A pretty vintage milk glass necklace, which I wore yesterday. Right now, I’m really into wearing very simple neutral things with pretty vintage jewelry.

Kenn snapped these while I was pulling a sheet off the pet hair roller. My hair is sort of a mess right now from chlorine.

Also, lest you worry for my health looking at these, the dark circles around my eyes are not due to lack of sleep, but my Italian genes. I also have that Italian/Jewish dark shadowy eyes thing, so that I always look like I’m wearing eyeshadow.

I’ve taken up swimming again lately, for which I wear your typical plain black sporty speedo one piece (though I do have a pink swim cap and goggles). But it’s made me think about summer swimsuits of the splish-splash-playing-in-the-pool variety (as opposed to the swimming-laps-for-exercise variety).

Nowadays, swimsuits are usually kind of flimsy and rarely seem to be built for curves. If you’re lucky, you might get some sort of shelf bra in there but that’s about it. One look at the swimsuits of the 40s and 50s though, and you can see that they were nothing less than feats of engineering: Pieced full cups, shirring, smocking, and strategic seams galore.

I’ve never made a bathing suit. Could be fun if I could manage the elastic shirring bit.

{more gorgeous vintage beach images from millie motts}

I bought this odd 80s sun dress for a few bucks recently. I thought it was really dowdy in that sort of horrible laura ashley way, but at the same time, the bodice is really beautifully cut. It has a very fitted princess cut, elastic shirring in panels at the back, and I like the crazy pockets. And recently I’ve had a bit of a textile crush on these kind of faded flowery large scale grandma patterns.

So I chopped a good foot off the hem and it’s really a new dress. The perfect thing to wear to the nursery this weekend and bake a cherry tart.

It even sort of matches the flowers we bought at the farmer’s market this week.

There are two shops in Rockridge that sell the most beautiful vintage dresses. Most of them are fancy occasion sorts of things, so I don’t have many excuses to buy them.

But I am in love with this little blue 60s dress. pretty pretty.

I have a great deal more to write about in the way of dresses and sewing and crafts and things, so expect a lot this week!

The perfect dress, in a shop window in Oakland.

Long ago, someone sent me this pattern for Folkwear #249, 1930s Day Dress. I bought the fabric, cut the pattern, and for one reason or another, it languished in my sewing box for many months after.

Well, I finally finished it, and it’s quite nice! I used a gorgeous blue toile cotton for the self fabric and a deep indigo silk charmeuse for the flounces. I often steer clear of printed cottons for dresses, but this one seemed lighter and softer than most, and I couldn’t resist those giant birds.

I made some small modifications to the pattern, such as taking in the shoulders (I didn’t include shoulder pads), transforming the shoulder pleats into tucks to get rid of some fullness there, and shortening the hem quite a bit.

I love the back of this dress. The bodice comes to a low point in back, and the skirt is gathered below. This creates a really nice profile that emphasizes the curve of the lower back and fullness of the booty without puffing out at the hips.

I’ve recently started working in a new location, which completely changes my commute. I’ve been using a combination of BART and my bike to get to and from work almost every day. This is fantastic because few things make feel more free than being on a bike, and it’s a great way to end my day and really put some space (literally and figuratively) between the work day and home.

But this sort of changes the way I need to dress a bit. Jeans, hoodies, and chucks are awesome, but I am a girl who likes dresses and high heels once in a while, so this gets a bit tedious every day. I feel most comfortable in dresses, and I do think they’re the most flattering on me.

So I think I have found a happy medium, thanks to the magic of leggings. Normally, I do not like to wear short skirts. I just feel sort of exposed in them. But I’ve discovered that a short dress with leggings is both incredibly comfortable and absolutely perfect for bike riding. My legs stay warm, I’m not exposing myself, and the dress is short enough to stay out of the way on the bike.

These are some of the cute, comfy-looking dresses I’m eyeing on Etsy:

Obviously, this is a pretty perfect specimen, from Vital Industries

I’ve been looking at this one for a long time, from nice face.

And this one from PrettyRacoon clothing is awesome because it references surrealist designer Elsa Schiaparelli, who rocked Paris in the 1920s with her trompe l’oeil bow sweater. Plus, it’s just awesome in a sort of debbie-harry-meets-japanese-lolita way.

A girly one from reddoll.

I am in love with this one, though it’s quite a bit more than the others.

And this is my personal favorite from Lucha Workshop. In fact, I had to buy it.

Dressing for activities like biking is a challenge, but constraints breed creativity. I never thought I’d be entertaining the idea of knitting legwarmers, that’s for sure. Speaking of which, this article on biking in skirts and heels at the SF Bike Coalition has some great tips, including using old fashioned leg garters to keep your skirt from flying up!

I finished this sweater fairly recently, and I’m really liking the way it turned out. It’s a British pattern from 1934, which is contained in my copy of Jane Waller’s A Stitch In Time.

I used a somewhat heavier yarn, Knitpicks’ Shine Sport in Orchid, which is bit more violet-based than it looks like here. I had it on hand, and I love the softness and sheen of Shine; but If I were to make it again (and I would!), I’d probably go with a fingering weight yarn, which would provide the nicer drape you can see in the old photos. Still, the slouchy fit is great and I do love the color. Lacy sweaters, vintage or handmade, are a wardrobe staple for me.

The one on the left with the roses is pretty awesome too. I may have to make that one as well at some point.

Just a quick, belated note that I wrote a short little piece for The Storque on vintage bridal style, for their Handmade Wedding series.

The Storque is Etsy’s ezine, and right now it’s full of ideas for DIY weddings. Reading about DIY weddings makes me want to throw more parties.

{And thanks to Rhiannon for letting me use this gorgeous photo of her!}

I am not a follower of high fashion (or low fashion, for that matter). I look at the collections now and again and have a general idea of which designers appeal to me. Overall, I appreciate the beautiful things that come out of the fashion world, but that good is more than cancelled out by the damage that industry does to our psyches and spending habits.

At the same time, I have a deep fascination with the older couture houses: their history, the personalities of their designers, and how they reflected and transformed the context in which they arose. There is also something really compelling about the extreme attention to detail and dedication to a craft, the sheer amount of work that goes into these astounding garments. Not to mention the theater of it all, the pure focus on presentation and adornment and creating characters and narrative through clothing.

This is a long-winded way of saying that all of these aspects of couture are gloriously represented in this sizable book on Lanvin. Lanvin, the fashion house, was founded by Jeanne Lanvin in Paris in 1909 and enjoyed great success throughout the 1920s and 1930s. Lanvin designs were distinguished by exquisite embellishment and trims, which are well represented and beautifully photographed here. Currently, it is the oldest fashion house in operation.

I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a more beautiful and balanced fashion book. I love the combination of design artifacts and clear photographs of garments. It’s hard to be cynical about fashion when you look at some of these objects and think about the creativity, the work, and the passion that went into them.