Condiments for Julie?

Julie is one of my all-time favorite clients.  She is a professional dancer, teaching and competing with her students.  She is also a retired a professional competitor, and that helps to explain the fact that this is our 53rd project together, by my count.  She picked up her new gown at the Snow Ball this weekend, and laughed in the dressing room, telling another dancer about looking at this gown at one point in our process and seeing ketchup and mustard!  Hence the silly name for this post.  

I am particularly fond of the buttons on the cuff detail. 

Julie was not on my schedule for the Snow Ball, but was taken by surprise just before Thanksgiving when both of her ballgowns sold to another dancer.  She called to explain her situation, and despite being VERY booked for the Snow Ball, I could not say no to Julie.  Our design meeting was mostly about the hunt for, and discovery of, an interesting piece of ombred fabric.  With only the vaguest of sketches, I talked with my salesman about the fabric, to confirm color and vibrancy, and sent for a piece of it.  While the ombre flew across the pond, I basted together a leotard, since we knew Julie wanted a portion of the gown to be rhinestone-embellished nude mesh.  When the fabric arrived, Julie met with me and we wrapped it around her body and watched our design flicker into life. She is a beautiful woman and this photo, while illustrating our process, does not do her justice.

Julie's confidence is a tremendous asset in design and fittings.  Even in a moment of doubt, (like seeing condiments instead of flaming gorgeousness!) she is always willing to move ahead from where we are.  I appreciate her calmness and ability to be patient until a great next step presents itself.

The design lines and details of this gown are simple, in the interest of allowing the color shift to be the eye-catching aspect of the work.  We both felt it would need an awesome piece of jewelry to provide focus and cohesion.  We tried out a few of my patterns and Julie liked one she felt was "Amazon" in character.  I reconfigured it to allow it to drop in a v-shape, both in the front and at the back, allowing it to synchronize with and support the neckline in three dimensions. Then I devised a simple means for it to attach to the gown that allows it both to move with Julie and stay neatly in place.  After testing, my paper pattern was drawn onto nude mesh fused to ultrasuede for comfort.  I edge-stitched for durability, and painstaking cut it all out.  Here it is, ready for my syringe of adhesive and the rhinestone embellishment.  As you can see, there are also a couple of bangle bracelets and a pair of as-yet-un-trimmed earrings, at the far left of the shot.

Here are the finished bangles and earrings, and a shot of the necklace connection, which I hope you cannot see!

And here is the gorgeous Julie, modeling the finished gown.

And with her awesome husband, and amateur competitive partner, Ken, wearing one of our suits.

Gown and Ballroom Suit by Made for Movement

I have not been the best blogger in 2013, and have written about only a few of the gowns I created.  I am gong to try and play catchup, (ketchup???) starting with my most recent work, and over the next few weeks, I will see if I can't get most of last years work posted so I can move on to some things I am really excited about for 2014, among them a DRAGON DRESS!  Thanks for reading and if you are imagining a 2014 project, call today to reserve time on my schedule!  

Ember's Icy Skyline

Ember is an accomplished woman, with a busy life as the Chief Advancement Officer with Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota. Known for her work as a broadcast political analyst, she is also an attorney, former Minnesota state senator, former radio personality, and enjoys acting in local community theatre productions. 

After some years away from competitive ballroom dance, she visited my studio last fall to ask my professional opinion of several gently used gowns she was considering buying for use in a local "Dancing with the Celebrities" charitable event. I gave her my thoughts and we artfully adjusted her choice (a Made for Movement gown) to fit. She looked great in the gown. and dazzled the crowd at her event with her winning performance.  Here you see her with her Dancer's Studio teacher Chris Kempainen, (also wearing a Made for Movement ballroom suit) holding their trophies.

She must also have been having a good time, because she decided to return to competitive dance and asked me to design a custom rhythm gown for her for the Snow Ball, which I was glad to do. 

As her career would suggest, Ember is a conservative woman, at home in tailored suits and not really interested in ruffles or overly-feminine details on her clothing.  As a dancer, she has both good performance skills, and long, attractive lines to display.  Ember wanted a gown that would be reflective of her stately elegance, and also her joyfulness at her return to dancing.

We wanted her gown to have simple, sleek lines, and be all one color.  Ember chose fuchsia, (a very popular choice in the last year) and it certainly is a joyful color.  We wanted her rhythm look to flatter her body and be tasteful and appropriate to her age.  We chose a longer, soft skirt with nice movement, but not fussy frills or ruffles, and sleeves to connect her slim arms to her body and emphasize her long lines. 

Ember is dancing here with her dance professional and teacher, the wonderful Scott Anderson, who is also the organizer of the Twin Cites Open. Ever an aware guy on the floor, he noticed me with my camera, and moved closer, so my photos are a little better than usual here!  Ember has a lovely hourglass figure with a very small waist and we planned to reveal her waist while de-emphasizing her bust and hip with diagonal design lines, meticulously placed in fittings to flatter and define.

Although her skirt is long, we used a diagonal hemline to allow us to see her legs and knees in action.

When it came to embellishment, in keeping with Ember's dislike of the overdone and fussy, I let her look through a collection of prom dresses. She found one with details she liked, and I used those details as inspiration for the rhinestone application, as you can see here.

I applied the stoning to the top of the bodice, and my partner Michele did the hip line.  I thought (perhaps influenced maybe by working on this gown in January) that the detail looked like icicles on a roof.  Like the story of the blind men and the elephant, Michele thought it was a lovely representation of a winter night time city skyline.  I'm fond of the cuff detail as well.

Ember was a joy to work with, and we look forward to seeing her again, when she is ready for her next custom gown.

