect I added some roots (from my dead bonsai) poking out of the cracks between the rocks.I think I might add some patina later on to make it feel more real and urban. Maybe some street dust, bird poop and graffiti, but for now this will have to do.

Here is the stonewall finished and in it's place in my diorama:

Hope you enjoyed this and will try it at home!

CDDC Challenge Eight - Around the world in one Fashion!

2010-01-11T03:56:00.001-08:00

Challenge 8 - The Final Showdown

14^th of December

Around the world in one Fashion! - Like Susie by R&D Fashion dolls, your model is a world traveller. On her arrival at her destination, it appears that her luggage went to Hoboken instead of with her. Now she must use what she is wearing to make a transition from day to night, but she needs that transition to reflect the city she is visiting. Please choose your city and don't forget to tell us in your description what city it is. You should also give the judges a good description of how your style fits your city/country. As this is the last challenge this is your time to really show us YOUR style.

Guest Judge - Rudi Teruel of R&D Fashion Dolls

Interesting... I wondered which city to choose. I’ve had quite a lot of practice reflecting the city into style in the flickr International Jetset Diva photo contest; although there we were given the city and a dresscode and now we needed to decide the both for ourselves. I wondered which city was best to reflect MY style: Tokyo? Paris? New York? Milan? Choosing someplace warm would make the evening wear skimpier – unless I wanted to shock everyone and make my model go to a S/M fetish party or something. LOL! It’s a pity a used the transformation idea in the Audrey challenge – it’s not like I wanted to repeat the same things all over again, but they sure would had been perfect now.

I was thinking of all the items that changing from day to night easy that I hadn't used. A vest: worn with a blouse during the day and revealingly without it by night? A miniskirt or dress: worn with leggings by day and without by night? Tops over dresses to tone them down as skirts for day to reveal the dress for night? A scarf turned into a wrap or a skirt? And so forth. None of it felt really inspiring though. I had to find my inspiration elsewhere.

Then there was the matter of what my model would be doing when the night came. Bar or a nightclub? Concert? Opera? A romantic dinner? A cosplay session with Harajuku girls? The S/M fetish party? I suppose it would depend upon the city; or the city would depend upon it, either way around I needed to do some research to start the brainstorming.

I checked out the R&D Dolls page for Susie dolls that had inspired the challenge and studied the destination map there carefully. Each city opened a picture with the doll wearing an outfit and some inspiration photos as background or on the side. I felt that starting with the city would be the best way to go, but I needed a city with a distinct image to channel. Miami would be easy with its pastel colours and Art Deco streamlining, but I absolutely loathe pastel colours so that wasn't for me.

The red walls of Seville in Spain caught my attention on the Susie page, but I had to be careful as there is a Sybarite called Seville and I don't want to stay clear of all associations with that. Anyway, I decided to study Seville in more depth and became certain my interpretation of it would be far more bloody than anyone else's. Seville with one of the oldest bullfight arenas in Spain, the Plaza de Toros de la Maestranza, and as the stage Moorish wars and Spanish tragedies such as Carmen was capturing the grim side of my imagination.

The nightlife in Seville could consists of tapas at El Rinconcillo, flamenco and bullfighting. Or maybe the Carmen opera and dancing the night away at Disco Antiguedades in Calle Argote de Monlina might be interesting. I also found out that the annual International Flamenco Fashion Show is arranged in Seville on January, maybe I should do something flamenco inspired: a passionately red layered skirt, a rose in the hair, a fan... Maybe a bit too literal approach, but I could just feel the old excitement rushing back to me once more.

I had lost my inspiration in the last challenge, but it was all coming back to me. I was already picturing a red suede leather jacket in my mind and a knee length skirt with ruffles, a scarf with long tassels and a matador’s hat. And I knew I wanted to use my Sybarite again to give her beauty some justice this time – although all this would look better with a pale skin. Anyway, Seville it was, I was sure of that! God, it felt good to find my inspiration again. It was like a surge of blood to limb that had fallen asleep except that this was in my chest. Like the first full gasp of breath after a bad asthma attack, but still tasting blood... Yes, this was a city with blood on its history and I loved it. It felt vigorous, intoxicated. I had hope again, though I still feared what the challenge 7 scores would bring.

15^th of December – Christmas Preparations and More Research

I spend most of Monday and Tuesday morning with much needed Christmas cleaning. Then I dag up the box of Christmas ornaments and did some Christmas decorating. I had thought that it was rather chillier than usual inside, but didn’t think much of it, just put on a thick cardigan and a pair of wool socks, but when I opened the front door to put an ornament on the door I was shocked to notice how cold it was outside. OK, -20celcius is rather normal for Finland, but last winter was quite mild here in the “south”, so I had forgotten what a real winter feels like. My nose prickled, all my hair shot upwards and I just one huge goosebump. Even my cat Neru, who had been waiting for an opportunity to take a stroll on the balcony backed away from the door when the wall of cold hit us. It is amazingly beautiful, though. Nice to experience a real winter again, but I do rather experience it in the warmth of my home rather than out there in the cold!

I sat down to do some more research on the city of Seville. It seems Seville has always been a flourishing city or trade and culture since antiquity. Whether it was established by Hercules as the legend tells or Julius Caesar, Seville is a city with mythical origins. Pillaged by the Carthaginians, conquered by the Silingian Vandals, five hundred years of occupation by the Moors and reconquest by Fernando III have given Seville a history of blood that I want to portray in my design.

I also came across the enchanting story of a King Pedro the Cruel's unwelcome passion for Doña María Fernández Coronel, a noblewoman whose husband the king imprisoned and executed. Doña María suffered at the hands of the Monarch until, to rid herself of the king, she burned her own face with boiling oil, disfiguring herself beyond his desires. Maybe a veil or a mask of a sort could echo the disfiguration of Doña María in my design. The more I read the more horrors I seem to find: Seville was also the first seat of the Holy Office, better known as the Inquisition and the plague of 1649 killed half of the city’s population.

There were some more positive cultural notes. Eg. Tirso de Molina's play "El Burlador de Seville" was the first written version of the Don Juan legend and Seville is the backdrop to Prosper Merimé's 1845 drama, which in turn served as the basis of Bizet's opera, "Carmen". There is also the La Feria de Abril, a colourful festival of flamenco, bullfighting and surprisingly fashion. I learned that the tailors of Seville had actually written a booklet about what to wear for the fair and what are the fashions don't for it as well. I hadn't known that the there was a seasonally changing fashion for the flamenco dresses, but I suppose it's only logical in the culture of human consumerism.

In this final challenge we are suppose to define our own style as a designer. I tried to define myself as a designer of business wear with an Avant Garde flair. I do love to shock, I’m a bit morbid and love gothic influenced Haute Couture. I adore pieces that are not only well designed, but also crisply tailored, but my own sewing skills quite don’t take me there. Now to reflect all this in my design...

There were so many questions asked about this challenge in the forum. can the models have a carryon bag with some extra accessories in it? No, just a purse with no accessories in it. Can they change shoes? Nope. Can they change they hair and make up? Yes. OK. Finally, we had something. Although, this would either mean changing the doll in between or a new wig and some repainting. I could change my Sybs wig, but I definitely wouldn’t repaint her! I suppose I’ll have to use Antoinette or FR if I wanted my model to freshen up in that sense. I did still have an Tonner head for the Antoinette body people haven’t seen, so maybe I could use it - I had repainted it to resemble Winona Ryder in early Autumn but then completely forgot about it.

16^th of December

I woke up early to do more Christmas decorations. I covered my staircase diorama in fake snow to take some seasonal greetings photos, but that proved to be a bad and messy idea. Even though I did get some nice pics my cats started playing with the stuff and suddenly it was everywhere and almost broke my vacuumcleaner when I was cleaning it. Do not use loose fake snow in cat homes!

21th of December

Days flew by with Christmas preparations. I baked gingerbread houses with my friends, brought the Christmas tree in to melt, made some good old British ginger biscuits to bribe my wonderful neighbor who would take care of our cat’s when we were visiting our families and some chocolate truffles too.

It might have seemed that I had completely forgotten about the final challenge, but underneath all the Christmas bustle my brain was working and sketching out ideas for my Seville outfits. There were little things I wanted to add to my design, symbols of past events in the history of Seville. A cross for its era as a monastery city (got discarded as it was too distracting in the end), a metallic corset inspired by an iron maiden for the tortures of the Spanish inquisition (even if the iron maiden was never actually used in Spain it still has most to offer for a fashion designer)and a Lady Gaga half mask make up for the burns of brave and virtuous Doña María.

I had debated with myself on the selection of my model – I did not want to paint my Syb, but then decided to give her a removable make up with pastels. It would have to be done after the doll was dressed since I wouldn’t be able to seal it. But if there was going to be a corset the model just had to be a Syb. And I had just the fabric to channel that beaten metal look: thin patina silver faux leather I had used during challenge 5 for the Red Carpet purse.

I was also playing with my old idea of using the raw edges of the hide as detailing – I had done a life size women’s purse collection with the style some years ago. The torn edge might work beautifully as an asymmetrical collar, but that would present difficulties with the lining and authentic leather might stain if I wouldn’t properly line it.

I started to draw the iron maiden corset and it became a dress. I had had this cockroach sort of a silhouette in mind on the Avant Garde challenge, but the soft silk had not produced the effect as well as I hoped. This might be the time to try again. Instead of just the general shape I would make layers that would open, move and breath with movement and inside the armourlike wings there would be spikes, like in an iron maiden there should, only that these spikes would be the new comfort during long slights: yantra acupressure mat incorporated in your clothing. The yantra mats have taken Finland by storm and they are the it-thing for Christmas. I tried one myself at my sister’s and they really do improve your circulation and nothing could be better when sitting on a long flight. I know I can’t feel my ass after 10 hours of sitting! LOL

28^th of December

I was just back from my sister’s place and the 5 hours in a train had been exhausting. But the holidays were far from being over for me. There was still a trip to Jyväskylä waiting for me to visit my mom and my hubby’s parents and granny. Time would be running short...

