Blog

To search this blog, please see the categories and search feature in the footer of any page or in the sidebar to the right.  This blog does not contain everything I’ve made.  More can be found at my Aria Couture Facebook page.  As time allows, I will move some things from my defunct website here, as well as move creations from my Facebook page here.  I encourage you to follow both this website as well as my page!

 

If you’re here for my Beauty and the Beast costume studies:

To my surprise, tens of thousands of people are, and to make it easier, I’m going to post those here.

Emma’s (“Belle’s) yellow gown from Beauty and the Beast: A Costume Study
Beast’s Ball Ensemble:  Costume Study
Provincial Belle: A Costume Study
Gaston: A Costume Study
Pre-movie costuming thoughts about Beauty and the Beast
Post-Beauty and the Beast costuming thoughts

Major update. Long, but very, very important.

The past two years of lockdowns and cancelled events, never knowing week to week what’s going on, weddings postponed and cancelled, supply chain issues and availability of the fabrics I need, etc., has really taken a toll on me. It’s taken something I’ve loved to do for most of my life, and turned it into a major source of stress and outright anxiety. Believe it or not, it’s very, very rough to pour your heart into something and then having it cancelled or abandoned without word and with unpaid balances, and it’s very, very stressful having to figure out what to do when a supply or fabric becomes unavailable after you’ve ordered it, and very stressful dealing with the clients of a different business altogether.

It also doesn’t help when an event in cancelled and a client forces a refund of their deposit because they no longer need what they commissioned…after you’ve already bought the fabrics and have started their gowns. I’ve learned the hard way that, if someone disputes a charge before you’ve shipped an item, then their card issuer won’t care that the reason is the balance wasn’t paid.  They’re getting the deposit back, and guess who has to pay for it.  Me. I even had a local client at the start of all of this who picked up her gown in person, then disputed the charge when her wedding was cancelled and I refused to let her return the gown for a refund.  She ended up getting a refund, and since there wasn’t proof of shipping, she got to keep the gown too.  Makes the abandoned and cancelled orders preferable. I don’t usually like talking negatively about clients because most have been absolutely wonderful, but there are three in particular who’ve broken me, and right now, I’m dealing with a fourth, another abandoned commission with an unpaid balance wanting either a refund of a finished commission or for it to be sent without the balance paid.

About HALF of the commissions I’ve started over the last two years have been abandoned by their commissioners, usually due to the events they were for being cancelled, though in a couple cases, without any word at all, and I’ve been unable to reach them by mail or by phone. This actually includes a well-known celebrity as well as a minor celebrity (I do not disclose names, even on non-abandoned commissions). But the ones mentioned above…

The only commissions that have been followed through on reliably have been things for children.

Despite having a contract that covers abandoned commissions, it’s still extremely stressful becsue imagine this: You’re paid for the supplies to do a job and a bit of the labor, and then you spend 80 hours of time on a job. But then never get paid for it, and worse, while doing the work, you now have it in your head that there’s a good chance you won’t be.

So in addition to the sadness of cancelled events, there’s also so, so much time of unpaid labor that, honestly, feels like wasted time after a while.

I know times can get unexpectedly rough, but frankly, that’s not a good reason to treat me like this.

This doesn’t touch on supplies. When I give a quote based on expected availability, then that thing goes out of stock with no restock date and how I’m having to pay as much as 4x the expected cost on the secondary market, it’s rough. Rougher still is when it’s for something that gets abandoned.

It also doesn’t touch on how that stupid, stupid business in Massachusetts, Aria Couture Inc, still hasn’t made it clear that I’m not them, and I’m STILL dealing with their angry clients, and I’ve had to deal with pissed off reviews meant for them being left for ME instead (there is still one woman who refuses to remove her review for them, despite acknowledging having left of for the wrong business in DMs). Having to continue acting as defacto customer service for that business is UGH.

So right now, I’m finishing a teacher’s Titanic dinner gown, and I’m hoping so hard that the school event that this is for will get to go ahead. It didn’t last year, nor the year before.

But after this, I’m planning to basically take this year off. Any commissions I would even consider will have to have something especially compelling, or from a repeat client, because I just don’t want something I’ve been so passionate about to be something I cry in stress about because I haven’t been able to reach the person it’s for in a couple weeks, or have the absolute heart-punch of something no longer being available after an order was placed.

Still send inquiries, but just be forewarned that there’s a real chance I may pass. I’d rather love what I’m doing and making rather than to be stopping because I’m crying in stress about, even if that means taking time off to wait out the ongoing state of the world. Hopefully, by next year, things will be reliably normal enough that I can look forward to sewing again.

There are two things I’ve been doing that have been a source of some happiness for me. One is that I’ve started on an English degree. Yes, classes are ALL still remote. 100% remote. But it’s something reliable that I can do, and I need reliability. It’s an actual mental health need. I’m in my second term, more than full time (4.0 so far).

