Category Archives: Fashion and Style

Fashion, design and style

The Fashion Show (The Colorblocked Jacket, Part 3)

Sorry to keep you waiting on my fashion show debut!  Between class projects and getting my teaching venture off the ground, I’ve let the blog fall by the wayside.  It occurs to me I owe all of you a recap on how the fashion show went.

Here’s the completed outfit walking the runway at the City College of San Francisco Fashion Show, “Odyssey.”  The model is Damon Mahoney; besides his work as a fashion model, he is a fashion entrepreneur who makes an exquisite line of hand-painted scarves and accessories.  You can see his creations at his website.  He was fantastic to work with and he really sold the outfit on the runway.  I was so fortunate to have him model my outfit.

Runway photo credits: James Mace

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The Colorblocked Jacket, Part 1

My course in Apparel Construction at City College of San Francisco this spring encompasses three major projects:

  • A sleeveless sheath dress
  • A pant or pencil skirt
  • A machine-tailored jacket, made with fusible interfacings

So here I’m beginning a new blog series on the first project for the class, the sleeveless sheath dress.   Careful readers will note that project isn’t the same as the title of this article, so some explanation is in order. Continue reading

Diving into the Deep End

There’s so much to write about, I don’t know where to begin!

Based on my experience from the summer session at City College of San Francisco, I’ve gone all-in on classes for the upcoming fall semester.

I’m taking four classes, which pretty much makes me a full-time student.  I’m hoping I can meet the workload for all four classes.  I’m pretty certain I won’t be sewing any projects outside classwork.  That’s not so bad, because some class assignments provide opportunities to make projects that have been lingering in my personal queue.

Fashion Illustration 2

This class continues where my summer class in Fashion Illustration leaves off.  I have the same instructor, Paul Gallo, who is a wonderful instructor and coach.

The second semester of Fashion Illustration builds on the first.  We learn additional rendering techniques, more menswear techniques, and the drawing proportions for children and teens. We also learn the details of producing technical flat drawings and spec sheets for production work.

One emphasis of the second semester is on developing everyone’s individual artistic style, and the midterm and final are capsule design projects that focus on original design work. My style so far is fairly photorealistic, and I’m curious to see how I develop as I work through the course.

Here’s some work-in-progress from the second assignment; we’re revisiting the basic figure and learning new coloring techniques.

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Fashion Illustration 101

Sometimes I come up with style ideas for new projects, or styling details that I’d like to follow up on later.  The problem is that I have no way to record them – a textual description doesn’t capture the vision that’s in my head, and it means nothing to me weeks and months later.

Also, I look towards a potential future of creating garments for others – where it would be useful for both myself and the client to have a clear picture in our heads of what we’re working towards. So, I saw illustration skills of some sort as an important thing for me to effectively create original designs.

With those thoughts, I enrolled in the introductory class in Fashion Illustration at City College of San Francisco.  The instructor is Paul Gallo, whose classes I have taken before, and is an excellent instructor.  He has two classes in draping and bias design on Craftsy.  I had a great deal of trepidation leading into this class – I don’t really think of myself as an artist or illustrator – but I am familiar with Paul’s teaching style and figured if anyone would make this topic comfortable, he would be it. Continue reading