I went shopping for materials and most of what I needed. The mandatory findings were long black fringe for the flamenco scarf and red yarn for the jacket, but I also found some absolutely exquisite Dormeuil houndstooth wool at my favourite fabric boutique. I would had bought some so myself too if it wasn’t 300euros per meter, but since it was I had to settle for 10 cm for dolls instead. That’s the nice thing about dolls, they can always have the most luxurious things I can’t afford for myself. I’m just totally bonkers about Alexander McQueen’s houndstooth fashions and want to recreate some for my dolls when the CDDC is over.

I also caved in and bought myself a yantra mat on sales. I had tried one and got totally addicted at my sister’s place and just needed it! I was also starting to think that maybe my idea to integrate the yantra acupressure points into the lining of travelling clothes wasn’t so outlandish after all – I sure would had needed it during the 5-hour train ride.

After I got home and started working on my design again I realized I had misread the challenge a bit. It was the transition, not the whole design – that needed to reflect the city of destination. Here I had been designing both day and night based on Seville’s history and culture. Maybe the matador jacket wasn’t such a good idea after all. The day outfit needed to be as different as possible from the night to make the transition more pronounced. I decided to forget the red suede bolero and use the luxurious houndstooth wool to make a long coat instead. I'd just have to be careful to keep the cut as far a way from McQueen as possible. No one owns the houdstooth pattern, but it is quite strongly associated with McQueen this season.

As I photographed all my potential jacket material on my model I felt more and more certain that this was the best course of action. The result would be rather dark and monochromatic, but then again this was supposed to reflect me as a designer and I love to make things all black and white. I think this will be very much me and if people won’t like it and consider it all too morbid it’s their loss really. I decided to use the 3rd potential fabric as the lining to give the thin wool some posture and colour.

30^th of December

I was just back from visiting my mum and my hubby’s folks at Jyväskylä and on my way home I picked a set of big grommets for the tote I was making. Unfortunately the grommet setter that came with the set was absolutely rubbish. It was one of those ghastly things you have to fit with a hammer while holding your fingers way too close for comfort and of course I had to miss my target an hit my middle finger instead. Hard. The pain. The nail got a lovely dark spot on the growth zone of the nail and I’m afraid the whole nail will come off eventually. Just sends shivers down my spine. I just had to take a break from the work, put some cold and compression on the finger and keep it above my heart level. The nap did me good anyway – all this holiday travelling has just sucked me dry.

I worked on the tote and the shoes until 2 a.m. and they were the hardest part as well as the focus of the whole design for me.

31th of December

It was New Years Eve and I was still working on my design with exceeding stress. It was one of those days again. I was cutting the lower parts of the hem on the doll and actually snipped the hemline while doing it. I actually had to make a patch on it, but was luckily able to cover it – no time to start from beginning and make a new one. I won’t be selling this piece then. *Sigh* I also started to doubt if I should line the dress. The patchworklike top does look a bit dodgy from inside, but the pattern is so complicated I’m sure I’d just screw up the lining and ruin the whole dress. Being that tired I really couldn’t trust my sewing skills in the most basic of things not to mention the complicated stuff. With fireworks sounding in the back I was finally able to finish the iron maiden dress and start the coat.

1^st of January 2010

I had spend the whole day sewing the jacket and I was almost finished, just buttons missing, when my friends came over for New Year’s dinner. Well, it was more like late Christmas really, as we had gifts and all. It was great and they left early to let me finish the coat. I didn’t have the right buttons, for I just picked the right size and hand painted them with black and white. I think it’s a nice touch. And finally I have a piece of clothing with a lining I can be proud of. Happy!

2^nd of January

Nothing but the spike lining of the iron maiden left undone I started to tackle the issue first thing in the morning. However, nothing I did really worked and all that I added to the dress looked excessive so I just gave up. The yantra spikes felt like a good idea at the time, but the esthetics had come first – it’s not like the doll needed the acupressure treatment anyway – I did.

With everything else done I whisked up a wallet from my scrap leather and decorated it with the same buckles as the shoes. We weren’t allowed to use any extra things for the night wear – just then stuff she wore during the day and what she had in her small purse – but surely she had her wallet! Many fancy wallets look like evening clutches and vice versa, so I thought that would be a way to solve the problem. I didn’t dare to put scale money or credit cards inside just in case they would make the judges preserve the wallet as a prop instead of an accessory.

Just strip my two-in-one boots from their “stockings” and she’s have nice high heels to go. My transformation concentrated on the accessories this time as I didn’t want to repeat the things I did on the Audrey challenge. I just hoped the judges would count the accessories as part of the design as I did, since sometimes I felt their focus was in the clothing and not the whole picture. For me it is always about the whole set and accessories do play a huge part in it, but then again I think of this as doll fashion instead of just fashion and in a doll fashion product people do want accessories well, not just a piece of garment.

As I was ironing the pieces for the photoshoot a little catastrophe occurred. I forgot to avoid the button area and the hot iron melted one of the plastic buttons I had hand-painted. Luckily I was able to save it with some extra layers of paint and varnish. Finally I was ready for the first part of the photoshoot.

This time we had been allowed 10 pictures instead of 6. The front, side, back and insides of both outfits and then the 2 extras. I had considered using different backgrounds for the night and day looks to really tell them apart, light grey for day and dramatic red for night. However, the last time I had had negative feedback on the strong yellow I had used, so I used the light grey throughout the shoots. I was just afraid that it wouldn’t make my quite monochromatic fashion seems too anemic. Then again a blood red background might have stolen the show.

After I was done with the day shoot it was time for the night one. It was established in the CDDC mailing list that the model was aloud to freshed up in her hotel room and change her hair and make up. I wanted to go a bit overboard with my make up and do a Lady Gaga inspired half-mask make up using lace as stencil (see the tutorial for human face). It was definitely a runway look and I can’t imagine anyone walking into an opera with that, but I did want to make a nod towards the gruesome tale of Seville’s Dona María that I found really enchanting. I used pastels without sealing them and tested that the pigments didn’t stain the resin before starting. The colours were red, brown and black so that the lacy pattern would remind the horrible burns on Dona María’s beautiful face.

*Note for those worrying about my Syb at this point

I can tell that the whole thing washed off easily afterwards

and I did test it first to make sure it was safe.

I was almost done with the second shoot when another catastrophe hit me. The camera battery ran out and the charger was nowhere to be found. After hours of panicked searching I was sure I had left it at my sister’s or folk’s during the holidays and that this was the end of it. I couldn’t even get my photos out of the camera with the battery dead. Finally, my hubby found it buried in the tools we had already packed – we are moving house soon – and I was relieved beyond words. I took the last inside photo and as done. *whew!*

All was done and no more mishaps. I resized the photos and stared at them for a long time. I wasn’t sure how well the transition from day to night took place. Using a coat was a simple way to do it and I had been criticized about the complexity of the Audrey design. I thought the boots were rather brilliant, but then again would the accessories count or be ignored again? It was the last chance to prove myself and I really didn’t want people thinking I won just because Lori made a one little mistake – like all things in life I wanted to deserve it with my own hard work. Also, for many people my dark inspiration might be a bit too much - even creepy - but this challenge was suppose to reflect me as a designer and I wanted to take a risk and make something dark and sinister. People did like the pools of blood I made for shoes in the 4^th challenge, though, so maybe they wouldn’t judge this one either. I clicked “send” and started the long and nervous wait for the scores, but in the end, I really liked what I had done and that’s what counts the most.

Description:

Rather than taking the literal approach and having my model dressed in the obvious colourful things the people in Seville wear I took a more conceptual approach. The Spanish have a passion for tragedy and I wanted to milk it, so instead, I let the dark history of Seville to inspire a sinister avant garde runway look that could be worn to a bullfight at the Plaza de Toros de la Maestranza, the Carmen opera and some late night tapas and manzanilla wine at El Rinconcillo.

As the sensible travel wear for the day flight from chilly London to the warmth of Andalucía my model wears a wool coat with leather belt intertwined between the pieces, driver’s gloves closed with two shank buttons, a scarf, pair of long leather boots and a chic houndstooth tote decorated with safety pins. She also wears a black short cropped OOAK mohair wig.

As she transitions into her evening look, my model casts away the coat revealing a dress made of metallic leather and inspired by ancient armour and a notorious torture device - the iron maiden. With this piece I wanted to commemorate the history of war and Seville as the seat of the Spanish inquisition. The long boots transform into a modern take of flamenco shoes and she wraps the shroudlike Spanish mourning scarf on her shoulders against the evening chill. Finally, when freshening up in her hotel room, she whisks up a Lady Gaga inspired half-mash make up to honour the tragic tale of Seville’s virtuous Doña María, who disfigured herself with boiling oil to escape the unwanted infatuation of King Pedro the Cruel. And on her way out, she only grabs her wallet leaving the tote behind – this girl knows how to travel light.

11^th of January – The Scores

Shane: Theme: 4 Originality: 4 Creativity: 4 Construction: 5

I just don’t feel that there is enough of a transition here though you have done a very nice job reflecting your destination city. I LOVE your armor dress. I knew exactly what it was before reading your description – it’s near perfect. I’m afraid I can’t love the silhouette of your coat over the dress – it’s almost there but just misses for me – I think it’s probably the way it bells out and drapes over the skirt of the dress.

Janet & Diana: Theme: 4 Originality: 4 Creativity: 4 Construction: 4

Diana:

I really, really liked the dress, and the over-all effect of the ensemble but i'm not sure it met the challenge as well as it could have. Pieces were removed but didn't really change in an interesting way. However, the details - gloves, boots, accessories - were fabulous.

Janet:

I was also impressed by the accessories. The dress was detailed. I would, however, have made it 2-piece and altered it, by bringing in a separate peice, such as a top.

Judith: Theme: 5 Originality: 4.5 Creativity: 4.5 Construction: 5

Interesting description! A very dramatic design including a great Spanish touch with the fringing on the shawl. Love the theatrical cut of the dress and the fall of the back peplum layers. Not much in the way of transformation takes place from day to evening but still an inspired solution to the challenge. Love the boots to heels and the meticulous tailoring!

Rudi Teruel: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

As colorful as the Spanish people are – this knock out design will WIN them over AS IS! Very nice, creative interpretation of the theme… and everything is nicely executed… SLEEK, SEXY, SUPERB!!!

