The Norma Desmonds: The new wardrobe

Filippo: You did a great job Giovanna, this idea of using old Edith Head models for Tecla's wardrobe was a stroke of genius
Giovanna: Thank you Filippo, I hope she likes them. The hardest part was adding the leopard accents to each of them. That was boring!

Filippo: You know, the leopard accent is her trademark. The used to own one in the old days. Oh yes, Virginia, the fitting is good, nice job.

Virginia: Oooh, thank you Mr. Filippo!

Giovanna: I won't come with you, I think Virginia shall present the models to her. Because of Enrico, you know.

................

Filippo: Madame Tecla? Your wardrobe is ready, if you wish you can come to the atelier and have a look at the models.
Tecla: Well Filippo, I don't really feel like coming to the atelier. You can bring everything up at my mansion so I shall see it at my convenience.
Filippo: Naturally Madame, how silly of me. We will be there in the afternoon.
Tecla: Very good, Filippo.

.................

Tecla: Max! The wardrobe is ready, finally. They will be here today.
Max: I'll supervise the defille, Madame. Everything as you wish.

..................

Filippo: Madame, let me introduce you to Virginia. She's our designer. She will introduce you each piece of the collection she designed for you.
Virginia: Good afternoon Madame, the clothes shall be modeled by our  models: Greta, Veronica, Vittoria and Camilla
Tecla: They are a bit fat, aren't they? It doesn't matter, let's go ahead. I've been waiting for this collection long enough.

Virginia: As you indicated, I designed dresses in marroon and black, with cheetaa accents.  Each dress has been named after the defining moments of your carreer. The first dress is called "how to divorce a millionaire"

Tecla: I like this one.

Virginia: Thank you Madame. The second dress is called: Untamed

Tecla: Excellent!

Virginia: And this  one is "Indiscreet"

Tecla: I like the coat, the line of the dress is interesting, too.
Virginia: Something classic and something new, Madam. As you requested. And now the Dressing Gown. "Beyond Breakfast"

Tecla: Perfect. Filippo you outdid yourself.
Filippo: Thank you Madame. You're very generous

...............

Filippo and Virginia are going to give the good news to a nervous Giovanna, their ordeal is over (for the time being!)

I'm curious about which is your favourite dress, I'm willing to make some more late 40's early 50's dresses, those Edith Head sketches are beautiful and Costanza wants a wardrobe of her own too!

8th March: Women's day

On 8 March 1914 In London there was a march from Bow to Trafalgar Square in support of women's suffrage . Sylvia Pankhurst was arrested in front of Charing Cross station on her way to speak in Trafalgar Square.
In 1917 demonstrations marking International Women's Day in Saint Petersburg on the last Sunday in February (which fell on March 8 on the Gregorian calendar) initiated the February Revolution.Women in Saint Petersburg went on strike that day for “Bread and Peace".

We've come a long way since those days, but there's a lot still to be done for equal rights, education and wages!

In spite the fact they may seem just fashion horses, the girls here are very conscious about these problems so they asked me to pose in front of the Wall of Dolls in Milan. The Wall of Dolls is an installation unveiled during menswear fashion week in june 2014 to shine a light against the increasing wave of violence against women which is rising all over the western world.

They also wanted to pose in front of this installation by Francesca Biasetton in Genoa's Palazzo Ducale, inspired by the "Zapatos Rojos" project.

Zapatos Rojos or Red Shoes is an art project realized by the Mexican artist Elina Chauvet. It deals with a city route which consists in lots of pairs of red or red-painted shoes to commemorate the many cases of violence against women in the whole world. In particular, her first work was realized in Ciudad Juarez, the border city between Mexico and the United States, where for the first time it was used the expression “femicide”. Here, indeed hundreds and hundreds of women were abducted, raped and then killed since 1993.

On a lighter side: In Italy to celebrate this day men give women yellow mimosas branches, mimosa blossoms also mark the beginning of springtime!

A great Women's day to all of you!

Aretha Franklin  and Annie Lennox: Sisters are doin' it for themselves

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

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).

A Merry Christmas from Billa and the girls!!!

Here's the Christmas Special I've been working at. All the girls wanted to partecipate, but they are too many! So this year the models for the Christmas Cards are:

Costanza

Camilla

Virginia

Caterina

Margherita

And we all wish you all a

travelling dolly 2 - Camilla: Around the snow in a day!

Let's get started with the  Christmas festivities, the girls now have their Christmas Tree, and I've just finished a new winter dress for FR2. It's pique cotton with faux mink details. And odd  combination you might say, but pique cotton has the right mix of rigidity and smoothness to look right in a miniature dress.

I made this dress for a photo contest,  my inspiration was my mother's wedding dress (she married in January). I'm so proud with the result that I've decided to let Camilla have some fun around the globe with her new outfit.

So here's Camilla in "around the snow in a day!"

Switzerland- Sankt Moritz: Picture by Sasha - Boots by Mattel - Christmas Tree: Swarovski

Switzerland - Sankt Moritz: Picture by Sasha

USA -  Tioga Pass: Picture by Billa

Italy - Alagna: Picture by Sasha

Canada - Columbia Icefield: Picture by Sasha

After all this running around Camilla enjoys some well deserved relax and hot chocolate!!!

Austria - Carinzia: Stock Picture

See you soon with some more Christmas goodies!!!

Camilla

Black Orchid Vanessa arrived today, she remained in her box for about three minutes. I'm so happy with her!

She is awesome, and she's so much a Grace Kelly type to me, so immediately I redressed her in my rear window fashion. I love her colours and hairdo.

actually it seems to me the dress fits her extremely well, better than it did on Ginevra:

shure enough she's a skinny girl.....but I'm quite happy that FR2 bodies can wear most of the dresses I sew for MM. The new body feels a bit rigid in the joints, but in this way she can keep her pose better.

Camilla