And a very dear friend and I are writing books. The first in our series is even available for preorder though Barnes & Noble, to be release February 6th. 1930’s mafia. This is another reliable thing, though I admit that it’s stressful not knowing how much longer it’ll take to get Library of Congress control numbers, which are taking more time due to remote staffing, and FOIA requests (we go hardcore in researching…) more or less have no timeline now either, for the same reason, but lockdowns and cancelled events actually mean more time to write.

So these are the things I’ve been able to look forward to.

Sewing will fit in around these things, and will need to have something compelling about them (or be for children). I think that, on this page, I’ll spend a bit more time sharing some historical research that Lisa and I are doing for this series.

I just need a break and a chance to regroup. I need a chance to get back to a point where I love doing this again without it being a source of constant stress and anxiety. I had a breakdown over it in November, and then delayed addressing this because I just couldn’t do it. But just having written this to post address it makes me feel a bit better, and that indicates that this is the right move I need to make for myself right now. I’m human and have limits on how much I can handle, and I hit that limit almost a year ago, and ignored it, and just can’t anymore.

So please, just bear with me this year let me know what historical and fashion eras interest you, and let’s keep trying to get through the ongoing uncertainty in the world.

Sorry, but I can’t share my sources for some very good reasons

The Suez Canal issue exacerbates it.

The last several months, I’ve gotten more inquiries than ever about where I get my fabrics and trims since they’ve gotten so much harder to find, especially good quality, much less high quality.  I’ve gotten questions about that for years, but more so since last summer.  Prior to the lockdowns, and for a while into the lockdowns, my answers were the same: Some of my suppliers aren’t available to the public and are through connection-only, and some are shops that don’t sell online, hence having to go to Paris and London in person.  But when it comes to what I can order and that the public can also order from, I’ve spent hundreds upon hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars over the years researching my sources, ordering swatches to verify quality or even that a fabric is what they say it is (very often, it’s not, and even Joann Fabrics is VERY GUILTY of this), reordering on occasion to ensure reliability and consistency, and when a fabric is discontinued, starting the process over to try to find new suppliers of that fabric, and really, that’s a large investment to just give away.*

And now?  I don’t know.  I’ve got nothing.  A lot of my best suppliers, the ones I’ve gotten the best silks and softest, airiest cottons and such from, have gone out of business altogether, and of the ones available to the public, they’ve merged and offerings have shrunk.  The ones I sourced in person, who I sought out in person in Europe, tracking some to literal underground shops literally underground where you have to know which unmarked door to go to and buzz and who to ask for…I can’t know which of them are even around now until I go back and check, which could mean trips that are fruitless.  Yes, it’s always fun to go to Paris and London anyway, but a huge disappointment when shops you rely on are gone, and it’ll be heartbreaking since a lot of those are small shops owned by families.  None, NONE, are chains.  I’m expecting to be sad a lot when I go back.  I developed the business relationships needed to get suppliers to go to their back rooms to look for silks for me.  The red duchess silk I got the last time took one shopkeeper a couple weeks to personally find for me.  We talked about our same-age kids a lot when I went there in trips before that, and he finally met my daughter the last time I went.  Who knows if his shop is still there.

I’m scrambling myself to find new reliable suppliers, and so far, have found none that are up to par, and so I’ve been relying on my stash, the stash that a lot of people in my life thought I was “crazy” for amassing, which I did with the mindset of “what happens if this stuff can’t be obtained one day”…which…well…and having to put out feelers to people I know to see who may have what I need and be willing to part with it.  There is one fabric I’m still hunting for for another seamstress I know, but otherwise, I’ve been lucky finding just enough of what I need, but this isn’t enough to call a source.  It’s scrambling.  I’m spending more time scrambling now than sewing, and it’s frustrating.

So when I DO happen to find a source, I’ll be holding that close to the chest for a while, not only because of the substantial time I’m putting into it (labor has value), but because even I can’t know now if a source I may have this moment could unexpectedly be gone next week, and so this is the one area I kind of feel the need to be selfish on.  I haven’t felt this lost in the fabric world since 2006.  That’s how many of my suppliers are gone.  Thank goodness for my stash.

When it comes to my stash, getting me to sell any of it would be very, very hard since I don’t know when, or if, I’ll be able to get more of what I have.  I’m honestly sick with worry that some of it won’t be obtainable again.  I’ve fought against the urge to mark up the costs of the gowns I can create out of my stash, which I would justifiably do due to scarcity of supplies, but just can’t make myself do that.  It feels like profiteering.  Instead, I’ve nixed my pricing structure (and have corset commissions for months, and nope, I won’t be making a penny off of labor, but it’ll help keep me on a schedule and is good for my mental health).  There are only two people who would have access to it besides myself, Carol and Nora, and that’s really it.