Patty's Quest for Emerald

Sometimes, a color is all important.  Patty came to my studio in search of the perfect emerald green for a new Rhythm gown.  Ballroom fabric suppliers provide a beautiful vibrantly pure (and sometimes neon) array of colors in a variety of fabrics, but greens for the last several years have been more on the yellow side of the color wheel than on the blue.  And Patty's dream color was on the blue side.  She had seen Oscar gowns in this magical but elusive color and nothing else would work. I think she was especially interested because her red hair is a new adventure for this octogenarian(!), and she really wanted to feature and flatter her spicy auburn.  Doesn't she look fantastic?


Her friend Randee came to her design meeting and helped work out our design.  Digging through my sources and scraps, we found a piece of silk in the perfect color to order for the skirt, and a scrap of satin lycra in my studio for a sash, but the stretch lace she wanted for her bodice did not exist in that particular emerald color.

So, off to superb dyer Marliss at Iris Color Studio I went, with a sample of white lace in the pattern Patty had chosen, to see if it could be made the perfect color.  Marliss did MANY tests.  The netting and portions of the flowers were nylon and other parts of the flowers were rayon, and the two fibers require different dyes.  Marliss struggled to get a deep, rich, vibrant enough color in either fiber.

Marliss's first samples, close, but not achieving the dream.

 When she mentioned the greatest challenge was getting the green to be both blue and vibrant enough, I mentioned the lace also came in bright, pure turquoise.  She was thrilled with the turquoise sample I took her and assured me that we could go ahead with the gown and she could get the color, particularly since the colored version of the lace was all nylon.

But I had to convince Patty that Marliss would come through.  Patty mentioned that having a  gown custom-made is a scary thing for her.  Trying to calm her fears, I suggested that even buying dancing lessons was potentially scary.  Teachers can demonstrate what steps and styling go with an Associate Bronze syllabus, and you can see how the dance looks on the teachers.  But what will you look like, doing those things?  You just have to trust the professionals to do their job, with your best interest at heart.  The same is true with custom dance wear design, but the difference is, when you are finished with the process, you have a valuable, re-sellable product.  What you learn in a dance lesson program is with you for your life and beneficial in a multitude of ways, but you cannot recoup any of the money you have spent, whereas, most gowns are good for a minimum of 75% of what you paid for them when you are ready for a new one, and that is a better value than buying a new car.  Fortunately, Patty gave me the go-ahead!

The turquoise lace Marliss over-dyed, and the final, perfect result.

Marliss came through brilliantly, and we cut, basted, assembled and fit Patty's gown.  I am especially proud of the lovely cuff detail on the sleeve.

Cuff Detail

I am also proud of the beautiful pattern match I achieved at the center back of the gown.  Lace yardage motifs can be very different sizes depending on where the pattern occurs on the piece, and blocking two pieces to exactly match each other is a tricky proposition.  Adding a zipper into the mix increases the challenge, but this worked out beautifully!

I am also happy with the beautiful edge I created with the lace selvedge.  And the rhinestone pattern works nicely with the lace pattern to emphasize shapes and edges, as well as providing all-over sparkle, while still allowing the vibrant emerald color to shine through.

I'll add one final shot of Patty dancing from the Dancer's Studio Showcase event last night.  I was not able to attend, but Patty had many family members and friends there to cheer her on and kindly shared these images with me.  Congratulations, Patty on your beautiful new gown, and on your performance!  I look forward to our next collaboration.

Randee's Hot Magenta

I have the most amazing clients!  Take Randee for example.  Randee is a former model and makeup artist, as well as a dancer.  She was willing to spend HOURS doing her hair and makeup in preparation for picking up her new gown and allowing me to take some photos for my blog.  I'd like to think my photography skills are improving, but in this case, I suspect it's the subject that improves my images.

Randee and I are both happy with the entire gown, but there are some particular elements I'd like to show off.

First, I have to give credit to my friend Marliss Jensen of Iris Color Studio.  Together, about 10 years ago, we worked out the process we use to create the shaded ombre effect featured in the skirt.  I choose colors (in this case, just the one) and Marliss prepares a dyed swatch to test the color accuracy and allow me to plan where I want the transitions to take place. I prepare the silk by washing it, cutting and sewing the skirt panels with silk thread, so stitches will dye with the silk, and even finishing the seams with silk surging thread.   Then I create a muslin jig and sew it to the bottom of the skirt, to give Marliss a means to control the mass of fabric at the hemline, as well as something to hang onto while dipping the skirt, upside down, into the dye vat.

In this case Marliss did her swatch on a piece of silk I had in my shop, but the stuff I ordered had been "dyed" white, infused with something to whiten the natural color of the silk.  She really had to work to get the "whitener" out and the color in as we wanted it to be, but as usual, she did a fantastic job. The color is one of Chrisanne's newest for 2011, called Hot Magenta.

Take a look at the bottom of the right sleeve, a pretty idea of Randee's.

The custom jewelry was designed for Randee to work specifically with this gown.  We co-ordinated the shape of the necklace with the shape of the necklline. The earrings were carefully planned to flatter her lovely chin and neck.  We wanted a big, chunky cuff for her bare arm, to call attention to her arm and hand styling, and I think this fits the purpose nicely.

If I told you her age, I promise you, you would fall out of your chair, and never again have a working excuse for a sagging jaw or wobbly underarm.

And speaking of pretty body parts, I think her back looks fantastic as well! And I would say the hours of hair styling paid off beautifully.

A HUGE thank you to Randee for letting me share her gorgeous new gown with you right away.  She won't have a chance to wear it until Twin Cities Open in July, but was kind enough to allow me to debut it here.  I can't wait to see some action shots.  In parting, here are a couple of other projects Randee and I have done together.