Why I Enjoy Sewing And Making Clothes - About The Author

 

Angela with a V-neck caftan. Neck style to copy. Dress colour matched to eyes enhances and draws attention to the eyes.

About the Author

I love sewing - may I share with you what I enjoy, my successes and failures!

An Italian au pair girl taught me how to re-line and shoulder bag whose lining was torn, and sew in the zip.

At school I made a blouse in a sewing class. 

My fondest memories of primary school (called elementary in the USA) are of

making a felt pin cushion

cross-stitch the cover of a needle case

learning about crontasting colours such as pink and blue and green and yellow

an afternoon 3 hour know your colours course which taught her that her colours are the vibrant summer colours of bright pillar box red, royal blue, emerald green, butter yellow, jet black and bright white. 

I discovered that changing her hair colour from brunette to blonde meant that colours which suited her changed from purple to red.

I learned from a red-headed room mate at Univeristy College, London, that redheads don't always match lipstick and clothes colour to their hair but to their eyes, so that a blue-eyed redhead might wear blue clothes and pink lipstick, whilst a green eyed redhead might wear green clothes and orange lipstick.

An Australian women's association meeting taught me how to make a newspaper pattern for a caftan, and cut the neckline edging.

I have a stock of unused sewing patterns and fabrics, and offcuts. As for buttons, I don't have one butto box but several. I have enough buttons for every class in  a school to hold noughts and crosses games with buttons.

This is amusing, but how does it benefit you? If you want to know how to turn a scarf into a dress, or make a small garment or large garment fit you, my posts will tell you how.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker, has homes in the UK and Singapore.