So we’ve got suppliers going under, suppliers collapsing into fewer suppliers…most of the big online shops are owned by two companies now, though you wouldn’t know it since they keep all the old websites up, and no, those aren’t the ones I go through because their quality isn’t up to my expectations…an inability to even access some of my suppliers to see if they’re even around anymore, global supply chain issues that started a year ago for obvious issues I can’t mention without my entire website getting knocked down in search engines (yup…it’s not just YouTubers being demonetized and excluded from searches if they dare even breath that C-word once)…

And now we’ve got that issue with the Suez Canal.  Though most of my supplies come from Europe not only for quality, but because I really try to find manufacturers that are ethical since quality and ethical manufacturing mean more to me than cheap pricing (keep in mind I’m not making crucial necessities), and it’s a small fortune flying stuff in, the canal is expected to cause flight issues as a lot of manufacturers of non-household goods are starting to compromise and fly half their goods and boat the other half.  Uh, yeah, that may mean higher shelf prices.  But it also means that the reliability of stuff that needs to be flown in could be dicey.  There aren’t magically more cargo planes to meet the demand.  Experts are saying it can be several weeks to months to get shipping back on track.

So…yeah.  That’s why I couldn’t share my sources before, and why I can’t share them now. I’m scrambling too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

*I kinda think I’ve already given away a lot, what with the costume-studies I do, between cost of traveling, buying equipment to take the best pictures (this is one of the lenses I bought, and I upgraded to this camera, which was more since it was newer at the time, specifically to get the Sarah ball gown photos so detailed, and no, I wouldn’t have upgraded otherwise since the T6i I was using was perfectly fine for my needs otherwise), the time of it all (8 hours of driving for each the three time I went for those photos alone, plus the time there, then going through the photos, making posts…), and then sharing it for free, without even affiliate ads of any sort to offset the bandwidth bills we still get every month from the traffic to my costume study posts, instead of keeping it to myself so that only I could know the details to make the most accurate ones out there.  Right now, I’m waiting for clearance for another photo op, which, when it comes, will likely be short notice, and my husband knows to expect me to bolt with a night’s notice when I’ve got the go-ahead.  Cameras (got to have backup) and everything are ready for me to hightail it several hours (unlike most people, I still get weekly Covid tests, so don’t panic, am actually the at-risk one with a severe autoimmune disease).  So I’m still planning to plunk down more money and time for studies I will be giving away, and doing this is exciting.  But it is a financial investment that I will never see a return of even a penny on.  If anything, I lose potential commissions since my photos have encouraged at least a few people I know of to take a stab at it themselves when they were initially looking into commissioning from me, and I’ve encouraged them.  So this is what I mean.

The Aria Couture shop in MA/RI IS NOT ME

Please be aware that this Aria Couture is NOT the shop in Massachusetts and Rhode Island.  My business is a one-woman operation in Washington State making custom items while they sell off-the-rack stuff on the east coast.  As of right now, their website, AriaCouture-dot-NET, isn’t even working, and hasn’t been for a while now.  That company has been far too happy leaving me to deal with their dissatisfied and confused clients.  I don’t blame their clients, but am furious enough at the company to take it public.  I can’t keep it hush-hush anymore, not with how often people contact me looking for them, or are unable to contact them and want me to help.  They’ve been made aware of this MANY times, and what have they done?  Nothing.

I’ve directed numerous clients to their correct contact information, and have contacted them more times than I’ve been able to keep track on on behalf of their clients who’ve contacted me, and that business’s managers have either ignored me or come up with pathetic excuses for why they “can’t” contact their own clients.  They have chosen to do nothing to make sure that their clients clearly know how to reach them, nor to make sure their clients are even aware that the top-level AriaCouture.com domain isn’t associated with them.  In a day and age where it’s Business 101 to make sure to come up with a business name with an available dot-com, they didn’t stop to think about how they were going to cause confusion.  (To be clear: Aria is a pretty name to them, but to me, it’s my actual legal real-life legit name.)  Instead of a different dot-com, they chose a secondary-level domain.  A simple “Not associated with AriaCouture.com” on their cards and website would go a long way toward making their clients aware of the difference. Have they done so?  Nope. They’re happy to take your money, then good luck to their clients if there are problems, and tough luck to me for having to deal with the fallout that belongs on them.

I won’t give prom dress refunds for them, can’t cancel orders for them, etc.  I didn’t receive money for them, can’t access their database, etc.  This company is the sole reason I had to shut off my Facebook reviews.  I was the one getting their negative reviews!!!  And I’m sick of it.  But please, PLEASE be aware that our businesses are entirely unrelated.  I am the very original, and started my business back when most people couldn’t even say Aria right.  “AIR-ea” and “are-EYE-uh” were common mispronunciations at the time.

