Appropriated Edge

Sorry for the forum hogging. I’m ill and with time on my hands this weekend and I’m enjoying catching up with you all.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the relationship between my shopping habits and how it relates to my personal style. This probably sounds like a no-brainer, but in the two years I’ve been a participant on this forum I’ve come to think that the relationship between the two is far more complex than I might have guessed.

In her book “I <3 your style” Amanda Brooks says something to the effect that behind every well-dressed woman there are some seriously smart shopping strategies. This observation rang very true to me, and I’ve been examining my own habits ever since.

Science has proven that shopping is addictive. This is not news and it’s a hazard that everyone who enjoys clothing will recognise. I’m no more immune than anyone else, and while I adore shopping as part of my lifelong passion for all things sartorial, I need to stay aware of its pitfalls.

Viva started a great thread about this a while back, and I posted a rundown of how I deal with it. There are two points here in particular that I think have influenced my shopping behaviour more than anything else, and they are a) raising the bar by dressing well every day, and b) stalking high ticket items. I was completely unsurprised that Viva and Lisap immediately picked up on these as useful tips because they work incredibly well.

This is only part of a bigger picture though.

I see my clothes as an extension of myself, a form of non-verbal communication with the outside world if you like. But I also have a strong emotional connection with what I wear and the retail transaction is part of that. Furthermore, and I know this sounds like whimsy, I like it when the things I use have a story of their own, and don’t feel like an anonymous industrial product. This is kind of absurd, because most clothing nowadays is exactly that, and there’s not much wrong with that. I just love it when it isn’t.

A lot of this comes from a lifetime of shopping vintage and making things for myself. But I realised the other day that so much of what I put on or otherwise keep about me are those kinds of things. More or less everything I reach for, those things that put me in that happy space, are exactly that. This is why I love unique pieces from tiny ateliers and why I can’t resist a bench made shoe for example. But it also leads me to hunt down shops where I can buy from people who share my enthusiasm, with some knowledge about the product they are selling. I’m fortunate to live in a city with a number of retailers like this, but they are few and far between.

The funny thing is that with regard to how I look, this is very much a chicken and egg situation. I used to think my shopping habits reflected my personal style, but now I’m starting to think it’s the other way around. Now I’m wondering how I’d look if I eliminated this emotional component and shopped differently.

What about you guys? How do your shopping habits influence your look? Would you do it any other way and how would you look if you did?

Don’t try this at home. Seriously, don’t. That is, unless you have an unhealthy interest in pants, or your idea of a good time is stabbing yourself repeatedly with pins. I’m at the end of my rope.

I’ve come to the conclusion that tailoring is like sausages. Everyone loves it, but nobody really wants to know how it’s made. If you’ve ever made your own sausages, you’ll know exactly what I mean. Nonetheless, you were all perfectly happy to push me into this so now you get to see what’s inside my own personal circle of Hell.  

I kid. This has been a fascinating project where I’ve pushed my knowledge of pattern cutting to the limits and advanced my tailoring skills. I’m considering adding trouser sculpture and pants origami to the interests section of my dilettante CV. And most importantly, I’m well on the way to some seriously excellent trews.

Here’s the thing though. Pants are notoriously difficult to get right. They have to fit, drape and move gracefully, so the only way to work them is on the wearer. And since the wearer is me and these pants are all about the rear view, that means I have to fit them using two large mirrors and a lot of selfies. You get the idea.

It’s all about rapid prototyping and iteration. Modify, test, modify again. The nice thing about working like this is that very occasionally it leads through some blinding complexity to a solution so elegant it feels like it was there all the time waiting to be teased out, leaving you wondering why you didn’t see it before. Not that it would be obvious, far from it, because that kind of simplicity is almost never easy.

There’s still work to do here but I feel like I’m in the home straight at last. The end result needs no cuts to the fabric and sticks very closely to the original seams, so in theory they could be restored to their former grandpa pants glory if I ever felt the urge. I know this isn’t a sewing community per se, but for anyone who’s interested, I’ve included a draft of the pattern blocks and approximate alterations, which I’ve been working on so I can see what I’m doing from the inside out, so to speak.

Here’s a rundown of the process.

