March 8, 2012

Blue like the sky on a clear morning

That's what I keep thinking when looking at this fabric. And, quite appropriately, we've had some very nice clear mornings, followed by dreary, cloudy, rainy afternoons this week. So, perfect time to introduce an easy, throw-over kind of cardi in this great colour into my wardrobe.
It wasn't warmly received in my previous post and I get that. A blocky top. Don't the pattern companies throw enough sack patterns our way already? Well, I guess they do. As you know, I'm no expert.

However, I do know that with loosely fitted garments, it's all about amount and proportion. You need to find the perfect balance between free-flowing fabric and showing some of the body underneath. It can be hit-and-miss, but it's quite do-able in a drapey knit.
This particular fabric is fairly thick but has a nice hand.

I designed it to be worn either loose or belted (although belts are always tricky for me. I love them on already fitted dresses, but I'm always hesitant about the cinched-with-a-belt look) and there are no closures. I think I may have to buy something like a little brooch, because I do like having the option of closing it in different places without having buttons or snaps on display when I wear it some other way.

I like how the proportions of this thing lend themselves to different, sometimes vaguely vintage-y looks.

Near Japanese minimalism?

Boxy 60's jacket?

50's leisure-wear?

This one is a bit frumpy to me, but somewhere half-way through the 20th century, mademoiselle might have approved...

P.S. Carolyn recently posted about how annoying the word-recognition gizmo can be, and how it discourages her from commenting. As an experiment, I've just turned mine off. Obviously, I hope to encourage commenting here. I'll wait and see if the spam-bots find me again.
Also, my email adress is now in the sidebar.

7 comments:

  1. How you've styled it makes all the difference! What a fun, versatile piece to add to your wardrobe!

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  2. The thing with blocky clothing shapes is that the beauty all appears when they're worn---it's hard to say much about it just lying flat on the table. I love all the different looks you're showing, and I think you're bang-on about a little decorative pin being the way to go. I think my favourite is the 50s-leisure-wear look, but they're all really fun.

    As to cinching---it's not a look that works for me, but I sure love it on a lot of other people, and I think you could definitely rock it with your teeny waist. You certainly do with this piece. :D

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  3. Love the styling with the skirt & belt!

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  4. That's amazingly versatile. I think I like the one with the belt best!

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  5. I love the Japanese minimalist and the boxy 60's jacket looks! A lovely piece and very versatile!
    Yes, if you do get the Pattern Magic books in English, then I would dearly love to know the translated names, thank you for offering! I've almost given up on trying to translate!

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  6. I really like the colour of this, and belted with that SKIRT! What a great little jacket.

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  7. It looks nice on you. I love the skirt, did you make that too? Its a gorgeous colour, the two contrast nicely. Wrt the commenting, you should set up disqus. It has akistmet anti-spam (same as what wordpress uses) and is awesome in that it allows cross-platform commenting from wordpress, typead, canalblog etc where non-google users can keep track of comments and responses without having a blogger account. It also means no sh*tty recaptcha which is an obvious bonus.

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