All posts filed under: Events

Fabrications: Mark your calenders!

Do you like textiles and fabric? Of course you like textile and fabric! That’s why you read this blog! Are you going to be in Wellington on Sat the 19th of November? If so, mark your calendars for Fabrications, an expo celebrating all things textile and fabric related. And I’m going to be there doing something new and exciting. I’ll be hosting a Antiques Roadshow type event, where you bring me a textile object of any type that you want to know more about, and for a gold coin I’ll tell you everything I know about the textile, except the valuation. What, what’s that!?! Isn’t that the whole Antiques Roadshow thing? It’s all about what an object is worth? Well, yes, kinda. I don’t particularly like the value-focused approach to antiques in the first place, and it works particularly badly when applied to textiles, which are the most intimate form of antiques: worn on our bodies, carried with us, the mementoes of births and marriages, celebrations and survival. What a textile is worth is so …

Feeling Grand and Frivilous

Published by The Dreamstress

Here are the images from Grandeur and Frivolity: Music and Fashion in the courts of Louis XIV and Louis XV. The event went beautifully. It was a privilege to work with The Historic Arts Trust, and especially the amazing Clarissa, who arranged all the music and coordinated all the musicians. I’m also deeply indebted to all of the people who made this possible: Mrs C, Madame Ornata (two of the dresses were hers!), all the models, my sister and mother in law, Shell and Joie de Vivre, and of course Mr Dreamy. And you! For suggestions and support and encouragement and research! Seriously – some days when I’m just soooo tired, reading your comments is just the perk-up I need to keep going.

In the dressing room

Published by The Dreamstress

The photographs from the dressing room from Saturday’s Grandeur & Frivolity talk demonstrate more than ever how indebted I am to all my friends for their wonderful help and support with these events. Sarah of Capital Adventures (e.g. Diana Villiers) was the official photographer and took the photos. Mrs C of the Hectic Eclectic did the amazing hairdos. And the poor sweetie wasn’t feeling well, so she didn’t even stay for the performance. Joie de Vivre and Shell were super wonderful and did a bunch of evil, evil handsewing, which I ended up not even using because my lovely mother in law and my sister, the Naiad, showed up in time with the backup dress. And then my mother in law sewed the last of the buttons on my 18th century men’s breeches. I owe those four majorly! Madame Ornata let me use both her pet en l’aire and her (barely!) finished polonaise, which she had to hem in the dressing room. Bianca the mezzo-soprano let me put her in a scratchy wig and stays …