Me Made May 2016

Hello All! This is my little round up of this years MMM. I loved participating this year because for the first time in my life I haven't had a compulsory dress code to follow. My challenge was to wear something handmade everyday and to also sew for 20 minutes everyday. I did wear something handmade every day, but the 20 minutes of me sewing didn't happen so much. But I am willing to cut myself some slack as I do sew 6 hours a day,  5 days a week now anyway. My photos have been the best they've ever been for MMM namely because of my wonderful friends  and beautiful uni campus. The days I missed were mostly weekends when I was wearing sweats.
It's really interesting to look at all the outfits together. The colours and shapes don't really form a cohesive collection at all. But I would get bored if I wore the same thing all the time. I love exploring with different shapes and colours, but I also love snuggling down in my comfies at the end of the day. Variations of my True Bias Hudson Pants get worn almost daily.
Below are a couple of my favourite outfits that just made me happy to wear.







I hope that was vaguely insightful!
Lauren xx

Lace Bodysuit

Hello all! After seeing all of Madalynne's amazing bodysuits over the last few months I got really inspired to make my own. So on my next trip to Goldhawk Road I kept my eye out for the perfect lace and nude lining, and I found them! I think 1m of each cost me around £8 in total? 

I muddled together a bodysuit pattern from a pair of my pants/undies and the Kitschy Coo Lady Skater bodice. It was all a bit rough and ready because I was very aware that my nude fabric was more of  a double knit and so didn't have a lot of lengthwise stretch, so I left a fair bit of ease in to account for that. For that reason, it isn't skin tight because then it would become uncomfortable.
For the first time in my fairly short life I'm going to parties with alcohol and dancing, and I've been wanting something to wear that makes me feel a bit sexy and more confident and just more able to embrace the dancing spirit. (I can dance to Blues Brothers stone cold sober, but today's 'music' takes a bit more effort.) I thought this bodysuit would fit the bill perfectly, with a fairly high front neckline and low back.
I probably could have made the back a bit lower, but when I made the observation and decided to remedy it I accidentally cut the front neckline lower. Low enough to show everything. So in a panic I kind of appliqued the front neckline back on and left the back neckline well alone. It looks a bit scrappy up really close, but I've been informed that it isn't very noticeable atall.
I finished the armholes and neckline with knicker elastic because it's my favourite new thing to finish knit edges with. However, I'd run out of it by the time that I'd gotten to the leg holes so I used fold over elastic instead. I applied it to each leg hole in a different way and the top finish is definitely my favourite. It's a lot sturdier and you have a lot more control.
It is a bit rough and ready. The armholes aren't even and the back straps aren't even but they are easily forgotten about when it's worn. I worry that the white isn't quite right for my skintone, but that can easily be fixed with a colourful cardi. The back is too low for a bra, but it's perfectly supportive for what's there without one.

I've worn it in various ways with a skirt and with boyfriend jeans and I love how different each outfit looks and how different each outfit feels. Add a leather jacket to the jeans and I'm a badass. My friends get tongue-in-cheek Lauren for the rest of the day. Add a skirt and cardi and it's a beautifully elegant summer outfit. My, clothing is powerful.

I spent a lot of time wondering how I was going to document this bodysuit. I wanted to show you guys all of it, not just the top half. Was it only acceptable to photograph it inside? Would the lighting be rubbish and affect the quality of the photos? My friend Amy suggested handstands as a way for you guys to see all of the bodysuit in a slightly more acceptable way. Only one problem. I am totally incapable of doing handstands. My solution was to drag 3 friends outside at lunch and get them to hold my legs up for me. You've got to admit, it makes for a fairly amusing photo. 
After that, I decided that I might as well just take my skirt off and get on with it. And I'm glad I did.
Thank you guys for reading and I hope you all had a lovely day! Thanks to my long suffering friends Amy, Alex, Zoe and Bethan for solving puzzles and for holding my legs up when I ask them too. 
Lauren xx

Pink Inari Tee Dress

Hello all! I finally have a new make to show you. I was intrigued by how good everyone's Named Inari tee dresses looked so I thought I'd try a new silhouette out. And I really really like it.


