Vintage Snobbery......

I've always loved old things, be it houses, furniture, films,books or clothes. As a teenager I read countless historical novels and even when buying our first home, new builds did not do it for me. Apart from the fact that on our budget we got three times more space for our money, I just loved that the properties we viewed had character, a story to tell.
Our first home was decorated with a nod to the Victorian era of its construction, with dark wallpaper and the compulsory aspidistra. A piano in the dining room was decorated with pictures of our ancestors and, well, I have to admit it was all a bit gloomy!
In fact it wasn't until about 10 years ago that my tastes started to change and the beautiful distressed greys and creams of French interiors took my fancy. Much of my home today still reflects that style, comfy distressed but lighter and fresher looking.

Only my kitchen and sewing room show that in my heart I'm really a vintage girl. Fascinated by the social history of the 1940s and 1950s. I love to watch films and series based on the era and Housewife 49, Goodnight Mr Tom and the more recent Home Fires are among my favourites.
We've started to attend one or two festivals over the last few years and have been amazed at the enthusiasm and good nature of those who attend. Complete strangers have come up to us to comment on our 'costumes' and taken pictures, so I have felt that we must be doing something right!

However that isn't always the case. A couple of years ago before we really got into researching our look, we attended a local War Weekend. We went to the dance on the Saturday night, which was well attended and great fun and then we went on the Sunday to visit all the stalls and displays.
The morning started with a service, which was very moving, immediately followed by a fashion show. Something I was really looking forward to.
There were about 20 people in the line up the first of which was an elderly gentleman who had obviously based his look on one of the principle characters in WW11.
The compère smiled sweetly and asked this 'gentleman' to tell the audience how he had got into dressing up!
Well if looks could have killed, that compère would be no more. Pulling himself up, the man in question returned...
'We don't dress up, we are re-enactors! Every piece of our clothing and accessories is original and authentic. People who come to these events and dress up, in what they think is the style of the period let these events down. We have been used as extras in films and television and producers know that if they employ us we are the genuine article'
To be frank my reaction was to be dumbfounded! Surely without we common folk who just 'dress up' most of the vintage events in the country would not survive. Ok if sticking religiously to authentic clothes etc. is what you want to do, then great, and of course you are saving these things for another generation to enjoy.
For the rest of us, dressing up helps us be part of the whole scene. We do our research and where possible buy one or two original pieces, but what about the make do and mend ethos of the era. Surely we are being authentic by researching styles and altering more modern garments to the styles of the day. Clothes that may otherwise end up in landfill.

So I'm glad that I took no notice of said gentleman, and continued to 'do it my way', 'cos we have had some amazing outings and met some lovely people through the whole vintage scene.
As you can see from these pictures of our recent trip to Goodwood, we even enjoyed the racing and a bit of celeb spotting!
So I'm off now to prepare things for our next Vintage Fair as part of Bea's Vintage Extravaganza at Grantham College on Saturday 3rd October. If you are local it would be lovely to see you there, whether you dress up or not!

TTFN

Jenny xx

Oh what a lovely Fair

Has it really been 3 months since I last posted on my poor blog?
It certainly doesn't seem like it!
My only excuse is that I have been happily engaged in other pursuits. A brief holiday in gorgeous Whitby, a busy half term week with the grandsons and a bit of time preparing for the lovely vintage fair which we attended today.

Organised by the equally lovely Debbie, Bea's Vintage Extravaganza held at Grantham College was an absolute delight!
Vintage stalls, Vintage clothing, Scrumptious Tea Room provided by Claire of Liberty Rose, Classic cars, vintage caravan, Ice cream van plus live music including a spot by the fabulous Elaine Bishop and dancers too, what better way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

We met some super people, really friendly and just an absolute delight, and we can't wait to meet up again hopefully in October in the same venue.

So come on Grantham, so many people complain that nothing happens here, and this was a day of real entertainment and great shopping as well! What more could you ask for. 

Well organised, well advertised and well if you weren't there you missed a gem!

So its back now to the wedding planning and the final push to get everything done in time. Only 3 months now...Eeeeeeeek! Yes it's scary, but exciting too. As each piece of the jigsaw puzzle drops into place, we can begin to see the overall picture and it's not looking bad! Of course I will breathe a little more easily when the bride (and her mother) has a dress, but of course you will have to wait until August to see how that turns out!

Have a great week, and I hope I can get back here again before the big event,

TTFN

Jenny xx

PS   I may not post regularly at the moment but I do keep up with lots of your blogs so I don't feel totally out of touch : )

I didnt see this coming...........

Do you sew?

If you've popped by here before you will know that it is quite a passion of mine. 

