It started, like many grand, elaborate, ideas, quite simply.
I was in Palmerston North visiting Juliet of Crazy Gypsy Chronicles, going to Fabric-a-Brac and generally having a lovely time. At Fabric-a-Brac I picked up a gorgeous vintage rayon, with red and purple and rust flowers on cream.
After Fabric-a-Brac, Juliet and I showed off our purchases, and Juliet displayed one of her treasures: a gorgeous vintage rayon, with red and purple and rust flowers on cream.
At first I thought my fabric had accidentally ended up in my pile, but nope, we’d both bought the same vintage fabric.
This got me thinking. The sewing world is so small, and always has been. Nana in Whanganui and Grandma in San Diego had some of the same fabrics from the 1960s. Every time a WSBNer makes an outfit one of us has the same fabric or pattern, or has already made something from it. Sewers around the world end up using the same fabrics and patterns.
Only a few weeks before I’d done a bulk Decades of Style pattern order with other Wellington sewers, and Nina of SmashtheStash and I had both bought the Dorothy Lara dress – which is what I was planning to make the feather rayon it. My Dorothy Lara would create a link between Nina’s pattern and Juliet’s fabric, for 0 degrees of sewing separation.
So, an idea: Could the Wellington Sewing Bloggers Network create a linking chain of sewing creations, where each person’s creation shares a fabric or pattern with the next person’s creation?
For example, Juliet could make pattern A with her feather rayon, I’d make the Dorothy Lara dress in it, Nina would make the Dorothy Lara dress in a spotty fabric, and the next blogger would make pattern B in a spotty fabric, and then someone else would make pattern B in another fabric, and so on, and so forth!
Three months of brainstorming, tearing through our stashes, comparing patterns, and sewing later, the Wellington Sewing Bloggers have a chain of creations that show all the links between the sewing world – and all the ways in which we take the same fabric and patterns, and make them completely unique to us.
To launch it off, we (well, half of us) got together for yum char (yum!) and photos, and to drool over each other’s makes.
Which means you get a sneak-peek at some of them!
Too sneaky? Want a proper look?
And that’s only 6 of the 20+ links!
Follow us for the next month and a bit! (really!), too see all the creations. I’ll update this page with each day’s blog post. And look! There is even a cunning little sidebar button to follow!
Already blogged:
#1: Two Random Word’s Sewaholic Granville in red floral
#2: Silly Billy Sewing’s Sewaholic Granville – in red floral! (and Silly Billy is responsible for the fabulousity that is these two final photos).
#3: Sewist Stitch’s Sewaholic makes a Granville in black & cream chiffon
#4: Fifty-Two Fancies makes a Grainline Alder in black and cream chiffon (and talks about 0 Degrees)
#5: Off-Grid Chic makes a Grainline Alder in gumnut babies cotton
#6: Modern Vintage Cupcakes makes a Named Wenona dress in gumnut babies
#7: Flossie FT makes a Named Wenona in goldfish cotton
#8 66 Stitches’ Simplicity 1880 in goldfish cotton
#9 Two Random Word’s Simplicity 1880 in spotted sateen
#10 Smash the Stash’s Dorothy Lara in spotted sateen
#11 The Dreamstress’ (that’s me!) Dorothy Lara in feathered rayon
#12 Crazy Gypsy Chonicles’ Belcarra in feathered rayon
#13 Sewist Stitches Belcarra in border print crepe de chine
#14 The Dreamstress makes a Dorothy Lara in border print crepe de chine
And in a new chain that’s going to link back in later:
The Curious Kiwi makes a Deer & Doe Bluet in Japanese Tanagrams
Modern Vintage Cupcakes makes a Deer & Doe Bluet in mushroom drill
Rubydust makes a Pauline Alice Alameda in mushroom drill
Since the sewing world is so small, I’m sure some of you have made something in the same fabric or pattern – if you have, leave a comment with links to it so that we can extend the 0Degrees of Sewing Awesome circle! You could even grab the blog button for your post to extend the linked chain!
The sewing world is so small! I follow your blog but live in Auckland. I was down for a weekend in Wellington and walking up the Te Papa stairs and there you guys all were! You looked fantastic!
Oh my it certainly is! How funny! Sorry we didn’t manage to chat! And thank you!
God, you guys have the best get-togethers!
We certainly know how to have fun! I’ve never been to a WSB event that hasn’t been awesome! 😀
[…] fabric with another person, who would make the same pattern as the next person…Leimomi does a much better job of explaining this than I […]
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Oh God, I just love that museum. Its the one with the giant cracken if I’m not mistaken? I am such a fan of our cousins across the paddock, you girls rock. What a fabulous idea to chain your sewing. Congrats one and all. xx
Hehe. Te Papa is indeed a great museum – very fun to spend time in, and a good place for photographs! You’re thinking of the Colossal Squid. Sadly we do not have a giant kraken – it certainly make Te Papa the most famous museum in the world! A kraken is almost as good as a mermaid or bigfoot after all! 😉
Thank you! You may see something in your chain that links you in – it’s amazing how global fabric and patterns are.
[…] by either the same fabric or the same pattern as the previous person. You can read her explanation here, and she has links to all the posts which are being updated […]
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[…] It links to Kat who has made the same dress in a cute mushroom fabric and Jenna who used the same mushroom fabric to make a Pauline Alice Alameda…and that’s how it goes. Check out all the links in the chain as they are published on Leimomi’s post. […]
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[…] Leimomi of the Wellington Sewing Bloggers Network was hanging out with Juliet and decided that most of us […]
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[…] back into sewing, and what better a prompt did I have than my friend The Dreamstress setting the Wellington Sewing Blogger’s Network a challenge, where each of our makes links to the next. And what serendipity that my fabric (which paired with […]
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[…] WSBN blog tour, 2015 style! This one was Leimomi‘s great idea, to hop from pattern to fabric to pattern to fabric until we’re all […]
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