ragmin | Made of Rags

Scrap-gifts and decorations for Christmas

Last week someone reminded me, I had planed to make some little doodads for Christmas. And guess what? I HAD forgotten! I was so busy with other things, that I don´t even remembered. But time flies and I needed the doodads. So the sewing machine had to run and the crochet hook had to fly! But I made it at least!

I had the idea with the Christmas-trees, when I saw some tree-shaped cookies. I made a simple pattern from cardboard and began to sew. I made lots of gift-bags for cookies and other small gifts, gift-tags and tree decoration from vintage and new fabrics and crocheted also a few collars and shawls.

The design for the little pineapple-collar isn´t mine. It belongs to Mayumi Kawai. You can find it in the book “Dentelles elegantes au crochet”. (Elegant crochet lace) Sadly, there is no english version. Only french and japanese, but the pictures and instructions are very good, so you can get along without foreign language competence.

And some of the projects in this book are so pretty, I will enjoy myself reworking them!

I had the idea to make a long version of the small collar and create a real scarf. You can see on the picture, what appeared…

Now I´m better prepared for Christmas and my rag-box is not overfull anymore.

The effect of simplicity

I like the simple, severe style of late 1920s cloche-hats. This one is made after a french hat. I wear it so often, it´s buckled by now. Maybe I give it a refreshment in spring….

Autumn Ensemble

Once there was a small tunic, that didn´t fit anymore….

I cut it up in the middle of the front, add a collar in the same color on, embellished with a precious piece of vintage velvet-ribbon and removed the sleeves. It looks much better now.

Then I sewed a matching trouser from antique sacking.

The button on the front is something special:

I bought it from an elderly lady, which is a gifted wood turner. She also makes buttons from wood, afflicted by wood worms. After the worms had turned into beetles and flown out, she cuts the wood and fills their remaining channels with metal.

The worm-patterns are fantastic.

I think, the wood worms would be astonished, if they knew, they´re artists now!

Time for a crazy derby-hat?

A crazy summer-derby hat so close to Christmas ?

Yes. To publish a derby summer-hat at this time of the year may be weird, but I see it as a symbol and a small protest against the racy world we life in.

You can find winterclothing in the shops at the end of July or summercloth in February, Santa Claus Ho-ho-ho´s at you from every department store in October, long before Thanksgiving and what about the Easter Bunny? That poor creature shows it´s long chocolate-ears in the first days of March.

I think, THAT´s really crazy.

So here it is, the most whimsical hat I ever made, untimely, but who cares today?

There is a reason for a season….So why can´t we celebrate at the right time?

And buy winterclothes in winter?

I made the hat with some vintage two-tone ribbons from the 1970s. As you can see, it has no back or front, it´s wearable from both sides.

Fluffy plum-hat

Some time ago I catched this vintage melousine-hat body for a small price. It has a fantastic, intensive color and – lucky me- I had a matching petersham ribbon in a shiny violet-blue tone. Usually I avoid feathers, but this one is vintage and was a gift.

The passementerie-trimming is selfmade. I copied an art nouveau embellishment I possess with vintage soutache. I could have used the original, but I think I keep the precious piece for another occasion.

Back to off-white …

Oh no…. not off-white again so soon after the Metropolitan- Project!

But there´s a good reason. Whenever I buy a lot of vintage lace , among the sought-after things are others, I´m not so fond of.

In this case it´s those rough bobbin-lace, meant for bed-and table-clothing or towels. I have enough bed-or table-clothing in my cabinet, so I don´t need more. And usually I´m the one to cut them up and not to sew new ones.

But the pile of rough bobbin-lace got slowly higher and higher, until I couldn´t close the cap of my lace- box anymore. I had to do something!

I couldn´t donate the lace to my usual group of sewing girls. To old fashioned for teens. And nobody else wanted it.

So what to do with that nasty, rough bobbin-lace?

Then I had an idea….I remembered a scene from Emile Zola´s novella “The lady´s paradise” (Au bonheur des dames). In that Scene, he describes a display window in a department store, overflowing with yards and yards of white lace…..Could I do something flowing, airy? With rough lace?

Maybe not exactly, but a long, fluent lace-poncho could be a thing for a spring occasion. Or a Christmas evening. And I could also sew some scarfs or stoles.

So I went to my sewing machine and did it. I think, it went good and what I have in the end is ok.

Of course I could dye it, but I like the two-tone shade one of the lace in the poncho has and it all matches perfectly. So it will remain off-white…..

A real “scrapy” thing!

This three-piece-ensemble I made from a pile of scraps. Some of them came from former projects, some from a rag-box in a second-hand-store. Most of them needed a new color. But it´s solid linen, wool-embroidery and machine-embroidered cotton, so dyeing was no problem.

For such a tunic-trouser-vest-ensemble you can use every kind of bigger scraps or old clothing. Just let your scissors fly!

Some hat blocks are quite funny!

Some time ago I found a funny vintage hat block on the web…1960s I think……It was a “must have” for me, so I bought it!

I really love the shape of it and call it “the turtle”.And I also like the nice straw-barett I made last year!

There are hundreds of funny, beautiful hat blocks – vintage and new- for sale on the web…But beware! Some of them are works of art and look fantastic in a shelf. But it´s impossible to make fair hats with them. Most of the hats look unflattering or- worst case- absolutly ridicolous.

I had such “flops” many times, but learned a lot from it. Before I buy a new hat block this days, I take a long hard look and try to imagine, how the future hat would be….Most of the time I decide not to buy and save the money for a better occasion.

I leave such hat blocks to more courageous, groundbreaking milliners or hat block collectors.

I bet, some of you made the same experience!

Another Curtain-Jacket

I was busy with a little christmas-project the whole weekend, but I also wanted to write a quick article for my blog:

Heavy old Curtains from the 1950s or 60s are perfect for bags, dresses, jackets or coats. You can also turn them into medieval- or renaissance-robes. And you can buy them for a cheap price on flea-markets, in second-hand-stores or social departements.

This jacket I sewed from a short, shiny-red curtain. The neckline ist trimmed with satin-ribbon and from all remaining scraps I made a front-bag and some origami-embellishment. Almost zero-waste!

New life for an old hat

No, not exactly “old” in terms of vintage, but a hat from a second-hand-store. mass-produced, cheap, boring. The condition was good, seems the hat was seldom worn, so I decided to give it a bit more style.

First I changed the shape of the hat crown, than the decoration. I had a nice piece of handmade art déco applique, which suited the hat very well. I like the mazy “swirls”!

So if you posses a cheap, boring hat and you don´t really go along with it- Change it. Vintage items, new items, anything is good for decoration. Maybe you cut the brim or embelish with some patchwork. Don´t be afraid to ruin the hat. Most of the “desasters” can be adjusted somehow!