This week I am helping my good friend Beth make the best of some hand-me-down furniture. With a houseful of active young children, pristine new seating is out of the question. We are conspiring to recover and update the cushions on this chair rescued from her parents’ basement. We’ve been to Jo-Ann’s with a fistful of 40% off coupons and purchased a whole bolt of upholstery weight brushed cotton in a warm camel color as well as a few miles of cording, new batting, and lots and lots of thread. The update will come in the form of removal of the button-tufting, squaring off of the back cushions, and addition of piping to the seams.
But wait, it gets scarier- there’s a matching sofa! For now, though, I can only wrap my mind around the chair. Time to oil up my trusty Singer Touch and Sew 750 and see what happens…
I used to be a clothing designer in New York City, then I chucked it all to start a family. I stay busy as an independent designer of kids’ clothing and textiles for various companies, and for my own label “chirp & bloom”. This is my personal blog, where I keep my notes on all things vintage, green, handmade, indie, kid-friendly, and whatever else inspires me to keep evolving. Just for fun, I feature artisans I discover at indie craft shows and share sewing and other DIY projects through tutorials. Thanks for visiting!
All personal designs, images, and written words in this blog are copyrighted by Rebecca Harkin unless otherwise credited. Feel free to link back to my posts all you want, but please do not copy my photos or words without my permission.
3 comments:
Hello!
Before I introduce myself, I have to give credit to the Next Blog >> button for fortuitously leading me to your page! I'm a young girl with too many raw ideas :P I absolutely LOVE customizing my posessions, ESPECIALLY t-shirts! However, it's my curse of nature to look absolutely horrible in a t-shirt. I was reading your blog and your profile description and saw you have a plethera of experience! I was hoping you could help me come up with great ways to cut and sew t-shirts into something amazing. I can't do print-screen because...well...I'm just a poor high-schooler, but I do have lots and lots of transfer paper (lol). I had some ideas already on how to sew up one shirt. I have a picture of it if you ever wanted to see what I meant...
But yes! If you could comment me back on my blog at massivehamu.blogspot.com, I would GREATLY appreciate it!
Thanks a bunches!
~Hamu
Go to http://www.flickr.com/groups/alabamastitchbook/ to see altered and deconstructed tees Inspired by The Alabama Project. Then get "The Alabama Stitch Book" by Natalie Chanin, the designer who invented the look in novelty tees you see right now in J.Crew and Anthropologie. There are how-tos in it. Hope this helps!
Thank you very much for the link! It was very helpful.
I should have mentioned this before, but I'm a very 80s vintage or Japanese fashion kind of girl, so if you knew of any other t-shirt deconstructioners of those styles, that'd be awesome.
Once again, thank you for your help! That site gave me some ideas :)
~Hamu
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