1. My first move was to fit the waistline. I set a concealed tuck behind the fly to achieve the fit while preserving the drape. This creates a staggered waistband which I actually find more flattering than the original high waist.

2. I then set the back tuck, which had to be balanced with a dart into the front section. This should have been a clue as to how difficult the rest was going to be.

3. I ran into serious trouble trying to tailor the legs themselves. My original plan was to reduce the length with horizontal seams and adjust the profile at the side seams. This draped like cardboard and created yet more bulk which had to be balanced.

4. I then hit on the scheme of twisting the leg around a diagonal seam, which made some kind of sense when I thought about it. It followed the natural drape at the knee and pushed the shape towards a contemporary boot cut. The problem was that it didn’t fit together at all.

5. I fixed this with a tuck from the back of the hip to the inseam above the knee to reverse the twist, and narrowed the leg to the straight grain, eliminating the taper, reducing the dogleg in the side seam and straightening the leg. I quite liked this, the drape was behaving and everything fitted, so I marked it out with tailor tacks thinking I’d do the same on the other leg.

6. In the pictures, the right leg is closer to a straight boot cut. I don’t think these pants were ever meant to be straight though. These are the old fashioned tapered bags your (great)grandfather used to wear and I think I want to keep them that way. Moving on to the left side, I went back to the original side seams and used the tucks alone to correct the twist, which was far harder to achieve on a tapered leg than a straight leg. This produced a larger dogleg in the side seam, a motif I repeated by lapping the side seam in the tuck at the hip.

7. A question on the length: at the moment, one leg is a little longer than the other. The longer delivers PPL, but it breaks ever so slightly. The shorter looks a little awkward but it drapes without breaking and shows off the shaped cuff. It was originally tailored for someone with far larger feet than mine and it looks a little odd even with my chunky shoes, but I’m inclined to shoot for the shorter length to preserve the drape. I need to see how this plays out on the next pass, but what do you think?

I had to part company with my prospective business partner. All perfectly amicable, but it wasn’t working out. Some good work came out of the process, and a few new ideas presented themselves, but once again I’m left wondering what to do with my life. A trip to the salon and a little retail therapy didn’t fix anything, but it definitely made me feel better.

The change in the season comes as a respite, a welcome relief from the late summer heat. Suddenly the weather is so much cooler and I can break out the winter wardrobe. I’ve sometimes found the transitional season hard to manage but this year I arrived with a plan. I’ve been steadily building a capsule of black and white as core neutrals and I’d been on the hunt for an oversized white sweatshirt for a little while, a team player to style with jeans or a skirt, and of course the fur wrap, which I’ve been reaching for repeatedly lately.

This little number appeared at the Amsterdam Fashion Institute shop and I fell for it instantly. Their Individuals collection is a series of small runs designed by the students and it changes very rapidly. I rarely buy anything there but I always make a point of checking them out so I can see what the newest talents are doing. Unfortunately, there’s no way of knowing who designed what. This is a pity, because whoever came up with this masterpiece of ingenious draping surely has a bright future ahead of them. I think it will be a key player this season, if I can resist the temptation to unfasten the knots to see what shape it is underneath.

As for the haircut, Angie tactfully asks the other day if I was growing it out, and I was inspired to reevaluate. I’d enjoyed the contrast between the dyed crown and the natural undercut, and I wanted to try something with a bit more body that played better with my specs, which have become a permanent feature in my style. I brought the challenge to my regular hairdresser.

I’ve been visiting the same stylist for many years and we have a good relationship. We met for the first time around 2000, when I needed a trim and randomly walked into a salon where he was renting a chair. I walked out with the best cut and colour I’d ever had and he’s been cutting my hair ever since. In the meantime, he’s opened two salons and built a successful practice at the local television studios. He’s an excellent hairdresser, a talented businessman and a great friend.

Few of his clients are willing to experiment, so he likes to push the boundaries when I’m in his chair. And I trust him. This week he worked together with one of his juniors, another colour enthusiast, to craft a winter look which evoked the ombre effect of the grown-out roots, tinted to harmonise with the natural ash brown. They agreed on purple and went to work. I’m as delighted as ever with the result, although I may ask for a shorter fringe next time.