However................

This week has sorely tested both my patience and had me questioning my own ability!

It all started quite innocently with this pattern

Vogue 2401, a Retro Vintage dress. I bought it some time ago intending to wear it to a Christmas do I think, but never got round to making it. And then suddenly this year is all about a vintage wedding, Twinwood vintage festival and now Goodwood Revival too. The perfect opportunity to give it a trial run.

What a stinker......... Whoever dreamed this up must have had the design skills of an aeronautical  engineer but failed to appreciate that unlike aircraft  we ladies don't like our undercarriage on show.

It took me ages to fit the bodice ,sleeves and especially the front ties neatly. Accurate marking of all those little dots was a must. The worse part by far though was the front skirt, which is little more than a flap fastened at the back with ties around which the back and side fronts overlap. The trouble is as you walk the side fronts lift and reveal your bare thighs in all their vintage glory. They are not anchored to the front panel in any way, so unless your fabric weighed a ton I really do fail to see how It could work and preserve your modesty.

Thank goodness for once I had decided to make a wearable toile as I had intended to use some rather expensive fabric to make it up for the wedding.

Needless to say I have changed my mind on that score!

I have saved the dress from the bin however by making a complete underskirt. I just had enough of the vintage fabric left to do so though I had to add a panel of a contrast colour to the hem to make it the right length, I also balanced this by making turn back cuffs in the same contrast and at least I like it enough to wear it at one if the vintage events now.

The sad thing is I still love the overall look especially the top and the stand up collar, but will I ever make it again...I very much doubt it and at £14 it was certainly not worth it.

As it is now intended for a festival and not this years main event, I even went as far as to make my own 1950s hat, using images on the Internet for inspiration and a 1940s pamphlet on how to create felt flowers. I am quite pleased with the overall look but cant decide if I should add a veil. What do you think?

I have now found what I think will be my alternative pattern Butterick 5880. and apparently there is a brilliant video tutorial by Professor Pincushion, so I hope my journey will be less traumatic. I am off to the NEC on 22 March so I may even find the right fabric, lets hope!

Have you had any dressmaking disasters lately or even found any vintage patterns (especially the retro ones which have been adjusted to fit our less than sylph like modern figures while retaining the original style) that you would recommend. I would be interested to hear about them.

Have a great week, I'm off to make a Peter Pan outfit now. Cant say I don't get variety in my sewing!

TTFN

Jenny xx

1940s dungarees, A pattern review.

Phew! Well I made them, the Wearing History 1940s dungarees, but it certainly wasn't all plain sailing. I think I made the common mistake of thinking that as a fairly experienced sewer, I would have no problem!
Big Mistake!

Oh there is nothing wrong with the pattern and Wearing History have done a great job of adapting it to our modern figure shape without losing the essence of the original. It was my hurry to get them done and not as the pattern company suggests, reading up on past sewing terms which was almost my downfall.
That and being in too much of a hurry to make a toile of course.

The one thing I did do was be very honest with my measurements. Despite the fact that according to the pattern sizing I appeared to be making a garment about 3 sizes bigger than I normally would. It was a very good job that I did because even then it really fitted where it was meant to!
The other thing which I almost slipped up on was the low rise. Fortunately I checked this out almost as an afterthought and I am so glad I did. Without losing the integrity of the 40s style when all trousers had a much lower rise than our modern equivalent, I still needed to lift the seam about 2 inches to prevent it almost hitting my knees.

The biggest learning curve though was the button placket or as the pattern puts it left facings. I could not get my head round cutting both front and back double. Especially as I was using denim.
I had decided to deviate a little by lining the front and back bodice, as I don't like faced openings, and so cut one each of the the side facings plus a second in lining fabric to keep the bulk down a bit. I also lined the pockets. I would be interested to hear how others dealt with the button opening as if I had followed the original directions there would have been five layers of fairly thick fabric once they were fastened! Perhaps I still misunderstood the pattern here!
I did eventually sort it out to my satisfaction whether right or wrong, and I do love the finished garment. It still niggles me though as I like to know what I am doing wrong if I can't fathom a pattern.
As you can see from the pictures I wore these to the latest pop up Olive & Edna shop last Saturday and they were really comfortable and very practical. I think they will be getting quite a few outings in the future.

Thanks once again to Claire at Liberty Rose Grantham for the friendly welcome and help, and to all the lovely folk who came and supported us. If you are interested in Vintage and Collectibles there is a Vintage Fair at the New life Church St Catherine's Road Grantham this Saturday, 22nd November and another that I will be attending at Liberty Rose on Saturday 6th December. So do come and say hello if you are in the area.

