Dear Weddings (Dresses 196-205)

Dear Weddings (Day 160),
You make people all excited and festive and optimistic. I like that, even if I find the institution a little sillygoose... Most of today’s dresses inspired by the woman on my tram who was all dolled up to go to a spring day wedding.

Dress I: Wedding Dress: silk dress with painted silk feathers)

Dress II: Bridesmaid’s Dress: comfortable cotton with a silk overlay, painted on the stomach region, petals and the central section of the flower then cut out of the dress and arranged as a corsage/hair ornament.

Dress III: Flower Girl Dress: a photographic print of petals being thrown in the air, with some already falling and a border of petals.

Dress IV: To wear to a wedding in winter: silk ‘paragliding’ sail as headband/hood with silver chain and silver bird on a black matte silk dress.

Dress V: To wear to a wedding in Autumn: Tiny panels of grey slate over a lighter grey dress with architectural grey ‘gutter’ (lace)

Dress VI: To wear to a wedding in Winter: Woolen dress with 2D scarf

Dress VII: fringing over mesh on the neck, waist and hem.

Dress VIII: Indian fabric under an elastic corset.

Dress IX: To wear to a wedding in Spring: black ribbon outline hand-painted filling on matte silk.

Dress X: perforated ‘stamp’ hem with ‘wing’ collar and buttons to below the waist.

All my love,
Ip.

Dear Caulfield Op-Shop (Dress 170)

Dear Caulfield Op-Shop,

I found a cape in your dusty innards. Looking for shoes I found her, hanging amongst drab coats and pilled bed-jackets. Long and woollen, and fire-engine red. There’s a faded circle on the left breast. Turns out you’re not just gorgeous and warm- you’re a part of history, a relic from WW2, when nurses wore red capes. I cut you down 13” before I knew. I’m going to use your excess to make a hood, and now you’ve got pockets, and you’ll get arm-holes soon.

I get the feeling I’m going to wear you for a long time.

Here was one hypothesis as to the alterations:

All my love,
IP

Dear Safta Shula (Dress 163)

Dear Safta,

You're getting bck into knitting, which is good because it means that even though tit's winter your arthritis is not being too harsh. Rather a surprise 'since you had to quit the knittety knit several years ago beause of the aforementioned joint pain.

Anyway, I've seen knitting needles made into necklaces, bracelets, brooches and rings, but never into clothes. There's always a way!\

All my love,
IP

To Sir Duncan Campbell, Bart Esq. (C/O Henry Raeburn, Australian National Gallery.) (Dress 64)

To Sir Duncan Campbell, Bart Esq.

you cut a dashing figure in your military regalia, a style which I feel has been (in my personal opinion, alledgedly, with all due respect) tainted by the late M.Jackson. I say we bring back the fresh tomato red, mustard yellow and charcoal combination! Gold buttons FTW.

I'd like to take a moment to mention the gorgeous frame on this- I'd love to do some architectural work to create that kind of impression in upholstry fabric...

Dress Specs: Gold braid, red wool on yellow cotton, and black cotton.

All my love,

Dear Winter, (Dress 59)

Dear Winter (well aware that it is still technically Autumn, but the weather says otherwise.)
You're the only reliable season in Melbourne. You're rainy and freezing and drizzly and haily and all sorts of damp and cold but at least I know that when I leave the house wearing a scarf and a wooly jumper I won't have to carry them around all day while passing out from dehydration...
What I'm saying is that consistancy is key. And that when people know that they can shake out the mothballs and go all out with winter clothing they really go for it and the results are lovely.
Today I saw a split-zipped hoody on the bus: if: then: therefore:

(Black wool blend with a rose-tinted cotton lined hood. zip up the back,)

All my love,

Dear Hyperskinny Co-Commuter (Dress 55)

Dear Hyperskinny Co-Commuter,
You were painfully thin, dressed in the fashion of the waif. It made me hungry just looking at you- I know that underneath that stupidly trendy french-stripe shirt, your ribs are visible. Thinking about that trend, of heroin-chic, the culture of terrible posture and pasty skin, I wanted to design a dress that somehow held your shoulders back- what a waste of all those centimetres when you hunch like that. There's a bit of an old halloween costume idea I had back in 2007 (a clear acetate capelet (double layered) with plastic tubing in the sillhouette of the arteries and capilleries in the lungs, over a skeleton suit).

(Dress Specs: blended wool- the shoulder sections are reinforced.)
All my love,

Dear High School,

Dear High School,
It's getting to that time of year when (at my old high school) we used to hotly anticipate the end-of term; seeing as Melbourne gets goshdarned cold around now. We used to have our knees nocking in those silly cotton shifts they made us wear, and waiting for the day when we could turn over our uniforms to the loveliness of pleated winter. Whilst there isn't much love in my heart for the silliness of christmas-coloured-skirts; there is particular fodness left for pleating. I think evenly-spaced pleats is wasting their potential.

(Dress specs: Cotton-Wool blend, with each pleat sprayed with a light edging in grey to give them extra definition.)

All my love,