African Tales: The short happy life of Francis Macomber

I love Hemingway, I love expecially  his short stories. I was a bit disappointed nobody noticed it by the quality of my prose ..... LOL
Ok, my prose is what it is, anyway, I was re-reading the complete collection of the shorts stories and I had an ispiration from "The short happy life of Francis Macomber". If you never read it just click on the link, it's worth the time.
The inspiration was for this set of pictures, it took me a while to prepare the dresses but here they are:

Camilla (as Margaret) is wearing a leopard printed mini dress inspired by a dress I own by Kookai,

Orso Maria (as Wilson - the white hunter) wears a simple safari suit,

Vittorio (Francis Macomber, who's happy life was really short) a more trendy safari suit.

And this is the picture inspired by the novel

Hommes classic fashion tutorial: the necktie!

In these first days of the year I've been working around some "accessories" for the guys. A new bunch of shirts, they will come in very handy when I'm going to start sewing the formal outfits I have in mind, and a whole collection of neckties!
I like neckties a lot, I liked them so much that I even learned to tie them.
So, as they are quite hard to find (I can't bear the fake mattel ones) I'm sharing some tips.
First of all you have to take the right measurements. The best way is to use a thin ribbon and tie the knot you are going to use on the doll.

How to tie a knot? I picked the two which can be made with a playscale tie without going completely crazy.

This is the simple knot (or four in hands), it is the easier, and it requires a shorter tie:

This is the Half Windsor knot, is very elegant , but requires more patience (expecially in 1:6 scale) and a longer tie:

When you have the right lenght you can draw your tie pattern:

I make mine in one single piece. When you draw it remenber to leave seam allowance. Then I sew the whole lenght with a  wipstitch, then fold it and sew it with a single stitch (makig the smallest stitches I'm capable of):

Here's the front of the finished tie:

Alessandro looks pleased (Enghish knot). In fact no guy's wardrobe is complete without some beautiful silk ties!

Travelling Dolly 8: Odette in Oman part 1 - Cities

After such a long stay in China the travelling dolly was looking for a change of scenery. So, what about Oman as the next destination for Odette and Carlo?
They immediately agreed, fascinated with the idea of visiting the white city of Muscat, the unbeliavable charm of the oasis and the Wahiba Sands, in the northern part of the "Empty Quarter"! To say nothing of the fortresses and canyons. They can't possibly miss all this!
First of all I had to pick the right wardrobe for Odette.
I came up with this simple trapeze dress  and a safari jacket, The colours look great! Carlo is wearing a khaki suit and green t-shirt which are part of a Male urban safari colletion inspired by D&G, I'm working on it, and  someday I'll be able to post the whole thing! In the meantime Carlo is going to introduce the single outfits....

I also brushed a bit Odette's hair, I love her natural look now....

This time I decided not to show a route but to make four instalments showing: cities, forts, wadis and last but not least the desert. This will, I hope, help to show how diverse is the experience of visiting this wonderful country!

Muscat, the Capital: a white gem nestled between mountains

This is the Great Mosque. Omanites are very kind and tourists are allowed to visit it, but Odette didn't want to ruin her new hairdo so she posed ouside of it (I went inside!)

One of the forts presiding the bay of Muscat

The sea promenade

Muscat has a huge and colourful Souk, Odette and Carlo bought some Halva and Incense

No Odette, it doesn't look like original local harticraft.....

Sur: In Sur Odette and Carlo visited one of the dockyards where they build the tipical Dhow boats, described by Marco Polo in his book

A beach with fishermen's boats

A nice overview of Sur with her many watchtowers

Nizwa: Before visiting the fortress Odette and Carlo take a brief straw in the local souk, they saw many beautiful and expensive articrafts, pottery and the tipical daggers with filagree sheats

See you soon!

In the next instalment: Fortresses and doors

Previous Instalment: Odette in China part 3

Kisses
Billa

30's fashion: evening dresses

As anticipated, i'm going to show you the dresses I sew for the New Year's Eve party, along with the original fashions that inspired them.
I got the idea while searching in internet for some Myrna Loy outfits for Ofelia, and I came across these beautiful pictures:

Veronica

Evening dresses are not exaclty my greatest passion, as you can see browsing my blog so far, but I really like this kind of design a lot

Agata

So I sew the first dress, and then the New Year's Eve party was on its way!!!

Ofelia

I made two versions of this one, is the one I like best

Camilla

Caterina

And then, among the google result I came across this one, which is from the late 20's, but I loved the oversized ribbon idea

Vittoria

As you see I only picked the general line of the dress, and used satin instead of the softer fabric of the original dresses.
Just to be prepared for next year (and not having to face Cecilia's anger) I'm going to add three more of  these dresses for the tall (FR2) girls: Cecilia, Giada and the new Dania (she doesn't have a name yet).

Thank you Brini!!!

Today I received my prize from Brini. and I had this wonderful surprise!!!!

Thank you so much Brini! The guys are pressing me for a fly fishing trip in Wales!

Many years ago I used to go fly fishing a lot.

I'm thrilled!!!!

The Cover: treats for january

30's evening dresses collectionOdette in Oman part 1Neckties!
The short happy life of Francis Macomber

2015 Editorial Line: some ideas and good intentions

Hello everybody, as 2015 has just begun I want to share some ideas about what is (hopefully) going to happen here.

First of all I feel quite pleased with the dolls I own, and besides having ordered the last WClub Exclusive Dania Zarr (which shall arrive next spring), I'm not planning to add any more girls. I'm still undecided about new boys, now that I have "fine tuned" my hommes patterns I'm worried about IT new male body which was going to happen this year, and probably will be launched in 2015. I'll probably stick to older models.

Anyway, I still have the problem to find a companion for Cecilia, she's too choosy and to be honest none of the guys seem quite to like her: this is going to be one of next year's themes:

we've not been on speaking terms since she dressed all up and then found out she was not to be invited to new year's party

So far this is what i've planned to work around:

Odette & Carlo are going to Oman and then Mexico:

sneak preview - Muscat in the background

I'm going to work on (and then present you) some Hommes Fashions collection: Urban Safari, Tartan Craze, Classic, Total White and Urban Cowboy....we shall see what I will be able to accomplish!

Urban Safari - sneak preview

Agata is going to get some new Chanel outfits and show you some more of Genoa

to be sewn.....soon

Ofelia and Goffredo are going to have their own series, inspired by the Thin Man movies I think, with fashions from the 30's and Nasty the Dog

The Redhead Connection shall go to Venice

New chapters for the Norma Desmond's: we can't leave Tecla alone on her sofa without consequences, can we?

New dioramas: I'm planning a new "persian room" and I still have to show you the "Earth room" in its full glory!

New Girls outfits: Urban Safari, Total White, Tartan Craze and some great fashions from the 30's

Of course I'll do more photomontages to show the fashions! I'm planning to use Spain as  a background!

I'd also  like to make a sort of a monthly "cover", as if the blog was a magazine, but I'm not sure yet.

These were the ideas. My good intentions: to improve the quality of the pictures! I hope I won't be always in a hurry and to be able to make some better pictures: as far as framing, posing and lighting goes! I also just bought a wonderful new camera: Panasonic Lumix TZ60. I bought it for travelling purposes, but as my poor Canon P90 has got several problems (too much desert sand I think) I'm going to use the new one for some selected photosessions.

I'd love to read your comments and suggestions!!!