Punto in Aria
Nov. 18th, 2005 06:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
threadwalkerNo, not a term for kicking butt on the computer. (Although I am still mesmerized by the pretty colors and sound effects).
It's a needle lace technique and it was taught in an EGA class that I recently took. They said they were teaching Reticella (not a pasta!), but we snipped and removed all the ground threads. Since I was sitting with several needle gurus who couldn't help observing that 'technically' we were doing punto in aria, I had to go home and research the terms.
Turns out the gurus were right. Punto in aria - needle in the air. Wow! How neat is that? I used to look at the pictures of "that stuff" years ago and go "you've got to be nuts. Who'd be insane enough to do that?"
Looks like I'm insane. I really like it and I've got my first project piece in the works and I'm at the point where I'm working up my design right now. It's probably over ambitious - I half expect a big knot of thread. I've also decided that given the million and one things I'm trying to do, it must be restricted to lunch time, it's not allowed to have some deadline that eventually turns me into a crazed "up all night" maniac, and I'm going to experiment with linen (even though the Gurus AND the teacher marfled about how the linen is too slubby. I weave so in my world slubby isn't bad, it's just challenging).
Who's Aria are you Punto-ing?
Boring stuff on my other projects:
The Spanish garment is on hold until I loose enough weight that the underdress doesn't feel quite so tight. I'm going to cannibalize one of the three, red, 1470 Italian dresses I have, so this project will wail. (hahahaha - I still crack up that I made three of the same dress in the same color without realizing it.) With this, my motivation to go to the Boar Hunt has fizzled. For whatever reason, my excitement for going to that event was tied to my self-motivation to complete that project. What can I say, I have a weird costumer-OCD brain.
English Ropa
Corset is done: I made a new one based on my universal corset for the basic pattern and then altering the neck per a Paris Bordone picture and adding the finger-tabs for comfort. I'm squishy, so finger tabs are good. All in total, about 3-4 hours of work.
Next up: hoop skirt. I'm looking for hoop material that isn't expensive - so not the designer, spendy hoop stuff they (used to) sell at Lacis. (Not sure if they still have it, but I recall it being something like $10/yard or something equally obnoxious). And I'm willing to experiment. So far nothing I've found at the hardware store is giving me the warm fuzzies.
I keep changing my mind about the garments under the ropa. First I was all set with doublet and forepart, a la "The English Icon" by Roy Strong. Then I was flipping through Moda and had the clever idea to make a dress that would fit under the Ropa and also work under a Florentine ropa next year. The bodice itself wouldn't be visible under the English style, just the skirt and sleeves. Since there's a lot of parallels between the English and the Italian with those, I could make a "double duty" dress. I could then do the gold strap work on the bodice like in the Italian Portraits, etc, and it would only take up half the space in the closet because it's one dress and not two.
That feels so clever!
What? When did I decide to make an Italian? Err, when Rosalyn the Evil Addictive Fabric Faerie sold me some. Honest, she made me buy it. Then I learned to prick and pounce the very next day (which is not like pouncing on and then pricking dinner/prey with your claws!! Hahaha!). So I want to use the new nifty embroidery technique on the scrummy silk and make a smashing 1560/70's Florentine gown.
Anyway, the silk I got to do the Italian with is sapphire blue cross shot with blood red. It's soooo NOT English - although it's VERY Italian. Unfortunatley, it clicked in my brain that in the pictures I've found, the English seem to prefer the more somber black and white look when it's not gorped up with gold embroidery. So now the eye-bleeding blue and red looks too costumey to my eyes to be an English dress. sigh. I am setting aside the blue and I'll console myself by petting it periodically while I ponder my near future with the droll English stuff.
Sigh. I'm just dying to bust a move with that silk!
Right now the plan is to keep working up the underpinnings and when I have to drape the bodice/doublet, I'll probably decide in that moment what I'm using. Feh! I hate not having a clear vision.