Off now to make vintage pinnies and some more Christmas slippers,

TTFN

Jenny xx

TWINWOOD 2014......Just fabulous again!

Well we certainly picked our day this year. On a somewhat unpredictable weekend we spent Sunday at the fabulous Twinwood Festival and had a glorious day. Though not quite as hot as last year it was perfect for walking about and out of the wind was quite warm.
This year we planned ahead a bit and took fold up chairs.

We found our spot up on the bank so that we could observe the main stage, arena and dance floors and then took ourselves off to visit all the lovely stalls, do some people watching and enjoy the atmosphere.
And that's just it, something we noticed on our first visit last year, everyone is so friendly and there is such a joyous vibe over the whole festival!

It really doesn't matter how you dress whether you come to observe or really go the whole hog. It's a festival that is just so welcoming. Families,couples, groups all having a whale of a time to excellent and varied music from the 30s to the 50s.

Outfit details.....Navy hat, Miss Sally Victor (Ebay), navy floral dress, Simplicity 1587. 

Brown hat, Tootsie and Tiger Ltd Truro, Yellow spot dressButterick B5281

We had some lovely comments about our dress, were asked to pose for some photographs by a gentleman who had just become the new owner of a vintage motorcycle company, and had lots of conversations with other festival goers about where we got our costumes and just generally about the era. It was like being on an outing with loads of friends!

 Gorgeous frocks for sale

Fabulous vintage cars

Young and old getting into the swing of it.

There were some amazing acts and bands from rock n roll to swing, check out the Twinwood brochure for more info here and so many actually dancing it was a real pleasure to watch, in fact there were times when I wish I was 16 again.

So well done Twinwood yet again. We will be back!

Hope you enjoy the rest of the week, the weather is supposed to improve again, so hopefully the children will get a bit more outdoor fun before its back to school.

TTFN

Jenny xx

COMING SOON A Date for your Diary....

WHOOPEE!!!!      A POP UP SHOP......

We have at last organised it. OLIVE and EDNA's VINTAGE EMPORIUM is having a pop up shop at

Liberty Rose Tea Room
22-23 Market Place
Grantham
Lincs
NG31 6LP

DATE  9 August 2014

TIME 10am to 4pm

Make a note in your diary if you are in the Lincs, Notts, Leicester area as we would love to see you.
The building is one of the most beautiful old shops here in Grantham and includes the really pretty tea rooms where you can pause for beverages and delectable cakes ( including chocolate and beetroot which I highly recommend) and also browse around one or two other permanent vintage and vintage style shops on the first floor.
We will be right at the top offering everything from chairs to ladders, suitcases and crockery, kitsch ornaments and vintage jewellery. There will also be a few OOAK collage necklaces made from preloved, rescued brooches, earrings etc.

 

 
We would love it if you would give us a shout on either Facebook or Twitter too, the more successful we are on the day, the more likely we are to be back again.
Hope to see you there

TTFN

Jenny and Heidi

Xxxx

A LITTLE VINTAGE STYLE GIVEAWAY

I cant believe that its been a week already since my last post!. It has been a busy but happy week. We have added a few more bits to our shop Olive and Edna's Vintage Emporium and had a few sales. But as with any new venture promotion is all important and though we know that all you lovely bloggers are worth a giveaway at any time, I hope you will forgive us on this occasion if we are doing it with a purpose!

We are offering this lovely handmade vintage style knitting/crochet/craft bag made from vintage and new materials. It is embellished with a hand crocheted doily and as you can see from the picture is plenty big enough to hold your next knitting project. Of course it can also be used as a tote to carry your every day necessities. The uses are endless. We will be adding these to our shop very shortly.

Of course this wont be the only little treasure we will be sending to the lucky winner. There will be other delights including a French copy of Modes& Travaux from November 1955. This wonderful blast from the chic French past is full of amazing fashion, awesome knitting patterns and brilliant advertisements of the time. I mean girls don't you all long to have 'un poli brillant' on your saucepans!! There will also be one or two other little surprises which we hope to match the personal style of the winner.

 

And so how to enter....  

Just click on the link on my sidebar for Olive and Edna's Vintage Emporium, have a browse and then 'like' us if you do. Then pop back here to tell us and you will be entered into a draw which will take place in two weeks time on Sunday 9th February 2014. If you want to follow us on Twitter too we are @oliveandedna  so let us know in a separate comment that you have done so and we will enter your name for both in the draw.

Have a lovely week and I will be back soon with a round up of some of my makes since Christmas, ( just to show that I havn't abandoned my crafting altogether)

TTFN

Jenny (and Heidi too) xx