Total: 72/80 Ranking 3^rd in the challenge and 1^st in the overall competition

The challenge 8 victory went to wonderfully talented Dal, who also won the challenge 7 (MadMen). Congratulation, Dal! I got the feeling that many designers were just getting started and final score might had been very different all together if the contest would had went on for the whole year. I know I was left wanting more.

To be honest I still haven’t really realized that I’ve won the whole thing - I’m just waiting for the next challenge to be announced. Now that it’s over it’s like a huge cap in my life. I gave this competition my all neglecting work and studies, actually postponing my graduation and I’d love to continue doing so. Now all I have is tackling my final thesis and packing away my old life to move to a new city and the adult life. No more studies. No more CDDC. My life is over. It feels sad and ridiculous at the same time.

Sure I’m happy. Or actually relieved – since I was fearing until the last moment that something would go wrong, the judges would loathe my design and give all time low points, that someone had made something similar before and I’d be disqualified, that the wallet I made would be vaunted as a prop and I’d be disqualified, that I’d open my big fat mouth in a wrong place again and I’d be disqualified and other horror scenarios. I’m one of those Donald Duck personalities that this sort of stuff just happens to. Accident-prone is my middle name – though I usually more leaned towards hurting myself physically. I suppose getting it all over with and hitting my left middle finger with a hammer absorbed the karma for now. LOL. Fair trade, the finger isn’t even broken. I won… I really actually won and the spread in the FDQ magazine will be a welcome start to my own doll business designing separate fashions!

The People’s Choice Award

…Goes to Lori Lyon! Congrats Lori! You were my favourite too! :)

Votes top 5:

Lori 30%

Dal 25%

Emilia 25%

Jen: 8%

Kathi: 5%

And congratulation for all who participated in the CDDC. I hope it was as valuable experience to you as it was for me and thank you for teaching me so much! I made many new friends and I hope we keep in touch!

Thank you Larraine, judges and others involved for making it possible!

And thank you for all the lovely people who have stood by me throughout this contest! Couldn’t have done it without you!

For more photos of the making of process and final fashion go to my flickr set!

CDDC Challenge seven - Mad woMEN

2009-12-20T02:17:00.000-08:00

30th of November – The New Challenge

Mad WoMEN - Our guest judge this week is the owner of the fabulous Dressmaker Details. This line is famous for it's fantastic cocktail fashions with that 60's flair. Your challenge this week will be to design the perfect cocktail fashion for your model, who by the way will be wearing your design as she guest stars in an episode of the wildly popular TV series Mad Men, entitled, The Cocktail Party.

Guest Judge: Steven Fraser

I must admit I wasn’t too happy when I read about this challenge. Yet another 60's challenge. Originally the 7th was suppose to be about manipulation of knit fabrics – that would had been fun – but the judge changed on the last minute and here we are again. Don't get me wrong. I do love the Mad Men show and it's visual style, but the thing with period garments is that they are always more costume than fashion design. It’s simply too limiting when the certain cuts and patterns define 60's and you just have to use them to get that certain flair. Well, if wanted to keep this on the positive side and I should try (*Note that I wrote this on the same day I heard my 6th challenge pictures had be rearranged and partially deleted, so I did have a good reason to be a bit agitated) I did love the Mad Men and the Dressmakers Details’ Mad Men inspired line this year, and if there is a dress I like making its a cocktail dress. I think I need to watch the Mad Men again to get into its chauvinistic, chain-smoking and alcohol marinated world again. And I’d finally get to use my new Sybarite as well.

After tons of research: cocktail dresses, 60’s fashion, Mad Men photos and three seasons later I was exhausted, but I had chosen two options for the fabric: either A: a thin white cotton with tiny black polka dots and embroidery; or B: a thick grey Chinese silk brocade with mustard wine patterns. However, I was experiencing the worst design blockage I’ve ever had – just the thing I had feared when I entered this competition. In addition, I suffered from a severe migraine that simply refused to go away no matter what I did or took for it. It lasted days and days on end. Maybe it was just the strain of spending too much time on a computer or the stress from the very last exam of my life. It feels so weird that my studies are really over now. Even this Cantonese course was extra, just a little something to prolong the evitable – I am really going to graduate. Huge.

The Cantonese exam and preparing for it ate away over a week of my time and after it was done the creative blockage was still there taunting me. So, instead of working on the difficult dress I made wigs for the Sybarite, and a mustard suede overcoat for the option B, that I then decided not to use it and make a luxurious fox stole instead. As I mentioned earlier on the 2nd challenge, I’ve inherited a huge pile of vintage furs from my grandma, but I don’t want to wear them myself, so I use them for doll clothing a bit by bit. I don’t like working with fur, though, there’s something so morbid and sad about them, and they make my allergies go haywire.

In the end I just forced myself to do something, and started to pin the fabrics on the doll, but I just wasn’t feeling it – nor did I the next day. I tried chiffons and tulle with the polka dot fabric, but everything felt like it had already been done. I really hoped this would be the last vintage challenge of the competition and that I could do something more me for the last one. On Wednesday evening I started to get seriously worried and decided to make a simple sheath out of the grey and mustard brocade. My migraine was still incapacitating, but I was able to form a simple dress with a somewhat weird and a bit too revealing cut. I tried hard to make the vine pattern continuous, but in some parts, e.g. darts, it just didn’t work out. I also made nude fishnet stockings, partially to help the fittings – Sybarite is a really hard doll to sew to as I like to sculpt the fabric on the doll and they are so floppy and can’t keep the same posture if you move them in the slightest. They are also much curvier than any doll I’ve worked with - this will take some getting used to. I'm glad my Syb is black because this baby's got back! (Oh no, now I have that song stuck in my head again. LOL)

My light sensitivity gone and able to work with lights on again I decided to relax and get my mind off things by making a photomontage for a flickr group called the International Jetset Diva, where we get a weekly theme to photograph our doll in. This week was a beach concert at Ibiza and I had fun taking the photo on Agnes croud diving in very unladylike manner.

12th of December
It was Saturday evening and I had just submitted my entry. Here was the description:
"For the Mad Men cocktail party I designed a curvy silk brocade sheath with a generous neckline and a matching sash. I chose a colour palette that complimented my model in tones of smoky grey and mustard for that 60's flair. I love the fact that vintage is all about accessories and topped the dress with a luxurious vintage fur fox stole and keeping the rest of the accessories simple black. I made a cute period purse in black leather with matching shoes, a straw pillbox hat, fishnet gloves, patina silver jewellery and as a cherry on the top an elegantly long cigarette holder for smoking those complimentary Lucky Strikes at the cocktail party. My model is an enhanced Sybarite Inque who wears a OOAK 60's style mohair wig made especially for the outfit."

I really doubted my design this time – I believed it would be the one that would cost me the whole competition. However, writing the description did bring some belief in me. I was satisfied with the accessories – they were really fabulous if you don't mind me saying it – but I couldn’t help feeling that they were only there to compensate the lacks of the dress itself. Sure, it was nice and licked the curvy body shape of the Sybarite well, but was it good enough to keep my lead? *sigh* It was going to be such an excruciating wait for the scores.

Midnight.
I was off to bed, but before I went I checked my emails to see that my submission had been received safely. Yes it had, but there was also a huge problem: I had made a beautiful and elegant cigarette holder as an accessory for the outfit, but it had been counted as a prop instead and all props are banned. This meant that I had to retake all my photos, and not only that, but to rebuild my photo studio and set again. (I did write a full line worth of swearing here, but had to censor it to save the more sensitive readers) And now to return to more British composure: This is not immensely pleasant. The Rule #14 of the CDDC is: "No props unless authorized by Organizer or required in Theme." To be honest I do consider cigarettes to be such a huge part of Mad Men they relaly ARE required by the theme, but what can you do? I just had to reshoot everything. Even if it wouldn’t be against the rules to Photoshop the cigarette holder out of the picture the dolls pose would still be silly with its hand holding the thin air. Ideal or not another photoshoot had to wait until tomorrow. At least I had more experience posing the Syb – she is really hard to work with, has trouble standing even with the stand and can’t hold her poses.

3a.m.
I lied in bed unable to sleep. The cigarette holder issue was bothering me simply too much. I got up. Ironed and draped the background fabric again, set up the lights, fixed a hole in pantyhose, ironed the dress, redressed the doll, put some fresh hairgel on the wig, fixed the purse to a glove to make it look like the doll was holding it, stuffed some suede inside the Syb’s joints to make it hold a pose and started shooting again. I think the new photos were worse, but I was too tired to care. Downloaded the pics, edited them, renamed them and send them again. I didn’t retake the two photos where the doll wasn’t in the picture: one being the inside pic and the other the extra pic with accessories on it. I thought that since the doll wasn’t holding the cigarette holder it couldn’t be considered a prop nor did I delete the mention of it from my description. As I said in it, the cigarette holder was the cherry on the top and the one piece I was really happy with too. It would be sad if I’d have to delete it from all existence. I had to wait until morning and see if it would be alright. I went to bed hoping that this time I’d get some sleep.

14th of December
It was Monday afternoon and the challenge 7 pictures were up. To be honest I was embarrassed of my creation and photography. My new photos made the bust line look awfully baggy as if it was a size too big and there were at so many great designs far better than mine. I struggled with this one and it shows. Then again, if the accessories count - and I hope they did – I sure had plenty and the sash patters met well with the ones on the dress all around the waistline. I just hoped the judges would notice that. I was so anxious while I waited for the scores.

19th of December
It was Saturday morning and wake up to find an email stating that one of the designs had been removed from the challenge for breaking the rule #2, use of commercial patterns. Being accused and penalized in points of the same violation without any personal notice beforehand in the first challenge - where I had used a classic 60’s cut, but done the pattern all by myself – I was absolutely horrified. I opened the CDDC site fearing to see my own design gone (would had been weird anyway as the cut I made this time was rather unorthodox) and I was even more shocked to find that it was #17 that was gone. That was the one I thought would definitely win. Could it have been a commercial pattern? It's hard to believe. The email had also said all discussion on the topic wasforbidden and would be moderated. I just felt stunned. I knew the designer of #17 too, but I think it’s better not to name her under the current cencorship. I was shocked, empty, disappointed. How can this have happened? At least this time they handled the situation neatly behind scenes instead of making it a full blown farce as it was in my case, but I really hope the designer got an advance notice and a change to defend herself this time. And was this accusation true? They must have been able to prove it somehow, as I was let of the hook with apologies since they couldn’t, but I still can't believe it. Ghastly.