If they rip you off (and some of their clients who’ve contacted me have done so regarding orders they never received and they’ve been unable to reach the correct business), please contact me though and let’s see what I can do to help you.  I can’t replace orders they don’t deliver, but may be able to work with you on a discount of some sort for something custom to offset your losses with them, but please don’t expect custom work done by one woman in the United States to be price-matched to off-the-rack items made in Chinese and Indian sweat factories.  This’ll be the absolute best I can do.  

Please don’t take your anger at that company out on me.  I am truly a one-woman business operating out of my house in Washington State, not in any way associated with the stores in Massachusetts and Rhode Island.

The beauty and body-positivity in burlesque

This in-progress corset is for a burlesque performance one month from now. (There will be a non-sponsored ad-ish in this post for a performance.)
There are pieces that go under the corset, bra, and skirt that aren’t drawn in this pic.  Initially I hesitated to say much about burlesque here, but you know what?  I’ve had quite a few people reach out to me since my post a few weeks ago, people who have been feeling bad about themselves and their bodies, people trying to find a way to feel attractive and sexy again, and if they can be so vulnerable with me, then the least I can do is to take the bull by the horns and open up some conversation about something that has been helping me with the same issue.

It can be very, very easy to feel like a mashed potato when we’ve all been stuck at home so long, unable to go out and see real people, having our images of reality shaped by edited photos on Instagram and photoshopped images in magazines, faces digitally altered in real time on TikTok since that’s where technology is these days.  Our mirrors and eyes, however, haven’t caught up, and so we see true reality in ourselves and compare ourselves to the faux reality of the internet, movies, and print media.  I watched my own 11-year-old start to fall down this rabbit hole.

It can be startlingly easy to forget that images meant to sell us something, whether that’s products or the pretty view of like that bloggers and bloggers wish was their life every moment, are in no way representative of reality, no more than reality TV is reality.  Yet this is what we’ve had for a year now.   But it’s not like self esteem issues only started last March.  The very first corset I made back in 2004 was for someone who wasn’t comfortable unclothed with her partner because she couldn’t see herself as sexy since she wasn’t a size 2 (neither was I at the time).  So I made her a white silk corset with caribou trim, and she refused to take it off the first time she tried it on.  She left my house will wearing it. 🙂 But even that wasn’t the start of it.  Self-esteem issues suck, and go back to probably the beginning of time.

Me in burlesque class
February 23, 2020

Before the lockdowns started, I was getting my toes wet in the burlesque world, hoping myself to find some way to accept myself.  I have a lot of scars and a body that has betrayed me.  It’s hard to feel attractive when you’ve got my medical history of missing organs, your body attacking itself, and spending an extraordinary about of time on a daily basis keeping your body running.  The prettiest car body in the world can make the owner never want to look at it again if the engine requires extensive maintenance to do basic errands.

But I was still so worried about what others would think that I told absolutely no one what I was doing. I told Cody he’d find out on April 20th, and to please ask no questions.  I was starting to feel a little okay, though still exceedingly nervous.

Then the instructor I had said some things that destroyed what little confidence I had, but literally just half an hour or so after I met the producer from another company who was his polar opposite.  I wasn’t sure if I was even going to go through with any of it anymore.  I went from starting to feel okay with myself to feeling like crusty days-old mashed potatoes left on the counter too long.  I suppose it was for the best that the world shut down mere weeks ahead of that.

Last month I started being a show kitten.  Show kittens are show assistants.  (Yes, there are in-person shows, but they are distanced, held outdoors, masked, etc.  Temps of the performers and skeleton crew are taken, etc.  These shows are also viewable online for those who prefer to stay in or who are too far away.)  And I had a chance to talk more with performers who have been performing anywhere from just a couple months to years, and the level of care and acceptance and support is unlike anything I’ve ever seen before.  I’m sitting here not even sure what words are strong enough to convey just how much.  I’ve watched people of all body shapes and sizes and genders across the spectrum get out there and do everything from staying entirely clothed to ending up in pasties, with performances ranging from the funniest things I’ve ever seen onstage in my life to touching performances about deaths from cancer not stopping living.  And do you know what you notice the more you watch?  That these amazing people, whose bodies are more like mine than like catalogues and movies, look more beautiful than anything.  The joy on their faces, even during the most heart-touching of numbers, is everything.  It’s a celebration of being human and enjoying it.  And if they can look that happy and be that beautiful without filters and airbrushing, literally more beautiful for it, then why can’t I?  Why can’t you?  Whether that’s onstage or at home.

And you know what else?  My daughter turned 11 in December, and had already been wanting to lose weight since she sees herself as fat.  She sees me eat like crazy (I go through major calories), but has still picked up on toxic messages that you have to look a certain way to be okay.  She has seen some burlesque performance videos, and watched the Broadway Takeover production online a few weeks ago.  Guess what her reaction was.  She doesn’t care about dieting anymore, just about making food choices that make her body feel good.  I was literally having to force her to eat sometimes.  Now she’s not worried about that, because she thinks that the performers she saw look absolutely…in her words…”so cool…when can I do that?”  (When you’re 18, kiddo.) It’s helped reinforce to her that the body is art, not something to be ashamed of.