Oh, and would you believe my sister found me the perfect lipstick? It’s Velvet Rope Brat Pack, a luscious true red by Lipstick Queen. It feels delicious and stays on for hours, but I’m still amazed that she picked out just the right colour. She always gives the best gifts. I have to find something really special for her at Christmas.

Last week I bought a lovely pair of vintage trousers and challenged myself to make them fit me. You all very kindly encouraged me to overcome my doubts about butchering a piece of museum-quality tailoring and press on.

To be fair, nobody could tell at the time exactly what I was up against, least of all me. The pants were huge, at least three sizes too big and a full six inches too long. I’m no stranger to a slouchy trouser, but these were clownish even by my standards and I was by no means sure I could pull it off. I spent far too much time over the weekend looking at avant garde menswear on Farfetch and wondering What Would Yamamoto Do?

Still, the fabric is a pleasure to work with, very supple and with lots of body so it holds its shape beautifully. The down side is that every fold and tuck has to drape perfectly. I’ve been trying to channel Yohji-san in the hope that the master would look over my shoulder, give me the nod and perhaps guide my hand once in a while. After much trial and error I think I’m finally on track to a wearable garment. Who knows, maybe he’d even approve this alteration.

In the interests of full disclosure, here are a few before and after pics, along with some nerdy tailoring details. It still needs tweaking but I’m pretty sure I can get this to work.

• I want to preserve the original tailoring so the only cuts I’ve made are to the leg seams, where I’ve put deep tucks front and back. This instead of hemming so as to keep the original cuff, which I will line with contrasting fabric so I can turn them up.
• I shaped the legs by making the inseam a little shorter than the outside seam, giving a more contemporary silhouette and making said turn-ups behave themselves better.
• Too much alteration to the crotch looks like a bad fit, so I’ve taken out little more than an inch there and done the rest with a couple of darts across the back, making the deep rise look intentional. The tucks on the back leg help control this somewhat and there’s a trick or two I have yet to try on the inside to make the seat drape nicely.

All needs yet more tailoring but I’m quite satisfied with the result so far. I think these are going to be workhorses in the winter season.

I've just found these amazing vintage men's dress pants in a thrift store for the price of a sandwich. No tailor's mark but definitely bespoke, possibly Weimar era German. Gorgeous fabric, unbelievable finish and fabulous condition for their age. These are pants for a very big man, in every sense of the word.

I could probably sell them on for ten times what I paid for them but I'm contemplating remodelling them. These are the sort of pants I want to wear all the time but can never find (huh?! what about the three pairs of black slouchy tailored pants already in my closet?!)  *ahem* Well, almost never.

I've pinned them up in the picture to show what I have in mind. It involves moving a few buttons to fit the waist, reshaping the legs slightly and sewing a seam at knee level, although I'd probably go shorter than this. It's not intrusive, it preserves the tailoring detail, but actually, it feels like butchery.

Alternatively, I could keep them around as an inspiration piece. Or I could make my friendly neighbourhood vintage dealer very happy. 

What do you think? Alter? Conserve? Pass on?

ETA: a few additional pictures of these awesome pants. Still not sure I've done them justice. 

Designer Norah Turncote is the anti-Angie for the YLF generation, with three decades as a dilettante technologist behind her. Now she’s turned her attention to clothing. Tousled and Windswept Magazine caught up with her in her factory space behind the KwikFit garage, where she is reimagining fashion as post-industrial folk-art.

T&W: Describe your look.

NT: I call this one “Hyperactive Preteen with Issues”.

T&W: How do you get dressed in the morning?

NT: I run through my wardrobe backwards grabbing as many things as I can and put them on upside down.

T&W: Like that jacket?

NT: Yes. I made this out of some scrap fabric a friend was using as an occasional tablecloth. I could wear it the right way up but you wouldn’t see the zipper on this strangely bifurcated shirtdress, and that’s no fun at all.

T&W: Is this what it means to be the anti-Angie?

NT: Exactly. She’s very polished, you see. Always fabulously turned out and appropriate for the occasion. And I’m not just rough around the edges, I’m rough from the inside out. A total hot mess, me. She’s a dog person, I’m a cat person, that sort of thing. But we both wear specs and talk like the Queen, so there’s that.