Now that I think of it, there could easily be a pattern for a similar dress I made earlier, the cut was so defining in the 60’s, how could I even know as I used patterns for the first time on this Thursday, when I took apart my worn out favourite dress to remake it out of a new fabric. It was surprisingly easy and made the sewing so much faster – I suppose patterns do serve a purpose. LOL. Well da, of course they do, but as I don’t like or my dolls to wear mass production stuff in new colours I’ve always preferred my own process of trial and error. With dolls the “ups” parts don’t even cost that much – they sure did when I was making bridal gowns though! Once I actually have to go and secretly buy a new fabric that cost more than my commission fee for designing and sewing the gown! LOL.

20th of December – The Scores are up
I woke up and rushed to check my mails and there is was. The winner of the challenge is Dal! She is a first time winner who totally deserved it with her very accurately 60’s and MadMen style coral red ensemble modelled by Antoinette channelling Joan Holloway, one the my favourite MadMen characters. On my opinion Dal should have won the Audrey challenge as well as her brilliant black and white design worn my Twilight Bride Momoko was absolutely adorable and very elegant as well. I’m really happy for her! Congratulations Dal!

And here are my scores and judge comments:

Shane: Theme: 4.5 Originality: 4 Creativity: 5 Construction: 4

Overall I think this is a fantastic fashion with great accessories. The brocade is the perfect choice of fabric for this theme. I have one issue with it – it’s far too low cut exposing too much of the breasts. Cocktail dresses in the early 1960’s would have been very fitted at the breast but they would not have exposed nearly so much skin.

Diana and Janet: Theme: 5 Originality: 4.5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

Diana: I loved the details of this ensemble, and for me, the fur just 'made it happen'. Interesting work in the front detailing, too.
Janet: Beautiful choice of design, exceptional work on the accessories. I love that fox stole, and the variation in color.

Judith: Theme: 5 Originality: 4.5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

Fabulous colour palette in this very elegant and quite theatrical outfit. This woman would turn heads at any party! Love all the accessories. I would have liked to see the neckline just a little higher for the period. Just a note on the photo. The brightness of the background detracts from the outfit making everything appear overly busy.

Steven Fraser: Theme: 3 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

Beautifully done, but a bit too modern for the 1960’s

Total: 74.5/80 Ranking 2nd on the challenge, 1st in the overall competition.

I totally agree with the judges and think this was not my best work. I’m just happy to come second and think there would have been other’s who deserved it more than me. For example Kathi who shares the second place with me and made an impeccable and glamorous black sheath with a pillbox hat for this challenge. It was truly beautiful and looked just as good as Dressmaker’s Details. I’m really sad to see Lori missing and that will definitely influence my motivation in the last challenge. She has been such a source of energy and motivation throughout the competition. I hope she will continue even if she missed this one.

CDDC Challenge Six - Inspired by Audrey

2009-12-06T01:50:00.001-08:00

15^th of November - Challenge 6
It’s Sunday and the challenge 6 is in:
"My look is attainable. Women can look like me by flipping out their hair, buying the large sunglasses, and the little sleeveless dresses."

The quote above is from the woman who inspired our next challenge...

Inspired by Audrey - This week's guest judge takes his inspirations for his incredible collections from many areas. This week you must take on a muse that has inspired our Guest Judge himself. Your challenge this week is to create a design that is inspired by Audrey (Hepburn). This should not be a remade or copied Audrey outfit, but something that you have designed that would suit Audrey's style and be something Audrey would have loved to wear.

Guest Judge: Randall Craig

Audrey is one of my icons, but to be honest another 60’s theme challenge doesn’t feel that inspiring to me. The things Audrey wore were groundbreaking in her day, redefining the styles that followed, but now they are just very normal and sort of boring. She was an icon who changed the beauty ideals from the curvy, blonde “bombshell” look into a slender brunette with a pixie cut, which I love and can thank her for preferring the short cropped hair myself. I suppose one could try to update Audrey’s simple elegance to modern times, but it’s a risky interpretation especially since her popularity has made her signature look into something very commonplace. Then again the Integrity Toys' Poppy Parker collection has Audrey’s 60’s wardrobe pretty much covered already so there isn’t much left to do in the 60’s department either. It will be a really tough challenge to create something new within a theme this used up. Of course Audrey was in the spotlight from 50's to 90's, but its the 60's that really identifies her style.

I did some research, browsed the net for her photos in roles and in real life, watched several of her movies and finally defined Audrey’s wardrobe to consist of:

Capri pants
Slim trousers
Button-down Men’s Shirts (with rolled up sleeves as seen on the Roman Holiday)
Black turtleneck (A must on Funny Face and outside the sets)
The little black dress (Breakfast at Tiffany's)
Elegant but simple evening gown
White trench coat (Breakfast at Tiffany's and real life)
Comfortable ballet flats
And the perios choise of accessories: silk scarves, chic hats, gloves and purses

Based on the movies I liked Audrey the best in the movie where she deputed: Roman Holiday 1953. On the other hand, I preferred to bring my Audrey to the modern age and make an updated versions of her signature favourites. I also planned to make an OOAK Audrey doll if the time would allow it and the perfect canvas in on its way – the Portrait in Black Poppy Parker. I had made one Audrey doll out of FR Giselle some years ago, but I didn’t have it at hand any more. If only the Poppy would arrive in time - I'd had to start the designing without my model.

My old Audrey repaint

This has been a time when my personal life has distracted me from this challenge quite a bit, but luckily only in positive sense. It’s been a very exciting time as we - me and my hubby - are considering to buy our very first apartment together and I’ve been running into bank here and Juhana from apartment viewing to another in Tampere. We finally found something that might be turned into a dream home by knocking down a wall or two and a bank promised us the loan so I was simply squealing with excitement! However, just before finalising the deal I called the janitor of that housing complex and found out that the real-estate agent had been keeping so things from us, such as full roof, balcony and window renovation that was eminent within the next 5 years. I lost my faith in our agent that instance and we backed out from the deal. We browsed the market for other option, but in the end decided simply to open a savings account for the down payment. Luckily, after browsing for rental apartments, I fell instantly in love with a small but beautiful 50m2 flat in luxurious neighbourhood downtown. It’s undoubtedly a bit small for us, but it’s too beautiful to miss and allows us to save more too. Besides, the building is an old one build in 1930 with those high rooms, so it’s almost like a loft and we can pile our things upwards. As a cherry on the top the landlady seems awfully nice and flexible too. We will move to Tampere on 30th of January.

Our new flat

21^st of November – Finally in the Sewing Phase

After all the distractions I was starting to sew. I had made some sketches while sitting in a train going back and forth between Tampere and Helsinki, but I wasn’t satisfied with any of my ideas. The framework was to bring Audrey to the modern era and make renewed versions of her favourite fashion items. However, this was a risky approach as the challenge especially forbid copying any of her outfits. I wanted to remake the Audrey basics: white trench coat, black turtleneck and slim capri pants. In my original idea the trench could be taken apart as a dress and a short bolero. Three pieces of clothing: three different outfits.

However, the turtleneck was still a turtleneck and there aren’t that many ways to differentiate casual capri pants. First I was thinking of making leggings instead, but then I remembered the penalties of using knit fabrics – you never get 4 or 5 for construction with knits. The turtleneck would use knit fabric anyway so I made 5-pocket-jeans capris from a windbreaker fabric that makes tiny detailing possible and functions well in scale.

I needed to reinvent the turtleneck, so instead of the basic long sleeved model I made it a sleeveless halter neck tunic with white ribbon to gather the hem to hip to be worn as a top with pants, or let loose with a knee length hem to form a casual little-black-dress – another of Audrey’s favourites. Three pieces of clothing: four different outfits. I was running out of photos and fast, so I contacted Larraine to clarify the submission photo rules. It was established earlier that if the garment had layers these could be posted as one photo if the 600pixel max height was still kept intact. However, the rule had only been applied to 2-layer designs before and mine had 4. I think its stretching the rules quite a bit, but Larraine assured me we could work it out.

Next was the trench coat and I started with the dress part. For the fabric I chose a lovely and statuesque silk dubioni that is so stiff it’s almost paper-like. I used the same fabric as lining and made quite a full pleated skirt part with a classic simply top. The whole dress is buttoned all the way down with fully functional white shank buttons topped with a silk rope belt. I made the bodice fitting so that it could be worn either way around, so that added even more variety to this compact travel wardrobe. I thought the outfit needed both a big hobo bag and a tiny clutch to vary with the different combinations. For shoes there was no other alternative but Audrey’s ageless favourite: the ballet flats. I can only hope that this ability to transform will be enough to pull my design off as a new thing instead of a copy, but I’m sure Audrey would have loved to travel light in these simple and comfortable clothes.

23^rd of November – Off to Stockholm

I had to put my work on hold for few days as I was going Christmas shopping in Stockholm with my mother-in-law and and sister-in-law. Sweden isn’t that far away and I love the old architecture of Stockholm, so it’s nice to revisit it after all these years. We took an overnight cruise there, shopped the whole day and took the same ship back home. very nice, but exhausting trip. It’s been a while since I was on a full time shopping marathon like this and I was totally out of practice.

27^th of November – Last Touches

It’s Friday night and I’m finally done. The teeny tiny fingered gloves really gave me a headache and took dozens of attempt to succeed, but I did it eventually. Instead of making the shoes from scraps this time I modified some high heeled shoes I had doubles of. I just can’t seem to get closed toe shoes right on my own so cutting off the heeled soled and making new flat ones worked wonders. After the gloves I had sort of run out of time and energy and did the lazy thing and just picked up a suitable purse from my collection instead of making one myself. I didn’t make any jewellery this time, as Audrey preferred simplicity and didn’t wear that much jewellery outside her films.

I used steel grey background to make the white silk really shine bright.