I think burlesque is often misunderstood as just stripping onstage, and there’s a lot of stigma against it.  Incidentally, that stigma tells us that we should be ashamed of our bodies.  That stigma needs to be broken, and whatever someone chooses to do with their body respected as their choice, instead of people being made to feel ashamed.  Making others feel ashamed makes us feel ashamed.  How we try to make others feel is how we will make ourselves feel.  But if we believe it’s okay for others to do it and look beautiful and sexy or silly with fake mustaches or all of it together and everyone is happy, then it’s okay for us to try for ourselves, even if we only do it in our bedrooms at night.

But really, what is the difference?  Stripping in the sense of strip clubs is solely to titillate, which is absolutely fine when those performers want to be there (that’s a loaded topic for my other blog), but burlesque has a story, whether it’s as Tina from Bob’s Burgers as an adult baring her butt or a fully-clothed drag king lip syncing to a number from Book of Mormon the world or just to say “I feel damn sexy tonight,” and how much comes off or stays on will depend on the message the performer wants to convey.  It’s a variety show in the truest sense of the word.  And think about this–burlesque shows on the 1920’s and 1930’s and 1940’s were literally no different than burlesque today except for one key thing that I’ll cover in a few minutes.  Watch some I Love Lucy and see the examples of burlesque numbers Ethel and Fred talk about and do in the show itself, and pay attention to the things they talk about doing that would have been incredibly racy for the time, but that we now see as no big deal.  Here, watch part of a sketch from one of the show’s most hilarious episodes (you can hear Desi Arnaz off stage laughing like crazy at times during this episode):

That bit was a well-known burlesque sketch going back a few decades by that point.  But this breathtakingly gorgeous piece, which isn’t at all funny, is also burlesque.

And here is another that is very much a cross of the above, a bit racier and also humorous.

Three very different acts, all burlesque. The only thing that’s really changed is that anybody with any body is welcome. If we can appreciate looking back on these videos now, then why can’t we appreciate it when there is no size barrier?

In just the short time I’ve been a kitten, I’ve found myself being kinder to myself and seeing myself better.  I think maybe a part of the solution to feeling so much like left over mashed potatoes isn’t to hide more, where we privately nitpick at ourselves, but to free ourselves to be ourselves as we are, and at burlesque shows, no one is nitpicking flaws, only looking for the good.  When you see these performers on stage and a mistake is made or a zipper is being a pain, you don’t sit there thinking they look stupid.  You cheer them on as they figure it out and enjoy that they’re sharing themselves with us.  The more you see this, the more you think, “That looks like so much fun.  I could do that too.”

And maybe…just maybe…

Next month is a Little Lioness Productions production with a Disney theme, and you can watch in person or from home.  Most performances will be on stage, and a couple will be via video.  This actually adds to the overall fun of shows.  Since I prefer to lead by example instead of just telling others what to do or to try to try to find confidence, I’m…in the show.  I’ll be Snow White.  If you’d like more info on it, the Facebook events page has some, and if you’re interested in watching either in person at Big Legrowlski in Portland or at home, tickets are available here.  It is Saturday, March 20th.  Doors open at 7:30, and the show starts at 8:15.  You do have to be 21 to attend in person, though all ages are welcome to watch online.

I encourage you to go ahead and give it a watch.  A lot of the numbers are still being choreographed, but what I know so far is there will be silliness and sexiness and possibly some touching numbers, just a bit of a lot of things.  My own number initially had more comedy in it when I started it last year, but we have to keep at least 6′ away from the audience now.

Helping people feel beautiful and sexy is something I love to do, and this is something that has been helping me, definitely enough that I’m actually doing it.  I was once in your shoes, thinking “There’s no way I could,” but then I pushed myself and started watching.  Modern burlesque is such a celebration of the human body as an art piece to tell a story and it’s just wonderful.  If you don’t end the night feeling a bit better about your own body and what it can do, then I may end up having to channel someone else whose career started in burlesque…

Some underbust corsets on an actual person

Just a heads up that this post will contain pics of me in a corset, and not in the historical sense.  No nipples will be showing, but all the same, I know there are people out there who are offended by photos of people in corsets.  Seriously.  But after my post yesterday about nixing the pricing structure I had, I had quite a few people message me about underbust corsets (I have enough inquiries now for corsets at the example price range that I really don’t think I can do more at that pricing right now) for boudoir and to try to feel sexy and attractive again after a year of being locked down without being able to go to gyms and do other things that fall under the self-care umbrella, and several included inquiries about if I had photos of any of my underbust corsets on people.

