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The Celtic Braid Cape

Celtic Braid Cape

The initial inspiration for my Celtic Braid Cape arrived in 2009, when I was working from home in an unheated garage.  I live in the San Francisco Bay Area, so it never gets freezing, but winter is still pretty nippy!  I was wrapping my fingers around a mug of tea to warm them up when I thought how wonderful it would be to have a coat to wear in the garage, to keep me warm as I typed.

And thus the idea for the project was born.

I have a long-time fascination with Celtic knotwork, and had prepared drafts for many different types of Celtic knotwork. Most of them didn’t work out well in practice – the knot designs tended to collapse when the fabric was wet-finished – but after much experimenting, I drafted a three-strand braid pattern that worked beautifully, in samples as well as on paper.

three strand celtic braid

On to creating the fabric!

I happened to have on hand some silk yarn, six strands of 60/2 silk loosely twisted together, and some fine cashmere/mohair yarn that I didn’t know what to do with.  However, there wasn’t quite enough of either to weave the fabric for the coat. So I added some fine wool yarn and some additional bits of silk yarn that I had lying around, to make up the amount I needed. I dyed the silk a beautiful garnet red, and the cashmere/mohair/wool mix a deep black.

Because I was cramming the dyepot (always a bad idea), one of the silk skeins came out darker than the others.  I solved this problem by alternating stripes of the darker color with stripes of the lighter ones, so the resulting fabric has every third stripe darker than the others.  I actually like this “design feature”; it adds interest to the fabric without being obtrusive.

Celtic braid stripe fabric

I wove the fabric in record time (for me anyway!) – about two weeks for fourteen yards of fabric. Now I had to work out how to sew it up. I liked this Photoshop simulation:

simulation of coat

However, I knew I’d need to do considerable work to get it right, especially since I knew nothing about couture sewing. So I labored over many muslins, and over a version in mohair I was using to practice couture techniques. This took several months.

Then, of course, I got engaged! and spent over a year weaving and sewing my wedding dress. By the time I finished, the impetus for the project was lost, and the fabric languished in my stash for several years.

Then Handwoven announced a contest for sleeveless garments, and I spotted a Vogue pattern that would be perfect for both fabric and contest – a cape over a simple vest. I knew instantly that this was the design I wanted to use.

Unfortunately, I was still finishing up my Autumn Splendor project, so I wasn’t able to meet the contest deadline – but the idea was sound, so I moved rapidly ahead with the cape, sewing it up quickly and with a minimum of drama. I was ecstatic when Handwoven published it in their January/February 2013 issue!

Here are some photos from the making of the project:

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Presenting the Celtic Braid Coat!

We did the photo shoot today.  Here are the photos!

(with thanks to Zane Artistry (makeup) and Joe Decker/Rockslide Photography.  All images copyright 2012 Joe Decker, used with permission.)

Celtic Braid Coat - front view
Celtic Braid Coat – front view
Celtic Braid Coat - slightly more dynamic front view
Celtic Braid Coat – slightly more dynamic front view
Celtic Braid Coat - showing vest underneath
Celtic Braid Coat – showing vest underneath
Celtic Braid Coat, aka my new Facebook profile photo :-)
Celtic Braid Coat, aka my new Facebook profile photo 🙂
Celtic Braid Coat - detail showing buttons
Celtic Braid Coat – detail showing buttons

And that wraps it up!  On to the next project!

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Almost done!

After two days of obsessively working on it, the Celtic Braid Coat is just about done.  I need to remove the basting stitches, tack down one seam, and sew in two snaps to hold the collar closed.  And that…is…IT!!

Which is a good thing, too, because my photo shoot is tomorrow!  (Makeup starts at 2pm…the actual photo shoot starts around 3 or 3:30.)

I’m not going to post photos until I have the “official” ones from the photo shoot.  But I will say that it is quite striking!  I briefly considered gold-edged black buttons, but realized quickly that they would look awful if they were the slightest bit off-center in the buttonhole.  I also didn’t like the “woven” leather buttons, so I wound up going with black plastic buttons with wavy/flame-like patterns on them.  I elected to do a buttonless collar – tried hooks and eyes, but it really needs some snaps.  So I’ll make a trip to the fabric store tomorrow, and finish it tomorrow morning.