Here is my description:
"I wanted to reinvent Audrey's old favourites: the trench coat, black turtleneck and the capri pants. I wanted to modernise the look, but still keep a nice 50´s retro wibe. The idea of this design was to make a transforming travel wardrobe to a person who loves comfort and travels light so there are 3 pieces of clothing that make 4 different outfits. The colour palette is Audrey's favourite black and white, and the simple fashions have those little details that make them chic and special - just the way she liked it. The main piece is a trench coat from white silk dubioni and buttoned with fully functional white shank buttons. The coat can be taken apart to make a cute bolero jacket and a simple classic dress. I wanted to remodel the knit turtleneck, so I cropped out the sleeves to make a halterneck tunic that can be either gathered to the hips with white ribbons or kept loose as a little black dress. The capris have the basic slim fitting 5-pocket-jeans cut and the outfits are completed by Audrey's favourite accessories: a chic purse from La Boutique, ballet flats, a silk scarf, huge FR sunglasses and white gloves with black stitching. It was a real challenge to make fingered gloves in 6th scale, but Poppy Parker is my first doll with parted fingers making it possible to make proper gloves."

30^th of November – Problems with my Submission Photos

Because of my design I had run out of pictures to illustrate it and contacted Larraine beforehand to ask how to handle the situation. She had said it was fine before and fine after seeing my photos. However, this morning, I had several emails waiting and saying there was trouble with the photos. She had tried rearranging them in several different ways, but it simply didn’t work – she had to delete some. It was not the best way of start a morning and I felt pretty frustrated. I had spend hours finding the best way to arrange them so that they illustrated clearly and presented beautifully what I had made. Larraine’s best efforts left me confused and I feel really bad for her spending so much extra hours with my submission. I did agree with her on the photos that had to go – they were the weakest photos. At this point I’m really happy I wrote and that extra long description to explain my design - I hope the judges will understand.

The original arrangement of the extra photos

The morning wasn’t getting any better when I read that the next challenge would be yet again period 60’s dress – is there no other era existing in the human history? This is the 3^rd time if you count Audrey! But I’ll complain more about it in my next post. Sorry to whine, but I really started this morning off on the wrong foot.

An hour later – The Pictures are up

OK. Larraine did a good job and my design looks lovely on the site. *Whew* The fingered gloves that were an ordeal to make are not really shown on the doll to their best advantage, but that’s the least of my worries. There are so many good designs here and I bet Lori will be real hard to beat this time. My 2 point lead feels like nothing when I look at her design. I’m so happy to have her in this competition as she is always keeping me thriving for better designs and better finish – though I don’t think I can ever be able to sew as impeccably as she does. We both have white coats as the main focus point... This is going to be immensely tight and there are others that have glorious designs as well – neither me or Lori are safe. Number 2 is simply exquisite in every way and I’d pic that as a winner in a heartbeat. Kathi’s design also caught my eye and she’s using the same doll as I am, the Portrait in Black Poppy Parker, as a model. I'm glad I took the time to repaint and restyled mine.

6^th of December – the Scores are up

Shane: Theme: 4.5 Originality: 4.5 Creativity: 4 Construction: 5

This is a gorgeous, meticulously-made set and I can see Audrey wanting to wear much of it, but I can also see Audrey telling you that parts of it should be changed to fit her preferred way of dress. I don’t see the bolero jacket and the dress working as a trench coat – you certainly have the silhouette of one but it doesn’t quite work in my eyes and does not make for ease in dressing. I’m also not a big fan of the white ribbons being used to tie up the dress. It stands out and takes away from the sleek lines that Audrey would have wanted to best show off her tall slim figure.

Diana and Janet: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

Diana:

Just jaw dropping. Audrey lives! A star to you for the handbag!! It's all perfect.

Janet:

I feel it's just perfect in every way. It's so inspiring – there was so much thought put into every aspect of mini collection. Bravo!

Judith: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

GORGEOUS! The cream coat is stunning and a stand out piece. Audrey all over! Down to the signature ballet flats & glasses and of course capris. The turtleneck is spot on. A very clever mix and match outfit. As cute as they are I don’t think the tiny white ribbons are necessary, I would have preferred them black to maintain the sleek silhouette. Gloves!! Amazing

Randall Craig: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 4

There are some wonderful pieces here. I will admit that judging so many pieces made this difficult. I think if you had picked your favorite pieces and put together one look it would have made more of a clear statement. The bolero is fabulous. The white dress is very Audrey. However, the dart points look like they hit about .5” too high and that is very distracting. My eyes go straight to that every time so I had to take a point off for construction. Otherwise, it is a beautiful set of clothing that is beautifully styled.

Total 77/80 Ranking 1^st in the competition; 2^nd in the challenge

Suddenly, for the first time since the challenge one, coming second hurts again. The feeling itself surprises me and I feel guilty for it. I know I should be happy. I got the best score I’ve ever had but it just wasn’t enough. I can’t believe I lost points with Shane because of my main idea to make 3 pieces of clothing into a full wardrobe. I should have followed the old KISS-rule: Keep It Simple, Stupid. I guess I tried to do too much. The construction point I lost with Randall Craig was totally deserved though. Those darts DO go too high because that was originally supposed to be the back of the dress and when I was dressing the doll I thought “Hey, this might look even better this way around!” *idiot* Well, you become blind to your own work and it cost me this challenge. Darn.

Ok, enough with disappointment. Lori absolutely deserved her victory on this. Impeccable as always and very Audrey. Besides, I did get the best score ever, plus full points from Diana and Janet and that’s just awesome! It’s so fun that all the judges have such a different tastes and learning what tickles their nerves. I wish this competition would take a full year because I still have so much learning to do. Now that I think of it, my pressures are not coming from a will to win, but horror that this competition will be over soon and I still haven’t satisfied the hardest judge of them all: myself. I wonder if I’ll be able to create something new in the next challenge or will it be just a recreation of some period clothing. The challenge 7 is really stressing me out horribly. Period clothing is such a pickle for a designer. I have already chosen my materials, but I still have no idea what to do with them. Wish me luck! And huge congratulations to Lori!

Poppy is doing the "release dance" from Funny Face:

CDDC Challenge Five - The Red Carpet

2009-11-21T15:19:00.003-08:00

Sunday, 1^st of November
On the Red Carpet - This week's guest judge is known for his fabulous gowns. So it seems only fitting that this challenge be all about, On the Red Carpet. Design a fabulous gown for your fabulous model as she walks down the red carpet with the stars.

Guest judge: Jim Farone

A gown for red carpet, huh. Glamour, obviously, and not too risky as celebrities usually do want to avoid being in the worst-dressed-list. I wondered would I need a model that smiles? Don’t think I have one really. I have no idea what to do and inspiration didn’t feel like coming at all. At this point I had doubts about my challenge 4 design a week went by without me doing anything much about the CDDC.

However, the challenge 4 pics were up with 2 gorgeous Sybarite dolls posing with amazing designs and my craving to get a Syb of my own got way worse again. Again I browsed thru flickr and doll boards learning about Sybs and drooling over the endless photos. The FBR (Fashion Beyond Reason) are just the type of Haute Couture I love so if I’d get a Syb and would make fashions for it the doll would pay itself back soon enough, so it would be a sort of a investment really – or so I try to tell myself as there dolls aren’t cheap.
I consider the available Sybs I crave for now: Voltaire on Superfrock site, Raja on Angelic Dreamz and the 1st Inque on ebay. The prices are all about the same – and all beyond my reach. The one I really want is actually the 2nd Inque, but since she costs about 700 there is no way I can even consider it right now. I decide to postpone the decision as I’m still not sure how to pay for Neru’s veterinary bills and the 2st Inque auction closes on ebay without a single bid. I’m quite determinate not to buy a Syb for now, but then the Inque is relisted on ebay “only” for 200pounds. The British’s pound being really low compared to euro and no risk of customs fees I cave in and bid. On Wednesday I’m still the only bidder and an ecstatic new owner of a Sybarite doll! I blow some more money on wigs at Superfrock store and start the excruciating wait for my newest “investment”.

On Friday morning I found my lost inspiration in a hospital waiting room reading women’s magazines as I waited to get the swain flu vaccination. My parents pressured me into it really as I’m in a risk group due to my asthma and as the epidemic seems to have reached a stupid panic point in Finland now. However, I was unable to act on my inspiration as I spend the night suffering the side effects of the vaccination featuring extreme headache and tiredness plus the ghastly pains in the vaccinated hand – all painkillers forbidden as they could reduce the effectiveness of the antibodies formed. The Syb wigs arrive and even though their design is beautiful, I’m a bit surprised by the coarse quality of the fibre used for the wigs. On Saturday morning I was flabbergasted to learn my challenge 4 design has won despite all my second-guessing and my hand’s still sore but the other symptoms gone. A good morning in overall.

Usually, I prefer to spend my weekends in a happy haze of quality time with my hubby. The weekends are far too precious to waste as that’s the only time we can be together. However, as the coming week threatened to be immensely busy, we did the next best thing and worked side by side on our own projects: Juhana was putting finishing touches to his thesis (still haven’t touched mine); I worked desperately with my design challenge.

For some reason this Red Carpet thing formed into bleeding mess – quite literally at several points too. On Saturday, I slaved to make this layered dress out of soft powder coloured fishnet I usually use for stockings. It was just one of those days when everything you touch turns to shit (excuse me the profanities, but they are quite necessary to express my mental state that day – and rather subtle I must say as I must have used way worse on that weekend). I redid the bodice 3 times and with that and the dozens of layers in the immensely wide skirt – went overboard with the volume again – Saturday was gone.

On Sunday I tried out my brilliant idea of gradient dying the dress and failed even more brilliantly. I had bought the fabric in one of those dodgy fabric markets in China and had no idea of the fibres used, so in the end it did take colour and the gradient effect was quite successful. However, the result was disgustingly pastel and reminded me of some grandma’s petticoats. I might be able to save it with some edgy detailing in the future, but for now it’s out of the picture. I need to start over again.

I found another inspiration shortly after the first failure as I was browsing for that “edgy design” effect that could save the ghastly thing. It was Rorschach ink blot test. I loved idea of using those ink blots as avant-garde patterns in a gown, but that path led to failure again. I tried printing the silk first and then sewing, but keeping the pattern absolutely symmetrical with every pintuck proved quite challenging. Besides, the effect might have been too avant-garde for red carpet, as the stuff the stars wear in actually quite classic and boring – you don’t want to be taking too big risks on red carpet and end up on a worst-dressed-list. Then again, not taking risks in this competition and playing it safe and boring sounds like a design suicide to me.