Howdy, world. How ya doin’?

Obviously society tends to get the vapors about this sort of thing, so I haven’t shared any previously, only on dress forms which tend to lose a lot of the effect.  So I decided to go ahead and share some of my own.  If anyone’s going to take heat for photos like this, I’d rather have the heat directed at me (might save money on my electricity bills since it’s cold…so aim that heat here, please!) rather than to ask anyone I’ve made this style of corset for to send pics for me to share.  I’m pretty sure it’s understood why many people would be shy about doing that.  Body confidence is hard…incidentally, I had more of it when I was 400 pounds than I do now…and there are many cruel jerks on the internet who get off on being mean and trying to tear people down after downing a handful of red pills.

But I personally don’t care and will eat incels for breakfast, so I post my own photos online, if you get my drift, yet am giving you that big long teal deer explanation anyway.  Insulting me only makes me post more to spite those infected ingrown hairs on horses’ butts.  I started to do it partly for the same reason as most of the inquirers–to try to not feel so blah over a year of not getting to do anything.  (And yes, I know there are people who live in various states of quarantine every year–I don’t get into my own medical history too much, but suffice it to say that I’ve got 28 years of experience and scars from my body rejecting some of my own organs, so I understand VERY well.)

To disclose, all photos of myself are selfies.  I don’t have the confidence to let others take pics of me.  Ironic, I know.  C’est la vie. Just mentioning that since I’ve had some people surprised that they’re selfies and I just want to be clear that I’m not withholding photo credit from anyone.

So you can see the very different fit on me versus on the dress form.  Even though it’s super dense foam, the lack of a skeleton means it looks crinkly.  This is one of my two primary underbust corsets that I have photos of.  This one is silk with more money than I care to admit being spent on Swarovski crystals.  The embroidery on the ribbon is only on the ribbon, and the design comes from the wedding gown at the end of the live action Cinderella movie.  To be extra, the modesty panel in the back is also embroidered and fully crystalled.  Speaking of modesty panel, is anyone else amused at the name?  As if that’s what makes corsets modest.

You can see some of that more in this video, which is on a weird spot on the page and I don’t know what do about that.

 

And the other I’m sharing is my silk dragons corset, with silk velvet binding.  I don’t have photos on a dress form for this one.  It is underbust.  What appears to be a corset top is a bra.  I do wish I’d enameled the busk gold as I did for the one above.

The back of this corset comes up a good bit higher than usual, as you can see in this one and only photo I could find from the side or back, though I could have sworn I had more. It’s similar to the back of the crystal corset though.

So here are just a couple of the underbust style.  That specific cut.  I didn’t expect so many people to be so interested in this same style at the same time, but I actually think it’s pretty awesome.

New pricing structure

My previous structure was:

+estimate cost of fabrics and supplies
+estimate hours times direct labor per hour
+a universal fee that covers things like wear and tear on machines and other costs not covered by the supplies and labor, like time researching and sourcing
                                                                     
=Cost

When a quote would be requested, this is was my starting point.  If fabrics or other supplies came from my stash, I’d use the approximate price I paid, which means that things I stocked up on while on sale would some with a bit of a savings, and sometimes I could use antique supplies, like easy 19th century trim, that I wouldn’t be able to find spur of the moment.  And then creating things would have priority when it came to my time rather than come after other things.  If I missed an event for my daughter, then I did.  If I missed volunteering for something, then I did.

But at this point, supplies are just sitting there, and time is an abstract concept.  The only scheduled thing is some performing I’m working on and show-kittening.

My new structure, for the time being, is that there isn’t one.  If there’s something you’re interested in and don’t have a close or strict deadline, let me know what it is, and your budget (either in one lump or in payments), and I’ll see if I have the supplies already and either comp them entirely or discount them steeply.  The more free time in my schedule, the more I can come down on pricing.  I need a reason to get out of bed by 2 in the afternoon. 😂 And you need something more to look forward to than endless nothingness, just…who knows what there is to look forward to in the future when we don’ know if we’ll even get to have the holidays this year or if it’s another year not seeing loved ones.  So let’s put at least something out there to look forward to.

Want an icy blue silk Victorian corset with some silver embroidery on a couple of the panels and can pay $150 (they usually start at $500) and I have the supplies? My thought process: the busks I use and have right now, are German steel spoon busks that I had custom made for about $40 each (made in Germany, custom, no cheap but amazing), and the particular boning I use works out to about $40 per corset, and the silk was 60€/m, plus other supplies like grommets, lining, coutil interlining, etc..  The cost of supplies are more than that $150, meaning technically a financially loss to me whenever I get around to restocking, BUT they’re also just sitting there doing on one any good and I don’t foresee the economy bouncing back to the point that I’m likely to need to restock soon anyway.