T&W: How do you even leave the house?

NT: I accessorise with a large dose of confidence and take the side-eye of twenty-somethings as a compliment. None of them will be dressed like this when they get to my age.

T&W: Which is?

NT: I’m not telling. But let’s just say I run a little hot these days and my bladder’s not what it used to be.

T&W: Mid-life crisis?

NT: It’s a transformative experience.

T&W: What’s next?

NT: I’ll take some pictures in awkward lighting conditions with this rubbish camera and crop them to make my photographic incompetence look like artistic intent. Then I’ll write some pithy text mocking the fashion press to cheer up the ladies on their Monday morning.

T&W: Pointless editorial. What’s not to love?

NT: Quite right. I’m very pleased with my photobombing mannequin. I’m thinking of giving her a pay raise. How do you think this random footprint on the wall got there?

T&W: We really can’t imagine.

NT: Neither can I. But it’s fun to speculate, no?

T&W: You know we’re suckers for an abandoned industrial space filled with the ephemeral traces of a mundane past. And we’re every bit as pretentious as you are.

NT: Pretentious? Moi? Why thank you!

T&W: You’re very welcome.

Sorry ladies, it's not a glamorous old lady strolling around New York in sunglasses (I wish) but I couldn't resist the byline. 

I've been busy with the New Venture. I have no end of pictures of half-baked calicos and other works in progress but I've been very slack about photographing outfits. This is disappointing, because while I've missed some of my favourite summer outfits, somehow I managed to shoot this one look of me in the New Boring. 

Let me explain. I grew up in the neighbourhood around the UK's biggest sporting arena and every weekend during the football season it would be overrun with young men looking for a fight. They dressed very sharp and had a distinctive style, which was two parts preppy to one part Mod. Pants were creased and trainers were expensive. The look was typically finished with a designer windbreaker or an Argyle sweater. 

Needless to say, in my youth I wouldn't have been seen dead dressed like that, but I scored these sneaks from the New Balance Made in England collection earlier in the summer and I'd been fighting the urge to dress like an 80's football Casual ever since. When I finally gave in I found I quite enjoyed it. 

But. As a middle aged lady, this does not translate. Because what do you get when you cross two parts preppy with one part Mod? It's not a young delinquent with a flick knife in his pocket and that's for sure.

It's Ines de la Fressange.

And that, lovely ladies of YLF, is my submission to the Icon Challenge. 

I went quiet again. A story was unfolding, some new developments kept me offline and life took an interesting turn. I’ll come to that, but first, let me tell you about this jacket.

Back in spring I posted a few different shots of a few different outfits, which may or may not have looked strangely similar in style and proportion. This is because they’re actually all the same garment, a jacket made from a pile of remnants of double sided technical denim, kindly donated by my wonderful friend Mel over at ByBrown. The writing had been going pretty well but I’d reached a point where I needed to step back, do some more research and let everything incubate for a while. I decided it was time to revisit some of the designs I was working on last year.

A word about the fabric, which is wonderful to work with. It’s crisper than cotton denim, robust and very wearable. Mel’s made some lovely pieces with both sides (including my trusty crash pants) but I thought she missed a trick for not producing any reversible garments. The challenge, though, is that each side is very different in character. The “right” side is a deep matt indigo, almost purple, and the “wrong” side is best described as silver. A reversible design needs to show the best of both worlds.

I wanted to use the resilience of the fabric to create something that would wear like armour plating. With this in mind, I cut a separate shoulder section which reverses at the neckline, partially lined the “wrong” side in black and added elastic at the hem and cuffs. The sleeve section can then be worn over or under the armhole, or even around the neck as a collar. One jacket, too many ways to count.

So I was out and about in this versatile number when I happened into a particular high-end bicycle equipment shop, like you do on a Saturday afternoon, where I happened to be served by a young man who was kind enough to pay it a compliment. Thanks, I said, I made it myself. Really? He’s made clothes too, in fact he’d trained at an English coat maker. We chatted for a few minutes about seam bindings and sewing machines and went our separate ways.