I always struggle with the play-it-safe challenges. For example the first challenge - the inauguration gown. The etiquette is clear and frigid and I went by the book – and didn’t do so well. For the second challenge I cannot blame myself – that design is still my own personal favourite – it’s easy to lose when it's simply because others are just so much better as you don’t have to beat yourself for your mistakes. The fact is there will always be people better than you in something, so it’s useless to spend energy worrying about it. The challenges 3 and 4 were right up my alley: a change to go couture and avant-garde. The more there will be challenges saying we have to keep it casual and boring, the more I’ll struggle. I just hate doing stuff that’s average and normal – that’s the whole reason I stopped making human clothes. Even on their wedding gown people want to play it way too safe.

Besides, designing for dolls has several advantages: 1) They can wear anything and still look good, 2) You can buy the most outrageously expensive and glorious fabrics since you only have to buy so little, 3) In the tiny scale you can warp the laws of physics a bit, 4) They don’t feel pain or want to be comfortable (or able to more or breathe = definite downsides of humans), 5) When you sew the garment on them – as I mostly do – you can hold the model in your hand and turn it around instead of killing your knees crawling on the floor as you’d do with a human model. One of my favourite works in human scale was an evening gown made of exquisite red silk velvet with a plunging back so deep you could see the dimples of her butt. Naturally this fully open back meant no bra and the customer had a very full bosom that needed to get a push up effect from the mere draping of the dress as the neckline was rather generous as well. I must have spend weeks hand sewing – sculpting – that garment of her and we did it. No zips, clasps or other closure, no hidden padding or lingerie, the sculpted dress gave all the support needed and I still consider it one of my finest works.

But now I’m badly sidetracked again. Back to that rotten Sunday again. I made a basic bodice out of very stiff white silk dubioni and lined it with the same fabric. Its quite statuesque base for design and can support the front part well even with the rather low back. I avoided making it too corset like as I’ve used that favorite style or mine too much. I also made the waistline go around hips to give it different shape from my usual waistline. Then I just poured out everything in my fabric and ribbon stash and started trying out everything and anything. I didn’t know what sort of skirt I’d do or anything and I was starting to panic as the time was running out. My best friend is moving house and I promised to help on Wednesday, Friday and Sunday, I have school on Tuesday, My dad’s coming over on Wednesday and Thursday and a friends who lives in Germany now on Monday. I hope I can do the photo session on Saturday, but in order to do that I should have something to photograph as well.

Finally, I tumble across a little strip of fabric I got from that outrageously expensive up town boutique. They called it the vogue fabric, and it’s a exquisite quality silk with photograph quality prints of fashion magazine covers all over it in 6^th scale. It cost 250e per meter, so I simply couldn’t buy it, but there was this tiny strip lying around on the cutting table and I asked if I buy it – even that half a hankie cost me 10euros, but then again is it very weird fabric just screaming luxury. The tailor there was making a men’s vest out of it – that’s going to be such a statement. The fabric is very similar to the one used in the Miss Sixty Autumn/Winter 2009 collection, though these prints were in smaller scale and perfectly suited for 6^th scale dolls.

I know using huge patterns is a risk on the red carpet, but the colours and shine of the fabric has a very glamorous feel to it. I think the Miss Sixty dress using nothing but printed fabric was a bit much, so wanting to keep it elegant I only accented the white bodice with the print fabric allowing a half of white unprinted canvas to show and then letting the fashion magazine covers flow freely as an asymmetrical full skirt contrasting with a narrow white fishtail skirt on the other side. It seems this metamorphosis between things is becoming my signature thing along with the sculpted sewing style. I tried not to sculpt that much this time, but I did so-to-speak guide a few drapes on their way down the hips. Sorry, just couldn’t resist it. I did consider using ruched chiffons again, but then I remembered that guy on Project Runway who could do nothing but Creek gowns from challenge to challenge and I want to be no one trick pony. I’m happy to say that the gown looks new and classic at the same time. As I has to hand sew the printed silk on the bodice and the edge didn’t look crisp enough I decided the add a row of graphite grey 2mm satin finish sequins to add a little something to the dress. I could have used black sequins but somehow the graphite grey was softer and more suitable for the fashion printed theme.

During the week there more people were leaving the CDDC. I do respect their decision, but I was sad to see them go. However, I must agree that the competition takes its toll. It feels like a full time job to me and of course there is stress too. Because of the CDDC I haven't done any progress with my thesis, so I might not graduate this year after all. It’s not the end of the world as I can still send my final version to my professor from Tampere after we have moved, but I did promise myself and that’s bothering me a bit. Then again, in the CDDC I've learned that I work well under pressure and found ways to push myself towards inspiration when I'm stuck so I consider it far more important to my future career than an academic paper in Chinese guanxi networking. Master’s degree does give me a lots better salary as a teacher than Bachelor’s, so I will definitely finish what I started no matter what.

The week rolled by and friends and family came over. I sewed, ironed and attached sequins as I socialized; I took photos of the finished garment as my dad browsed thru the papers for next day’s meeting. On Wednesday evening Jing came to my place and we squeezed my dad for business advice. There are so many things to consider when starting a new business and so much work and research to do in order to make a solid business plan that we need to find financing.

And in the topic of financing my own is looking pretty bad. I forgot that I paid for my hubby’s air tickets to Paris with my visa card and the number of digits in the bill is a bit of a surprise.Ups.

Saturday the 14^th of November - Done

I had just submitted my pictures. I don’t think I had ever been so pressed for time as with this challenge and I still wasn’t satisfied with the results. Maybe I was becoming more demanding as the competition was growing tighter by each challenge; maybe I just hadn’t performed upto my own standards. Well, time would tell eventually was my gown good enough or not, but all I could do was hope. I loved the fabric and the silhouette was nice but was it glorious, divide, perfection? No. At least I was happy with the concept, though I wasn’t sure was I able to communicate it well enough in my description:

"My red carpet gown is a bold and modern statement in a form of a asymmetrical dress that wraps the model in extravagant silk patterned with vogue covers. The dress began with fully white bodice and a fishtail skirt that became partially consumed by the overload of fashion magazines. It symbolises a model as a tabula rasa for a designer, and the immense pressures for stars to make it to the best-dressed-lists and magazine covers. The edge between blank canvas and the print is edged with graphite grey sequins. The metallic grey accessory colour is repeated in the chain jewellery, simple yet elegant leather clutch and the soles of the white platform pumps. I'd like to see this dress on a fresh and brave young star such as Rhianna. My model is Model Behaviour Nadja by Integrity Toys."

Well, I just had to wait and see meanwhile preparing myself to the next challenge to come.

22^nd of November - the Scores are up

It’s midnight and I check my emails before going to bed. The winner has been announced and it’s Louos with that gorgeous red dress with Chinese embroidery. It was my favourite too and I’m so happy for him. I think he absolutely deserved to win, not only because he had the best design on this challenge, but also because it was his time to win. Louos does great designs that are always young and fresh, and it’s about time he got the spotlight. I came second with 3 points less, but I’m still in the lead with the overall points. Here are my scores and judge comments:

Shane: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 4 Construction: 4.5

This is one of those dresses that could put a celebrity in the best dressed category or the “what was she thinking?” category. You took a real risk here and from my point of view the gamble paid off. The dress flows beautifully and the print is fantastic.

Diana and Janet: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 4.5 Construction: 4.5

Diana:

Superb presentation and the designer's notes helped a lot to understand the depth of thought that went into this.

Janet:

I could see the work that went into that fitted bodice and the whole ensemble. And to make it detachable was an added plus. Interesting!

Judith: Theme: 5 Originality: 4.5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

Striking use of a very clever print! Excellent choice of colors for this doll. Extremely well thought out design for the Red Carpet!

Jim Faraone: Theme: 4 Originality: 4 Creativity: 4 Construction: 3

Fun fabric overlay

Total 72/80 Ranking 1^st in the overall competition, 2^ndin the challenge

I was so happy to finally impress Janet and Diana as it’s really hard to get good scores out of these two ladies. That felt more rewarding than actually winning. I was a little disappointed with the guest judge though, as he must have been too busy to put real effort into his comments to any of the contestants, but then again it could be just be that we were too spoiled by Rob who gave us his heart and soul in his commentaries. Jim Faraone really left me wandering where the 3 for construction came from. Anyway, in the whole the risk paid off – that print might have easily landed me in the worst dressers list but I was able to pull it off after all the setbacks and that’s priceless. I know I need to work hard on the next challenge in order to keep my lead, though.

CDDC Challenge Four - On the Fashion Edge

2009-11-07T03:43:00.000-08:00

19th of October – Challenge 4

The challenge 4 clue was delivered one day late due to internet trouble and now we have until 2nd of November to complete it. The next judge is Rob Thompson whose work I’m already familiar with from flickr and the challenge is:

On the Fashion Edge - This week's guest judge is an amazing doll artist. His OOAK creations are always on the cutting edge. This week you must create an avant garde casual outfit (no you don't have to use an Avant Guard doll). This outfit must be edgy...think Alexander McQueen.

Hmmm. “...think Alexander McQueen” This sounds like the best challenge for me up to date! Together with John Galliano Alexander McQueen is one of my favourite designers and as a tribute to these talented men I want to do something totally outrageous! Alexander McQueen is all about exaggerated form, unusual materials, pattern and texture, unbelievably artistic (and painful) shoes and weird head gear. I think I’ll be making a business suit that will attempt to corporate these attributes. Off to work it is then – but not before I’ve picked up some antibiotics for my cat Neru who’s quite ill.

I made two sketches and liked both. I think I’ll let the materials I find to dictate which one I’ll make. I think I’ll add both of them to the list of fashion I want to produce in my own fashion line in the future. I also instantly knew I wanted to use the new Elise Jolie as the model as she is very Alexanger McQueen type girl with her severe look and heavily sculpted features!

20th of October - Trouble with Fabrics
Tuesday. My only day of schools and my new official fabric shopping day. I leave home early so I can browse thru every fabric shop in town before my Cantonese lesson. First shop is a dead end, but from the second one I find amazingly thin and soft faux leather, golden fabric with 3mm sequins and some weird stretchy lace with printed patterns. None of them crucial for this challenge, but they could be useful later on so I byu some anyway.

