strange elven-esque hooded vest

made one. outta charcoal-hued felted wool with lime green detail (well, there are some visible seams). started it at around 6 last night, worked on it virtually non-stop until ⓶AM (must emphasis how late that felt at the time), and am finally done after working on it today, on and off, for maybe an hour).

the vest aspect was pretty simple.

i quite literally folded the fabric twice, to outer edges towards the middle for a semi-double-breasted asymmetrical affect, and cut a couple oblongated holes for arms (after playing around with the fabric by holding it up to and wrapping it around myself... this creation was sans measuring. or... was visual measuring and shape-matching, devoid of any measuring devices). snaps keep the vest closed, and make all the lines and wrinkles i've created look right. i can do all the snaps up for a sort of boat-neck effect, else keep the top one undone for a cute, off-centre v-neck plus half-a-collar/ooh-that-kinda-looks-like-a-bandanna look.*

the fabric is great to work with because once you cut it you can kinda just fold and mold it into the shape you want, stitching here and there to keep the structure you've decided on (at times it felt like i was making a bra---never wear 'em but haven't you always wanted to make one yourself? just for a challenge?---via some modified form of origami.° applied origami? reclaimed origami? whatever.) anyway, continuing on with the awesomeness that is working with this fabric, its edges don't fray, so i saved a lot of time that would have otherwise been spent on sewing (more specifically: hemming). the sewing method breaks down to probably 60 per cent with the machine, and 40 by hand.

might i say hoods are the most difficult things to make. this is where i really clocked up some hours. after mounds of attempts, mistakes, alterations, and web searches†---not to mention a wee bit of frustration and deciding to 'sleep on it'---i've finally come to a result i am rather pleased with. the hood has evolved from a square, to a tent, followed by sith hood, back to a tent, and into a pretty decent hood. again: zero measuring, just playing and using one of sam's hoodies as a guide.

i feel like some sorta ninja-elf-pirate when i wear it. (a warm ninja-elf-pirate at that)



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*did you know the second result you get after punching 'how to sew a hood' into googz is 'how to make a jedi robe'?! it's so hilarious because a) you can totally tell a bunch of nerds came together and half-assedly taught themselves how to sew just so they could make fanatical star wars digs and b) that is totally how i sew shit!

° 'the process of making is the point of it. this needs to be a kind of ballet.' they've got films about this kind of stuff.

†photos once sam and isaac come back from the wood shop (they have the digi-cam to document their own project).