So…you got it!  Custom embroidered silk corset for $150 and something to look forward to, and I have something to help me keep on some sort of schedule for my sanity.

Want Christine Daeé’s mirror robe in a soft cotton for $250 (usually starting last $750)?  My thought process: I have the perfect cotton, so that one would depend on if I have the lace already.  That one uses a lot of it, so I might have to add in the cost of the lace, but otherwise…sure.

There will be some reasonable limitations. Want something that would take 300 hours, and 18 yards of French silk taffeta for $500?  Or 100 cotton face masks for $100?  That’ll be a No, so please understand that, while I’m very willing to scale back a lot and comp a lot more than usual, there will still be some lines beyond which I will say no.  Still, go ahead and send your inquiries and offers, and you might find a Yes where you’d expect a No since what I’m considering reasonable is quite far down right now. I’m pretty sure the difference between a corset that’ll take about 15-20 hours, include custom drafting and embroidery, and $150-ish in supplies I already have sitting there several times over, for $150, and something taking taking 300ish hours and $1,400 in supplies that would use all of that fabric that I have left, for $500 is kinda apparent.

If you send an open inquiry, I’ll reply with what my normal quotes would have been or with a link to this post.  Right now, it’s less about a for-profit business (if you knew how much time and supplies I donate to non-profits in a usual year, you’d question if this is actually a for-profit business anyway, considering I put more money and time into 501(c)3’s than I actually talk about, and I’m lucky to be in a position to do so), and more about let’s just all try to help each other get through this and have some reasons to smile.  The for-profit-ish side of things can wait until life is back on track.

Let’s see who gets the reference in this image, which was going to be my closing line to this post until I amused myself by singing it. 😂

In fact, I dare you to send those offers you’re thinking right now. 😁

Announcement of a pricing structure change

I may be walking into a virtual minefield here, but between the magazine I flipped through mentioned below, this HuffPo article, and couple things that happened on the way to a book store yesterday, I decided to go ahead and do what I wanted to do last fall and throw my pricing structure out the window, and scrap even discounts, and instead move to a new system for a while.  I’m going to post about it tomorrow.  For right now, I just want to explain the reason why because anything to do with money right now risks making people mad.

Since last fall, when I predicted this was going to go on for quite some time (and was called out as “pessimistic” by people in my personal life who thought the end was going to be before Christmas…), I thought about lowering prices to reflect what’s happening, but then worried that that would be seen as opportunistic.  The FTC even had to come down on MLM hunbots who were trying to poach people’s stimulus money, making price-adjustments more iffy.  So I nixed the usual Black Friday/Cyber Monday stuff I’ve done every year for many years.  It didn’t feel right, but I did it.

At about 3am or so yesterday, I read that Huffo article and read every comment on Instagram and Facebook, and it was sad.  I think we all know that society in general has just hit walls.  It’s hard to feel any reason for continuing to exist when there’s nothing more to look forward to than vague “one day, when this is over”‘s, and there’s so much shaming of people who want to celebrate anything, and even for those who can ignore that shaming, there are still a lot of financial issues for so many because of extremely obvious reasons.  So it’s just running repeatedly into a wall and breaking into apathy.  It resonated deeply and descried pretty well how I felt at the worst of my illnesses growing up.  I kept mulling over some of those comments though…

Then yesterday morning at around 9am (no sleep FOR THE WIN…and it’s 4:35am and I’m awake still) I was walking through the fabric store yesterday getting spray paint, as one does when getting spray paint, and walked by the magazine display.  I saw a magazine for weddings*, and decided to flip through it really quick, and was struck by how much thinner the total magazine was versus issues a year ago.  I get it.  Really.  When so many people can’t travel or are afraid to even in areas where local rules make it okay, big weddings just aren’t happening.  It’s a social gathering, and where I am, those are limited to 15 people, but only outdoors, and some states and localities still have stay-at-home orders altogether, or bounce back and forth between having them or not.  Hard to plan anything when what’s allowed day to day is iffy.  So who wants to rush ahead planning weddings?  So what’s happened is pretty much most people who wanted big weddings either scaling back altogether because why bother having any part of they dream, or pushing it back until 2023 or later. It made my heart sad since, for some people, weddings are their ultimate way of declaring love, and they can’t. (*I know weddings aren’t for everyone…stay tuned for an upcoming post about this.)

The two thing that pushed me over the edge into deciding to go ahead and do this happened when my daughter and I were on our way into Portland to pick up some music books.