The third shop I got to is the one that saved me the last time – maybe I should head here first from now on, but with these up town prices one does hope to find it elsewhere. The challenge 3 materials cost me around 100 euros since in this boutique some fabrics cost 1800euros per meter! Not the ones I’m using though, but the fact is I need to start selling my works to be able to afford to continue in this competition.

I buy 15cm of burgundy raw silk and am happy to see the nice seller gives me 7cm extra due to an imperfection in the fabric, then finest silk chiffons in burgundy and dusty teal. On my way out I fall in love with a patterned silk in the same colour scheme and even though it wasn’t a part of the plan, I simply have to take it too and make some redesigning to fit it in. I decide to change the skirt a bit and make a tulip skirt to cover the original idea of ruffles skirt.

All fabrics bought and I’m still early for my lesson in Cantonese which is good since I haven’t done my homework again and I really need to prepare to chapter in advance. The course is taught in Mandarin Chinese, as the teacher doesn't speak any Finnish or English really, and the book is meant for native Chinese learning Cantonese. This meaning no English and that in the 3rd chapter of the book today we are already discussing establishing different types of bank accounts, what interest rates they have annually and so forth. To quote my British friend: “It’s a bid of a kerfuffle really.”

In the evening at home I do some more sketching and start to dread I’m playing it too safe again. I wanted to do something brave and outrageous, but instead it feel simply classic and boring. In the end, I’d rather be punished for going too avant garde than doing well by making it conventional and boring. I thrive to create something new - even though I do know there is nothing new under the sun. Rob, our guest judge for this time, gave a lot of emphasis to the edgy side of this competition. He asked us to watch Alexander McQueen’s Autumn 2009 the Horn of Plenty show as a inspiration.

The Horn of Plenty is one of my all time favourite fashion shows, but I didn't mind seeing it once more. Besides, I've only seen it before as a slide-show and watching the show on video was awesome. I got more motivated to push myself further again. I did watch Spring 2010 show as well and those hoof like armadillo shoes simply blew me away. There were two words in my mind: constraint and exaggeration. Many Alexander McQueen’s clothes are like straitjackets on runway forcing the model to move in a peculiar, bound way and I wanted to incorporate that in my outfit too. Then again, when you look at the McQueen clothes in a store without the runway styling, they are quite wearable after all. So, just like with the warrior woman design from last challenge, I wanted to make the accessories bounding – almost bondagelike – and the fashion itself wearable and more commercial.

So I made leather gloves that morph into a purse that is chained to high leather collar, together giving the effect of shackles – either it’ll be a huge flop or some American designer with no regard to copyrights (they have no legislation to protect intellectual property in States - can you believe that?!) will rip me off and make huge money with it! LOL. I think the accessory set has a nice fetish feel to it.

For footwear I designed a hybrid between the controversial Nina Ricci shoes that caused a turmoil at the Olivier Theyskens Autumn 2009 show (might I add I’d never wear those but I love them no matter what other people say) vs John Nouanesing’s bloody table combining them into a kinky shoe made of blood – it is Halloween when we submit this challenge in after all. ;)

Before I start sewing I make the staining test to all the fabrics I’m about to use. I sculpted two pairs of blood shoes out of two component epoxy putty (I also sculpted my thumb so the blood shoe is quite a fitting title for the project), one set of soles for sandals and another over a pair of discarded FR boots that I shortened and took apart. Under the platform there is a pool of “blood” (just paint at this point) that provides balance and instead of heels there will only be drops of blood about to fall. The painting takes time as the shoes need dozens of layers of thin acrylic paint for the blood effect. While waiting for the layers of paint to dry, I make the shackle purse out of the soft faux leather I found yesterday. It worked out quite nicely and has a very kinky feel to it.

To make a stain test at home:
- Cut strips of fabric and tie them around expendable barbie's leg
- Pour boiling water over it
- Let it dry over night
- Check for stains

The staining test is ready, but one of the fabrics has stained badly – it’s the burgundy raw silk I need for the jacket and quite crucial for my design. Usually I would just swap fabrics at this point, but I don’t have time to hunt for a new fabric or redesign my fashion so I resort to the almost as bothersome process of sealing the colour. The process goes:
- Wash the cloth 3 times with bleaching washing solution in really hot water.
- Then rinse it in the shower with in turns with hot and cold water for 15 minutes or so.
- Let is soak in vinegar over night
- Iron it while its still a bit moist
- Repeat the staining test and hope for the best - this time it worked.
This treatment should stop the staining, but it it does take away lots of the fabrics colour as well. So instead of burgundy jacket mine became closer to brick red, but at least my doll is safe from staining.

A pool of BLOOOOOOD...

Muahhhahhaaa.

Happy Halloween!

(Just the anti-staining treatment

- don't worry, I didn't get this desperate.)

Meanwhile I make stockings out of the green siphon and another pair for Antoinette from the weird lace I bought as an impulse purchase. The stocking lead me to design another outfit for Antoinette using the faux leather and to ponder which one should I use for the challenge. Maybe the Antoinette one is too basic and simple: just a sort of a leather qipao with a corset belt and motorcycle padded shoulders. I suppose I’ll just make a few of them for sale after the challenge 3 scores are up. I know I'll be needing the cash with Neru's veterinary bills piling up on my desk.

24th of October - Done!

I can’t believe it. The challenge 3 scores haven’t even been posted yet and I’m done with my challenge 4. I finished the garment yesterday and took the photos and submitted them today. Done. Weird. I just wonder if my design is too tame – or too kinky. LOL. Well, I suppose there’s no use to ponder about it as it’s submitted already. Now I can hopefully just concentrate on my thesis. It’s not like I want to, I’m totally bored with the topic at the moment, but I suppose I have no choice – I did promise myself to finish it before x-mas. Graduating would be kind of nice if I plan to move to another city and this current situation where my spouse works in another city and I study in another sucks big time. So, like it or not, I’ll have to start reading thru a pile of cripplingly boring books while I wait for the challenge 3 results.

Note: I never got to my thesis as Neru's state started to decline rapidly leading him to be hospitalised and me too emotionally devastated to do anything but cry and worry.

7th of November – The Scores

Exceptionally the scores came one day early on Saturday morning and I woke up to find an email announcing the winner – me! I was so surprised my first reaction was to got to the site and check the scores as I really though it must have been a mistake. Maybe it was the last challenge winning email that had just got into a loop in the system or a prank or something. But there it was on black and white: I had won. Again. A little squeal escaped me. And another. I just can’t believe it. I send SMS to my family as it was rather too early to call them on Saturday morning and kept squealing all thru the phone calls that I got in return.

It was not only that everyone had done so amazingly well on this challenge (there were plenty of designs I had picked the winner before my own) but also, that for the first time, I had been second guessing my design up until the last moment of submission time. I had had several inspirations and also almost finished another design for Antoinette – only the shoes were still in progress because of the severe illness my baby cat Neru had gone thru during these stressful and exhausting week. However, I will not go into the details here and now as I don’t wish to relive those moments ever again. But, for all those who have been there for me and worried about him with me all those days I’m happy to tell Neru is quite healthy now and is playing along with other with his usual vigor.

But to get back to the point, here are my scores and judge comments for challenge 4:

Shane: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5
Absolutely wonderful interpretation of the theme. Your colors and your lines are fantastic! This is an amazing look!

Diana & Janet: Theme: 4.5 Originality: 4.5 Creativity: 4 Construction: 4.5
Diana: So much thought went into every element of this. I was particularly taken with the details, such as the shoes (and soles!) and the shackled aspect of the purse. Woo hoo!
Janet: Bravo on the jacket. It is both tailored and sculpted. A little goth for me, but that theme is carried in three different places, so I like the consistency.

Judith: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 4.5 Construction: 5
Where do I start? Love the caramels, the rustiness, the richness and the boldness of this design. The blood heels are frighteningly captivating, her tailored jacket is beautiful, leather accessories are fabulous, very defiant, punk, edgy, the hat adds the perfect touch of elegance and sophistication.

Rob: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5
Fantastic use of form and function! I love the structure of the jacket, with the hidden volume of the ruffles of the skirt. This fashion feels more like it was sculpted than sewn; a fabulous use of skills for each fabric. The accessories are not only well thought out, but scream Avant Garde with the fashion forward edge that I have been looking for in this challenge. I am not a big fan of fall colors, I prefer bold bright colors, but everything works so well in this fashion. I love the use of the various textures playing against each other, and the shoes are extremely runway! Well done, I am impressed. I would buy this fashion in a heartbeat.

Total: 77/80 Ranking 1st

To be honest I’d never do this well nor would be able to exceed myself with these designs without the other designers in this competition. It is the constant thriving to keep up with these amazingly talented designers that keeps me going. Thanks to all of you and all those who are rooting for me! Couldn’t do it without you!

Featured article in the CDDC post

2009-10-27T15:03:00.000-07:00

The CDDC blogmeister just wrote an article featuring me as the winner of the challenge #3. I was blushing so hard with all the praise as I was reading it I was sure I'd just compulsively combust! I'm really honoured and flattered and everything, but for the first time in my life I feel like a proper Finn and Finns mainly get embarrassed if complimented. I know it must sound pretty ridiculous, but it's a culture thing. For us small talk means complaining about the little things in life just as the British talk about weather. Praise is easy to take in Asian cultures: in Japan you simply deny it and apologise; in China you say "nalinali" which literally translates as "Where? Where?". Maybe that's why I've always felt at home in Asia. If you compliment a Finn about their outfit, they are taught from childhood that the proper reaction is to say "Thanks. Oh, this old thing? I've had it for years! Its so dirty and all..." and so forth. We find the benauty in modesty. So in short, I really don't know what to say, but thank you. Thank you so much. *blush*

I bet I'm going to bore and disappoint everyone with my next entry, as I did have my own doubts about it and finished it in a rush hoping to work on my thesis. Well, it was good that I finished early this time around as otherwise I wouldn't have finished at all with Neru's severe illness. But for what its worth the horrible ordeal with my baby cat seems to be taking a positive turn - I hope it lasts. And the thesis will have to wait.

CDDC Challenge Three - The Epitome of Perfect Embellishments

2009-10-25T07:40:00.001-07:00

Challenge 3
Embellished - Our guest judge this week is known for her fabulous embellishments. Use your creative skills to create an outfit that is the epitome of perfect embellishment.