To share the Love, I brought my brand of Indecisive Chaos to D'Salia's last night. When I showed up she showed me her fabrics for her outfit. It was droolsome; gold and red silk brocade (from Venice!) with black velvet, gold trim, and a unique red/gold fabric in "pinched" stripes for the doublet. It was an amazing pallete of muted reds, antique golds and black. However, if she used the silk brocade, she wouldn't have enough of the fabric left to make a full Venetian from it later (which is what it was supposed to become).
In my very special helpful way, I start yammering about English color scheme, Italian color scheme and about my own indecisiveness. Then I said something that reminded her of another cool piece she owns (she has several cool pieces. I keep forgetting to switch them around as a prank when I'm house-sitting for her.) It's a cream brocade. Also droolsome! But now she has to pair that with cream silks, right? So away go the reds and golds, out come the cream silks for the doublet, a different, paler gold trim, pearls and pale gold ribbon. It looked so right!!!!! We stared and stared. Wow! Then I helpfully point out how adding pearls to the trim will really make it pop, how the trim will have to be put on by hand, and if she was feeling really motivated, she could do a black work collar. D'Salia, who HATES tedious handwork, pointed at the open door and yelled "out!" at me.
Hahahahha! Feel the love, baby! She's hooked (well except for the black work - sis don't do embroidery if she can help it.) But I did feel the force of the costume muses move through us and I see a lot of hand application of trim and pearls in her near future.
On the other hand, at least she has a vision.
Hellooooooo! Give me a vision, please!
Hello?
It's a needle lace technique and it was taught in an EGA class that I recently took. They said they were teaching Reticella (not a pasta!), but we snipped and removed all the ground threads. Since I was sitting with several needle gurus who couldn't help observing that 'technically' we were doing punto in aria, I had to go home and research the terms.
Turns out the gurus were right. Punto in aria - needle in the air. Wow! How neat is that? I used to look at the pictures of "that stuff" years ago and go "you've got to be nuts. Who'd be insane enough to do that?"
Looks like I'm insane. I really like it and I've got my first project piece in the works and I'm at the point where I'm working up my design right now. It's probably over ambitious - I half expect a big knot of thread. I've also decided that given the million and one things I'm trying to do, it must be restricted to lunch time, it's not allowed to have some deadline that eventually turns me into a crazed "up all night" maniac, and I'm going to experiment with linen (even though the Gurus AND the teacher marfled about how the linen is too slubby. I weave so in my world slubby isn't bad, it's just challenging).
Who's Aria are you Punto-ing?
Boring stuff on my other projects:
The Spanish garment is on hold until I loose enough weight that the underdress doesn't feel quite so tight. I'm going to cannibalize one of the three, red, 1470 Italian dresses I have, so this project will wail. (hahahaha - I still crack up that I made three of the same dress in the same color without realizing it.) With this, my motivation to go to the Boar Hunt has fizzled. For whatever reason, my excitement for going to that event was tied to my self-motivation to complete that project. What can I say, I have a weird costumer-OCD brain.
English Ropa
Corset is done: I made a new one based on my universal corset for the basic pattern and then altering the neck per a Paris Bordone picture and adding the finger-tabs for comfort. I'm squishy, so finger tabs are good. All in total, about 3-4 hours of work.
Next up: hoop skirt. I'm looking for hoop material that isn't expensive - so not the designer, spendy hoop stuff they (used to) sell at Lacis. (Not sure if they still have it, but I recall it being something like $10/yard or something equally obnoxious). And I'm willing to experiment. So far nothing I've found at the hardware store is giving me the warm fuzzies.
I keep changing my mind about the garments under the ropa. First I was all set with doublet and forepart, a la "The English Icon" by Roy Strong. Then I was flipping through Moda and had the clever idea to make a dress that would fit under the Ropa and also work under a Florentine ropa next year. The bodice itself wouldn't be visible under the English style, just the skirt and sleeves. Since there's a lot of parallels between the English and the Italian with those, I could make a "double duty" dress. I could then do the gold strap work on the bodice like in the Italian Portraits, etc, and it would only take up half the space in the closet because it's one dress and not two.