At this point, I’d more or less given up on any prospect of ever turning this into a viable business, but our conversation left me thinking. I went back to the shop a couple of weeks later and asked him if he’d mind meeting for a coffee and talking production. Sure, he said.

We had our first real conversation a couple of days before my last post here. Today I’m packing up my office in downtown Amsterdam and moving into a factory space close to the river with my sewing machines and my new business partner. The guy I met randomly in the bike shop, who said something nice about my jacket, turned out be a fashion graduate, a craftsman with some serious chops who’d come to Amsterdam from the UK because he wanted to make something too. And that, good people of YLF, is why you haven’t heard from me in a month.

UPDATE!! And I've landed. Packing went without a hitch at the weekend, almost everything has been moved and it's not even lunch time. As you can see, I've traded the balcony for a solid factory floor and a workspace in full daylight with bonus miniature mural. Now the fun starts!

No, this is not a luxury boutique hotel. This is where I went to school.

It is an extraordinary, wonderful, confusing and confused place. It was founded in 1850 by suffragettes. If it looks scary from where you're sitting, try to imagine an ordinary kid leaving a grubby London suburb to go there every day. I'm not joking when I tell you that everyone raised in this hothouse leaves with the finest education and some kind of anxiety complex. We love it deeply from a distance and return to it in abject terror.

With this in mind, I wasn't 100% happy with the emergency fall-back look I wore to last weekend's reunion of the Class of 1986, but then I was never going to be. That said, I was comfortable in the heat and at least my hair behaved itself in all the pictures. The best bag of the day was not my 80's mix tape purse, but a canvas tote sported by one of my classmates, printed with the slogan EMOTIONAL BAGGAGE. Enough said.

The event was amazing. To paraphrase one of my buddies from the sixth form, connecting with long-lost friends is like rediscovering a piece of yourself you didn't know was missing. At the end of the day, I had the privilege of leading a memorial toast to my oldest, dearest friend, who passed away two summers ago. It was a moving and cathartic moment for all of us. 

After that, the tattoo reveal was a bit of a non-event. Following your wise advice, I wore short sleeves and acted normal until my brother outed me over drinks in the garden. He was the first to mention it and went on to describe his own plans to go under the needle. Bless him.

Anyway. Next time you see this famous alumnus and the most powerful woman in fashion, remember that she comes from a place that has probably left her with a deep seated sense of inferiority and is constantly worried that the whole world thinks she's faking it. You heard it here.

I must apologise for being scarce here lately. Writing, designing and teaching are taking up a lot of my time and I'm trying to stay away from too many distractions. Plus I've been slack about taking photos of what I'm wearing, so there's that.

But generally, I've not found much to inspire me in the new season's offerings and anyway, I've been enjoying shopping my closet. Focus on quality essentials, I told myself. Work on some new designs. Develop a more streamlined persona. That sort of thing. And no more vintage. My wardrobe can do without any more objets trouvés.

Then I happen past my favourite vintage store and catch a glimpse of something hanging on the wall. I'm not usually one for florals, but there's this one iconic print and if I ever find it I'll happily make an exception for it. OK, OK, I'm going in. Just for a look, mind.

ANDY WARHOL FLOWERS!!! On a JUMPSUIT, people!!!!!

Nadine takes it down for the wall. Some Italian designer, she says, early 90's she thinks. Tag says Ferretti Studio. Would that be Alberta Ferretti, do you think? She's not sure. 

It fits, it looks good. But really, do I need another colourful jumpsuit?

Yes, yes you do, says Nadine. Not many people can wear this. It needs to go to someone who can rock it. If you don't buy it, I'm going to cry.

For all my efforts to be streamlined, sensible and minimal, I just can't seem to contain my colourful impulses, my magpie sensibility, my nostalgia for the rave years, a time when fashion was exciting, original, adventurous. I hand over the cash and my resolution goes up in smoke. 

Truth be told, they're not quite Warhol's flowers, more of an homage reimagined as camo print, which is quite alright for this military inspired garment. On brighter days it'll look good with the sparkly bomber and pirate boots, but today the weather calls for raingear, combat boots and the default hat.