Let me preface this by saying that she was just cast in an Oregon Ballet Theater production last year when the lockdowns hit.  That was taken away.  The horse camp she and her Girl Scout troop worked for was taken away.  Everything she worked for was taken away.  Nutcracker.  School.  Halloween.  Everything.  All because Covid makes it so that literally everything in children’s lives is now subject to being taken away.  Why have goals?  That’s been severely depressing her and has had her in suicide watch at various points.  That’s how I lost my dad in 2003, and so this has been especially hard for me too.  Something as simple as a goal to look forward to, that can’t be taken away…

So in the car I played a Lord of the Rings song for m daughter that she said reminded her of Star Wars, and she wished she could play it on her flute.  Well, the books we were going to pick up were flute music books, which she didn’t know at all, just that we were going to pick up a few things, and one of them?  STAR WARS.  They’re beyond what she can do right now, but she got so excited and said it’s something she can work for that can’t get taken away. Just…a simple goal.  Something to look forward to.  No student concerts, no one will see, but it’s something she can work toward and reach now.  I thought about the magazined I’d looked at and how wedding goals were smashed.

Without thinking, I told her to look up Galadriel on her phone, and she did, and said she wanted the dress Galadriel wears.  I hadn’t made her anything in a year because…why?  What for?  I decided that, since I still have some of the fabric left over from making one before, and nothing the foreseeable future, why not offer to make it, even if only to do some photos.  Sure, it’ll be a financial bloodbath (something like $400 or yard…ouch), but the fabric is just sitting there, and if it could potentially make her even a little happy…

Folks, she was over the moon.  So over the moon that it seared itself into my head in the way that I can tell you the exact spot of the interstate we were on   Just the prospect of a pretty dress to wear, even in our backyard, lit her up.  A goal that couldn’t get taken away, and then a dress.  It gave her a distraction from the doldrums of daily life, and just…something to look forward to.

I decided then to do what I’d been wanting to do for months now, even though it will undoubtedly make some people try mad and think I’m being an opportunist.  It’s damned if you do, damned if you don’t.  Raise them, and you’re taking advantage if people, lower them, and you’re an opportunist.  What my plan is will probably result in a net loss for me, but eh.

Regardless of what’s happening in the world, we all need reasons to be happy and to have something to look forward to.  (Don’t even start on “but people are dying”–unless you know the extent and severity and length of my medical history, you have less than no room to lecture me on this.  None.)  That’s what helps get is through the rough times, something positive out there in the future to reach for and to pull us through the quagmire.  So I’ll be doing that in the way I know how.  If that makes some people mad, so be it.  For others, it might be the boost needed to look forward with some happiness, and that’s more important than trying to keep some people from getting mad.  More people need to get to feel what Charlotte felt today, and I hope to get to make that happen.

So I’m going to write up the new stuff and get it posted by tomorrow.

Bridgerton , body-shaming, and a missed opportunity, walk into a bar…

Note: This post tackled more topics than I initially intended, but they all are related.

Over the years, I’ve met many people who want to wear regency, but fear it’ll make them look “fat” or “fatter than [they are]”, quotes that are sad because they’re ashamed of their bodies.  But since someone who knows fabrics and design well enough, as I do thanks partly to experience as a much, much larger person, can alter the visual proportions of the body, regency can actually be a great tool to help someone start to like their bodies.  Unfortunately, Bridgerton…let’s swing back around to that.

Continue reading “Bridgerton , body-shaming, and a missed opportunity, walk into a bar…”

Life update

In early November, while writing on my Days of Thanks series, soothing happened that was absolutely devastating to me as well as a couple small children (not my own) thanks to someone I trusted gaslighting someone else I trusted, resulting in me losing that person and those children from my life. My daughter and the little girl were bonding in their own way as well.  Gaslighting is literally a form of abuse, and it’s a hard one to handle since the victim is made to believe they can only trust the abuser.  This abuser has already admittedly interfered with one other relationship this person has, resulting in a divorce, and she admits wanting this person all to her very own self, and I was his last friend aside from her.  He’s completely alienated now, and it’s just crushing.

That distracted me a good deal, as you may be able to imagine.  Tons of tears, tons of trying to get him to read full context about something, trying to get him to realize I couldn’t have said something (a lie about my birthdate) on a very specific day when I was 127 miles away, and to explain to me how I could have “created holiday conflicts” with a schedule when I didn’t create the holidays.  Yeah, blame me for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I actually really was.

When provably false accusations are made against you by someone who admitted to you wanting everyone out of someone’s life, and you can’t get the victim to even look at context or explain those things, and it results in immediate severance from children you love, it’s hard.  It’s been very hard.  I lost all motivation to do anything.

Yesterday I started rearranging one of my sewing rooms, and hopefully a fresh arrangement in there will help me want to go in there more.  I have a lot to do still, just…I think you understand what I can’t figure out how to say.  It’s just been rough.  2020 sucks.

For anyone worried about me seeing someone outside of my household, we’re talking a very small group with me getting weekly COVID tests, sometimes twice weekly.  If I don’t ever get out of my house, I will literally go insane, and as it is, my antidepressants have been increased twice this year to help me handle what’s going on.  I think a lot of us are in a similar position with mental health these days.