That feels so clever!
What? When did I decide to make an Italian? Err, when Rosalyn the Evil Addictive Fabric Faerie sold me some. Honest, she made me buy it. Then I learned to prick and pounce the very next day (which is not like pouncing on and then pricking dinner/prey with your claws!! Hahaha!). So I want to use the new nifty embroidery technique on the scrummy silk and make a smashing 1560/70's Florentine gown.
Anyway, the silk I got to do the Italian with is sapphire blue cross shot with blood red. It's soooo NOT English - although it's VERY Italian. Unfortunatley, it clicked in my brain that in the pictures I've found, the English seem to prefer the more somber black and white look when it's not gorped up with gold embroidery. So now the eye-bleeding blue and red looks too costumey to my eyes to be an English dress. sigh. I am setting aside the blue and I'll console myself by petting it periodically while I ponder my near future with the droll English stuff.
Sigh. I'm just dying to bust a move with that silk!
Right now the plan is to keep working up the underpinnings and when I have to drape the bodice/doublet, I'll probably decide in that moment what I'm using. Feh! I hate not having a clear vision.
To share the Love, I brought my brand of Indecisive Chaos to D'Salia's last night. When I showed up she showed me her fabrics for her outfit. It was droolsome; gold and red silk brocade (from Venice!) with black velvet, gold trim, and a unique red/gold fabric in "pinched" stripes for the doublet. It was an amazing pallete of muted reds, antique golds and black. However, if she used the silk brocade, she wouldn't have enough of the fabric left to make a full Venetian from it later (which is what it was supposed to become).
In my very special helpful way, I start yammering about English color scheme, Italian color scheme and about my own indecisiveness. Then I said something that reminded her of another cool piece she owns (she has several cool pieces. I keep forgetting to switch them around as a prank when I'm house-sitting for her.) It's a cream brocade. Also droolsome! But now she has to pair that with cream silks, right? So away go the reds and golds, out come the cream silks for the doublet, a different, paler gold trim, pearls and pale gold ribbon. It looked so right!!!!! We stared and stared. Wow! Then I helpfully point out how adding pearls to the trim will really make it pop, how the trim will have to be put on by hand, and if she was feeling really motivated, she could do a black work collar. D'Salia, who HATES tedious handwork, pointed at the open door and yelled "out!" at me.
Hahahahha! Feel the love, baby! She's hooked (well except for the black work - sis don't do embroidery if she can help it.) But I did feel the force of the costume muses move through us and I see a lot of hand application of trim and pearls in her near future.
On the other hand, at least she has a vision.
Hellooooooo! Give me a vision, please!
Hello?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-11-19 03:46 am (UTC)Punto in Aria
The history book lies open, webs of lives
Lie stretched before the seamster's waiting hand,
She snips a space to work in, strand by strand.
Behind her needle, soon the pattern thrives.
And if her work is featly done, or not,
Or if her lace is true to ages past,
The strands of time weave through it; hold it fast
As any fly caught by a spider's plot.
But you and I couch threads to barren ground,
Straining to see the pattern left behind
By those who may, or not, have come before.
Like those who hear strains of unearthly sound,
And spend their lives in hope that they will find
The point in empty air from which they pour.
Copyright c 1993 by Heather Rose Jones
All Rights Reserved
no subject
Date: 2005-11-19 05:36 am (UTC)And I bet it will still be sitting around in 5 years. :->
no subject
Date: 2005-11-21 07:12 pm (UTC)Check out the 5th one down (A Lady from Wentworth) - this is the English Ropa (Coat) over a skirt/forepart, sleeves and doublet. The Ropa is like a long black "Neo coat" (a la "Matrix").
http://www.tudor-portraits.com/Various_4.htm
Here's some Italian Pictures - some of these dresses could be worn under the Neo Coat and you'd never know the difference if you kept the coat closed:
http://costume.dm.net/Tailors/womens.html
Kind of like Gr-Animals - One ensemble = two different outfits. Hahahaha!