I’m not really happy with the workmanship on this piece.  From a distance, it looks fine, but if you start poking around in the seams you’ll discover all sorts of nightmarish mistakes and goopy bits.  Working with such thick leather was nearly impossible, especially in the pieced sections; I broke several leather needles in my struggles with the piece, the seams are thick and inflexible (and some actually feel “crunchy” from the glue holding the seam allowances in position), and the whole piece weighs a TON.  It will do nicely for photos, but if I were doing it again, I’d use solid pieces of much thinner leather rather than trying to piece together bits and pieces of thicker hides.  Or, frankly, I’d just skip the leather and work with regular cloth.  I could have done a marvelous job on this piece if I hadn’t been fighting with the leather every inch of the way.  As it stands, it’s not up to my standards for my own work, and while I’ll happily wear it, I won’t be exhibiting it.  But that’s OK; it won’t be eligible for a lot of exhibits anyway, since it’s going to be published sometime next year.

Speaking of publishing, I published my second post on the book blog today, “Starting out with Design”.  I’ve got a third one lined up for Tuesday publication, and I’m hard at work on the fourth one (which will be about ways to make learning to design easier).  I’m really digging this new format – short posts of 350-400 words are quick and easy  to write, and the feedback in the form of comments, Facebook “Likes”, etc. is wonderful – like getting calorie-free treats every time I write another chunk!  This could easily become a habit – which is, of course, exactly the point!

Off to write some more!

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Buttons

I’ve made considerable progress on the Celtic Braid Coat, having reworked the lining, assembled the collar, and basted the cape to the vest.  Now I’m considering what button to put on the collar.  I have three possibilities:

blingy button?
blingy button?
dotted button?
dotted button?
crosshatched button?
crosshatched button?

At the moment I am inclined towards the dotted button (second photo).  The first button, while beautiful, calls attention to itself and not to the rest of the cape  –  the eye gets “stuck” there.  The third button (which I admit is hard to see in the photo) doesn’t feel like it belongs, probably because the red isn’t a perfect match and the cross-hatched pattern doesn’t relate to the rest of the garment.  The second button, with the red dots, seems to harmonize better – the red is a better match and it echoes the dots of red in the Celtic braid.  But I’m still debating it, so would love opinions!

Today’s plan is to work more on the Celtic Braid Coat, and design the structures for katazome.  The repeats will be small and I’m going to do my best to keep the number of interlacements the same on each warp thread – which probably means a crepe weave, to add some visual texture without distracting from the image.

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Pieced panels

After  four or five hours of work, I finally have the side panels pieced and cut.  And they look pretty good!  Here they are:

pieced panels
pieced panels

The piecing is regular and the pattern clearly suggests a braid.

Now I need to sew up the body of the jacket, recut and re-sew two lining pieces, and make a bunch of bound buttonholes in the front panel.  Then I need to attach the lining to the vest, sew in the cape, and that’s it!  I’m trying to get it done this week, but it might go into early next week, because of the buttonholes.

Meanwhile, my design class continues.  Inspired by the exercises, I’ve analyzed a bunch of my most-liked fashion photos, looking to see what characteristics appeal.  Here are some of the words I found repeating in my analysis:

  • long
  • flowing
  • dynamic when moving (flash of contrast)
  • wings
  • soft
  • light and airy
  • dramatic
  • feathers or suggested feathers
  • more loose than structured, but with some structure (i.e. not entirely loose)
  • asymmetric
  • diagonal lines (add movement)

And I am now thinking I would like to make two pieces – a cloak entitled “Dying Phoenix”, crumply-textured material, predominantly black (maybe some gray) with red and orange accents – and “Phoenix Rising” – the one I’ve been working on.  The cloak I have a strong vision for, the other is still totally in the air.  I need to generate more designs, and also start sampling fabric!