The fabric made this simple dress a lot more of a 'mare than it should have been. I found this viscose remnant on ebay and the colours and print are stunning but it's shifty as heck and frays every time you look at it.
 I added a CB seam to get it out of 1.1m of fabric. Even though I understitched the facing it kept flipping up so I stitched it down in my break.
I have come to the conclusion that without an overlocker, seam allowances need to be 1.5cm or more. There isn't a lot you can do to finish a 1cm seam allowance if you don't hong kong it. I pinked these seam allowances, but I'm not sure how well they are going to hold up!
This is very much a dress that needs wearing with shorts underneath.
It's super super comfy. One of those dresses you don't notice you're wearing. In this dress I went to uni for the day, out for dinner in London, a walk outside Buckingham Palace, a cocktail at the pub and quite a bit of dancing. There's been a little wear and tear on one of the splits but that can easily be patched up.
In other news, I got my braces off on Thursday! Arghh looking at these pics makes me so happy!

Thanks for reading and to MK for taking photos!
Lauren xx

Aggy Gnome - The Musical

Hello all!
I took a bit of a leap into the unknown by writing, composing and staging a musical for my friend Millie's 19th birthday over the Easter holidays. Aggy Gnome was the tale of a girl that magic was not kind to. She gets turned into an aggy gnome by a jealous witch, and then into an aggy dragon by a wizard who's not entirely sure what he's doing. (aggy is a shortcut for aggravated) It was great fun to write. I've never written original songs before so that was a pretty big learning curve, but it was pretty cool to hear them sung on stage/in our kitchen. We also had some classic songs including 'Somebody to Love', Wicked's 'Defying Gravity' with the title words exchanged for 'being a lesbian' and 'At Last' by Etta James.

Aggy Gnome was set in a fairytale universe, so it needed appropriate props and costumes. I managed to adapt lots of existing pieces in my collection, spending only £4.50 on some hessian sacking for the cretin costume, custard creams and for masks and leaves for the dragon masks. This dress and this top made an appearance.
Props-wise I made 2 dragon masks with masks, leaves and pva glue. My friend MK stuck some cotton balls onto the lower half of a mask for the gnome mask. I made a sword from my strongbow cider box and wrapped that in tin foil. The crown was cut out of a rice crispie box and left as is as I was pretty much done at that point. Below is Lydia wearing her dragon wings and mask. I could have done a lot better with the wings but I didn't have enough fabric so had to make do.
 I also made a tree from a big cardboard box, green card, masking tape and brown paint. This tree caused a lot of trouble. It was being stored in the kitchen and was mistaken by rubbish by the cleaner so I had to go on a tree rescue mission. It was eventually recovered (my first bin diving experience). There was also a wasp nest made from brown paper wrapped around a big water bottle. The 'tree' was no where near as stable as it needed to be and collapsed halfway through the show to general hilarity.

Costume-wise I made a shirt for myself as the Prince, a sack dress for the cretin and some dragon wings for the aggy dragon. For the shirt I wanted something massive and pouffy. I used the Grainline Archer pattern as a base, with major adaptations. The leather jacket soon got abandoned because it was far too hot.

 It was made from an old white sheet. I decided that I wanted a front and back yoke, with a gathered front and back attached with massive gathered pouffy sleeves with a ruffle-y cuff. I also wanted a neckline ruffle.











First, I decided to discard the front Archer piece and work only from the back. I cut 2 yokes -
1 for the front of the shirt and 1 for the back. I then cut 2 back pieces on the fold, placing the side seams as close to the selvedge as I could so it could be gathered into the yoke. I split the sleeve into 3 lengthways and spread it out for a puffed sleeve. I also made it 10cm longer so I could turn it back on itself, and insert some elastic to make an easy gathered cuff.

When that was all put together I gathered up a long rectangle folded in half so the outside edge would be clean and gathered that into a V neckline on the skirt. It was sewn wrong side to wrong side, then trimmed, turned over to the right side and topstitched. My gathers didn't work very well and they aren't very even. 2 layers of the sheet fabric was very bulky.
As a performer I loved this shirt. It really helped me get into character and it's so incredibly comfy!
So yeah, that's what I got up to over Easter!
Thanks for reading,
Lauren xx