Guest Judge: Magalie Dawson

Embellishments. This seems like a change to go all out Haute Couture. It’s the intricate detailing that has always captivated me in fashion and costume design. I think it was seeing the Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula with Eiko Ishioka’s unbelievable costumes that awoke the passion in me in first place. I wan to make something very couture as a tribute to her strange and inspiring work, but I don’t know if have the minerals for it – if you what I mean. Anyway, now I need to go and buy some groceries and bake a cake as thanks to my cat babysitter. Let’s see what my mind can conjure and if my hands can keep up!

Sunday 4th of October - Preparations

When I think of embroidery, beading, sequins, draping, ruching and other embellishments the first thing in my mind is that 6^th scale is a big handicap. It’s time to make my first fashion for a 16” doll and luckily I have the freshly resculpted and repainted Tonner's Antoinette waiting. This will be a good test of my style’s recognisability as no one really knows I have an Antoinette. Normally, I get several emails from my friends and acquaintances writing “I know which one is yours!” which is always loads of fun but I do want to know if it's my dolls or fashion design they recognise.

Luckily, I had ordered a pile of sequins when I first heard I got accepted to this competition which is crucial as the time will be real tight with this challenge and there’d be no way I could place an order now and wait until they’d arrive. Embellishment is all work made by hand and will take ages to do – especially the megalomaniac flashes that keep brandishing my head with ideas and you can’t buy anything in this scale from Finland.

Monday 5^thof October - Design Work

Since I have a limited supply of sequins – and I really want to test them out for the first time – and this small size cannot be bought anywhere in Finland I need to work with what I got. I have two sets of sequins: 2mm satin tones of light and dark ecru, chocolate brown and black; 3mm iridescent tones of dark brown and chocolate – or that’s what it says on the package – I’d call these gold and burgundy with weird brown and purple tones. I also have some beads to match the later. I spend the day trying to find fabrics to inspire me and end up rearranging and cleaning up my whole fabrics stash. Finally the inspiration comes, but I don't have the fabrics to fulfil my vision of intermixed flowing colours. I find yellow and red and brown silk dubioni that might work, but I feel more like silk chiffons and I don’t have any nice colours (only black, white, grey, green, dark blue and brown - LOL). No choice. I have to go to a fabric store tomorrow.

I make drawings of an evening gown inspired by the legend of the fierce Amazon warrior women who cut off one breast to improve their archery. I wanted to contrast draped silk chiffon with armoury like sequin embellishments playing with the contrast of soft sheer and hard scaly texture. I also need to make the shoes as I've promised myself when I bought Antoinette that I'll never buy anything for her and will sell all I'll make for her too. I can't afford to start collecting 16" dolls as well! So, I design a pair of high heel gladiator sandals matched with an ornamental bow instead of a purse and a selection of exotic golden jewellery. I have one piece of broken golden coloured jewellery that I use for making a half mask to cover the dolls lower face. I think it gives a nice feeling of mystery and sort bondage flavour too. Its like she is an wild animal ready to jump and that muzzle is the only thing holding her down.

Tuesday 6^th of October – Fabric Hunting
I rummage every fabric store and boutique in town – in vain. They have nothing. Nothing what so ever. I’m thinking of dying the fabric myself, but then again that will always take trial and error and I simply don’t have the time. Two weeks is a short time to work with sequins and my inspiration is yet to come. This feels like the hardest challenge for me so far, but first things first: my friend has a birthday on 10^th and I need to make her a present. I gather up a cute little travelling set with theme colours for her Momoko using my newly arrived re-ments and some OOAK fashions I’ve made earlier. She just came back from her anniversary honeymoon so now her Momoko can do the same!

Wednesday 7^th of October – Sewing
My day off. Off anything else. I spend the whole day from 9a.m. until midnight working on the challenge and all I have to show for it is a base for bodice and the jewellery. As for the Amazon warrior women of course I wouldn’t go mutilating my dolls and cutting one of her breasts of, but I make the cut symbolic – the armouryjewellery like corset bodice leaves the right breast unprotected. I decide to censor the nipple with golden hoping no one will get any Janet Jackson associations. Took me whole day just to make the bodice as I had to make real boning to support the sheer fabric. My cat Neru was "helping" me whole day too trying to confiscate my arm and by being awfully interested in all my fabrics and yarns all the time. He's being a real bother but love him like his my baby. Now all I need is the skirt, shoes and embellishment. Piece of cake, right – I’m in deep trouble with this one... Tomorrow I really need to go to the library and work on my neglected thesis.

Next Days

The following days are a nightmarish pool of back pains, sequins and draping. I did make it in time – I heard that some of us didn’t. I neglected this diary working with the challenge with all I got. Well, not all as I was too worried about my little boy Neru who has fallen ill. One day spend in the vets office, x-rays and ultra sound shows he has urinary infection and bladder stones are beginning to form. This means new and expensive veterinary diet, weekly urine sample (that he luckily allows me to take – there’d be no change with my traumatized little girls as they are from a homeless animal shelter and are yet to trust people) and a twice a day medication of antibiotics and painkillers that Neru swallows, but is growing impatient to take. I’m so worried. I couldn’t imagine my life without him.

I’m sorry I didn’t keep a project diary this time, but I did take photos of the making of the gown so please see the set in my flickr instead. I will try and add some descriptions there later on.

Thursday 15^th of October - Photos
I submit my photos hoping the risk will pay off and that judges won’t find my design too costumey. I’m rather happy with the result although I have very little recollection of the days that brought me here. I completed the gown I made with very weird and constraining jewellery that on my opinion creates an air of harnessing the raw power it gown bears. I made a pair of high heel gladiator sandals and matched them with a golden ornamental bow instead of a purse. The left shoulder covered with a removable piece of beaded and sequinned netting in a form of a plate mail. I want to give the future buyer the choice of seeing the design either as a daring evening gown or all out couture so all the armoury pieces can be stripped down from it – the shoulder plate can actually be used as hat instead, hopefully with some other outfit, though. Now we just wait for the results and the 4^th challenge.

25^th of October – Victory and Late Night Medical Emergency

It’ s 3 a.m. and I wake up to Neru’s panicky cries. He’s vomiting white and scentless foam in the living room. I stay with him all night, not sleeping, worried sick. The veterinarian emergency clinic in my town isn’t responding to my calls. The vomiting and coughing continues and I give Neru some paraffin oil. He vomits a huge hairball, more like a plug, the size of my thumb. I think it’s over, cat’s have hairballs even if my cats have never had them. Must be the new diet they have because of Neru’s urinary infection. I nap with Neru a little on the living room floor before the sunrise.

Morning. Well, its 6 a.m. anyway. I give the cats their morning food and go to bed hoping to get some real sleep – its Sunday after all. I have just closed my eyes when I hear the coughing sound again. I rush to the kitchen and Neru is vomiting the milky stuff again. I call the animal ER again – no reply. The recording says they answer phone 24 hours a day. Obviously they don’t since the recording is on. What a stupid message to play in your machine. I spend hours reading chat pages and veterinarian magazines about the symptoms, but I’m interrupted by a rustling sound. Neru is eating a plastic bag and there is more vomit. I study the stuff and find fine shreds of plastic in it. Has he eaten a foreign object? Hairballs shouldn’t be life threatening but piece of plastic stuck in your gut is. Another thought creeps to my head. Neru has been under severe medication for the past week, could his liver or kidneys be failing? Vomiting milky stuff is one of the symptoms and my friend’s cat died like that few years ago. Time to panic. I call again. No reply. I find the animal ER in next town and call them and finally there is an answer. Embarrassed I call my neighbour if her husband could drive us there. It’s a long ride but he will me and promises to pick me up too. I’m in tears with worry, apologise for ruining their Sunday morning and thank him. There should be a word for both apology and thanks combined in Finnish language but there isn’t. Japanese know better: Sumimasen.

It’s 2 p.m. We are back home and Neru is still alive. Not sure if I am after the vet’s bill with Sunday rates, but what would you not do for your kids, right. The bloodworks found nothing so it isn’t organ failure, most likely its digestive but I can’t tell what yet. I’ll go to my own vet on Monday. The diet he’s on is making it worse – the poor thing has lost 600g within one week and that’s quite concerning pace for a cat. Anyhow, he’s ok for now and that’s most important.

My hubby’s in Paris with his school right now and I cannot call him, so I go to my computer to write him and email. And what I find? The “We Have a Winner” email declaring I’ve won the challenge 3! I’m stunned. I cannot believe it. Sure I was happy with my design but a winner. Wow. And I’m ranking the first in the whole competition as well - with only a half a point away from brilliant Lori, but it does feel amazing. For the first time I’m thinking maybe I could win the competition, but that’s not what this is about al all. This challenge has taught me so much about sewing (it was my first time using sequins), design and myself, that first of all I must be thankful for that, though I cannot deny how good it feels to win and get recognition for my work. It really made my day and it truly needed making. Thanks you so much!

And here are my scores and judge comments:

Shane: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

Wow! Gorgeous work. Your fashion is beautiful and disturbing at the same time. Your interpretation of an Amazon warrior is fantastic! I believe I am jealous of the ruching and gathering work that you have done on the back of the dress.

Diana and Janet: Theme: 4.5 Originality: 4 Creativity: 3.5 Construction: 4

Diana: High fantasy is well presented. The mask is an artistic touch that took me by surprise.

Janet: I can see the difficult challenge in the sheer corset. The embellishments are effective.

Judith: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

Amazing design showing wonderful originality and workmanship. Beautiful color palette. Definitely an Amazonian flavor very cleverly constructed as elegant and flowing.

Magalie Dawson: Theme: 5 Originality: 5 Creativity: 5 Construction: 5

You should make a print of the first photograph and frame it! One of the most skillful way to embellish is to be able to "sculpt" the fabric, and you mastered it with the chiffon. It is also very skillful to be able to create a costume that allows the breast to be revealed and still be viewed as an expression of art, such as you did. The construction is impeccable, I love the sheer bustier with the "boning", the fit is perfect, and the draping falls perfectly. I love the necklace and the face mask is a dramatic addition that works well with the rest. You have created a museum quality piece, Bravo!

Total: 76/80 Ranking 1^st

You'll find the process pictures in my flickr set!

Happyyyy!!!