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Greetings dear readers!  Yes, its been much to long since I sat my hind parts down at the keyboard.  Since I last published I have been emancipated from the humdrum doldrums of work!  Yes, I am a free man since my retirement of August 2019!  Now with my days and nights free I can concentrate on my greatest love............ designing.  This has been an eventful year one of the best being the making of the doco/drama on Halston.  It was a great series and really reignited my creative spirit.  In short, I got my "sewing mojo" back!  One of the things I did was a bias cut hoodie that I made from a beautiful 100% cotton sheet that I ran across at a local thrift store.  I love the look of bias cut garments especially when they are as seamless as possible, one of the main principles of Halston's aesthetic.  I pictured my process below: This is one of a couple of versions I have planned for the classic hoodie.  I 'm going to make them in wool jersey and fleece and may include
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SKETCHES, FABRICS AND MUSLINS! OH MY!! Can someone please tell me where is the time flying off to!!!  I just can't believe that on the 11th it will be a month since my last post!  I don't know how it is for you dear readers, but for me there really just aren't enough hours in a day!   Well let's not waste a moment and get down to brass tacks!  As you know, I'm a devoted follower of Peter Lappin's wonderful blog Male pattern boldness and I was recently commenting on how much I loved flannel fabrics, especially shadow plaids. I then diverged to the subject of home sewing and cheap clients. Well needless to say, I received a reply from another avid MPB fan whom I shall call "T" (for Testosterone) who abruptly yanked up my reins and put my hiney back on the topic of flannel!  Well!!  Being a product of the 'Eisenhower era' and and a staunch follower of  the rules of etiquette and decorum, I offered my most humble apology and went on to say
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MAKE MINE VINTAGE!!

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Gracious greeting to all! Yes dear readers, I've returned!  Where have I been??  Well sometimes I wonder!  I do know however, that I'm currently on a weeks vacation and regretfully, it's all coming much too quickly to a close.  If there was anytime to write a very long overdue post here.........well now is as good as any!  To this day I  marvel at Peter Lappin and how he use to consistently post at his blog 'Male pattern boldness' on a daily basis.  I mean, you really gotta love blogging to have done that for several years!  I consider myself lucky if I could get up the gumption to post every nine months! LOL!!  Yes, Test if you're out there, I know you have all of the evidence against me........but remember there always a chance for reform!!!    Well, now that I'm back, I wanted to discuss the second greatest love in my life (of course Halston being number one) and that is my love of vintage Singer sewing machines!   I attribute this addiction to
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CHARLES JAMES!

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Greetings dear readers! By gosh, by golly, I can't believe two years have whisked by since my last post!  To say that I've been sidetracked would be an understatement.  I'm finally eliminating the many obstacles that have been blocking my creative path.  Inspiration is a funny thing and comes and goes in a hot moment and when I'm riding a creative streak I go into isolation mode!  That's something that's hard for some people to understand, but I always make it clear that phone conversation must be kept to a minimum and quite frankly I'll let calls go straight into voicemail.   Now there are many sources of inspiration and a great one has been the Metropolitan museum's exhibition of the work of couturier Charles James.  Like many I have heard his name and saw some of his work, most of it being his fabulous ballgowns.  I bought the Met's book on him entitled "Charles James" and was stunned to realize the wide scope of his fashion genius!
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SOURCES OF INSPIRATION!

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Well I guess that I've surprised myself by posting again within a six month period!!  I'm sooooo bad!  I had a real spurt of inspiration after writing about Truman Capote's 'Swans' and I couldn't get the image of Babe Paley out of my mind!  I have the picture I posted last, hanging in my sewing room and as I looked at it, I knew I had to take that look of elegance and some how translate it into something that would work for a man.  What struck me was the color blocking of her dress as seen here.  I knew I could create a shirt of some kind that would have that same color blocked effect.  A light bulb went on and I decided to do a sweatshirt!  I'm very fond of fleece fabrics.... to me they're the poor man's cashmere and so easy to care for.  I went looking for a light blue and navy combination of colors at the local Jo-Ann Fabric store but didn't find exactly what I wanted, so I chose a vibrant Chinese blue shade and paired it with black.  I lov
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IMAGES OF CHIC!!

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Hi all! Just wanted to take a moment to have a little fashion chat, this being a holiday weekend and season.  First of  all,  I want to discuss a group of seven women that Truman Capote dubbed "The Swans", these were women of extraordinary chic, who not only were muses of some the greatest designers, but whose personal style had immense impact on the fashion world.  The Swans included the following: Babe Paley, Slim Keith, Gloria Guinness, C.Z. Guest, Marella Agnelli, Lee Radziwill and Pamela Harriman. Two of my favorites are Babe Paley and Slim Keith.  Barbara Cushing -Mortimer-Paley was one of the Cushing sisters from Boston who were renowned for their beauty and all were groomed by their  ambitious mother to marry into money and titles.  'Babe' was married and divorced from her first husband who made his fortune in oil and later married the founder of CBS,  William Paley.   She was the perfect 'trophy wife', Paley a Jew, needed and wanted someone who co
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Hello all! Well it's been much too long since I posted here, I don't know where the times files off too!  A lot has been going on, first of all the documentary "Ultrasuede: In Search of Halston", was released and premiered at the Tribeca theater in NYC!  I'm waiting for it to come out on DVD since I didn't get a chance to see it there.  You can see more about it at You Tube of course! I fell out of my sewing due to so much going on in my work situation and personal life, but I'm glad to say that I'm back on track and creating again!  Part of my renewed excitement is the recent discovery of Google.sites which gives you the ability to create your own website.  I needed something more than a blog and I've finally found it!  I'm going to start creating the page soon after I have the necessary images to post there and it will be focused on my designs and  the steps of construction.  I also will have the prices of the items and the location where
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