PROJECT RUNWAY

Endnu en sæson af Project Runway er skudt i gang, nemlig  sæson 8, som har premiere i morgen den 29. juli i USA. Men som vanligt må vi væbne os med tål- modighed her hjemme, da den nok først bliver vist på TV3 næste år. Men du kan følge serien på Lifetime´s hjemmeside her.

LE GRAND BAL DIOR

While we were waiting at the Lounge in Montreal, I stumpled upon Les Beaux Arts Magazine. To my big surprise iI found that Christian Dior (1905-57) apparently has his own museum, that I never heart of before now.

On top it was his home when he grew up and it is situated in Granville in Normandy, France.
This year it displays a big exhibition with more than 50 ballgowns from his masters own hand, until the 26th of september. I would really like that. You can take a look at the Museums official webpage here.

ONE-OF-A-KIND

Since last, I have been busy constructing the three very different "wedding- dresses", I have on commisions. All three customers have had their measures taken and these measures is the basis for their very personal patterns, that the dresses is founded on.

Next step is to cut it in silk- paper and make a Muslin/calico. The Muslin/ calico is a basic model made up in a cheap cotton, that is used for the first fitting.   

After these steps, every single customer is appointed to a fitting, where the dress is adjusted. Depending on the cut and figure, more fittings can be ne- cessary. But usually 1-2 fittings is enough.

The final design and details is decided, the fabric choosen and a deposit payed.

The last fitting for finetuning adjustments is agreed upon and the dress is beeing finished. The result is a very special One-of-a-kind dress.

If the customers don´t mind, I will show the results later on.

Photos: John Frantsen

HOT STUFF !

Here in the middle of a Heatwave in Montreal, I finally succeeded to find some fabric for "Weddingdresses", that I hope my customers will like. I had these colours as a reference. . .

-And I found this heavy silk/viscose on Rue Saint Hubert where a there is a big selection of fabric-stores.

-As well as this nice changing silk-taffeta for another customer.

Photos: John Frantsen

TAKE A WALK ON THE WILD SIDE

-For vi kan skam også her hjemme i Danmark.
Kunstindustrimuseet i København, viser i øjeblikket  udstillingen Walk on the wild side, med Margit Brandt´s banebrydende modedesign fra 1965-80. Hendes design var netop fra midten af 60´erne med til at skabe begrebet dansk mode -også på den internationale modehimmel.

Margit Brandt (f. 1945) er uddannet designer fra Margrethe-skolen 1961-63, hvor hun blev bedømt af Holger Blom.
Hun tog efterfølgende et kursus på Tilskærerakademiet i 1964. Derefter drog hun til Paris, hvor hun  startede som husmodel hos Balmain, for senere at komme i lære. Hun har bl.a. også arbejdet for Louis Feraud. Margit Brandt er gift med Erik Brandt, som også er hendes partner professionelt.

Efter en flere år lang periode med andre opgaver, bl.a i udlandet, blev brand- et relanceret med stor succes i 2005, nu med datteren Julie Brandt Dam som designer.

Du kan læse meget mere om Margit Brandt på hendes officielle hjemmeside her, samt på Aok´s hjem-meside her. Udstillingen kan opleves indtil den 19. september 2010

AMERICAN WOMAN

 

Hvis du nu skulle komme til New York inden for den nærmeste fremtid, så bør du se nærmere på American woman - Fashioning a National Identity, som er en udstilling der vises på The Costume Institute på The Metropolitan Museum of Art indtil den 15. august i år.

Ustillingen viser udviklingen i opfattelsen af den amerikanske kvinde fra 1890 til 1940 og hvordan den har påvirket opfattelsen af nutidens kvinder. Ved at fokusere på amerikanske kvindelige arketyper  gennem kjoler, viser udstil- lingen hvordan modeudviklingen afspejlede hendes sociale, politiske og seksuelle frigørelse. Hvordan "Gibson girls", bohemer og filmdivaer bl.a. lagde grunden for nutidens amerikanske kvinde.

Amerikansk Vogue bringer her i Juli en reportage fra The Costume Institute´s store Bal i anledning af åbningen den 3. maj. Tjek udstillingen ud på The Met´s officielle hjemmeside her.

H FOR HAUTE COUTURE

In connection with my previous post, I suddenly remembered the special exhibition, H for Haute Couture, that The Collection of Time  were organizing in 2007.
The exhibition  showed examples of the 20. century greatest and most outstanding danish createurs, which was the master, Holger Blom and his two apprentices, Erik Mortensen and Jørgen Bender.

Holger Blom (1906-1965) created a lot of elegant creations for the Divas of danish theatre, like Liva Weel, Bodil Kjer and Helle Virkner, as the Wedding-dress for Danish Princess Anne-Marie in 1964.

Erik Mortensen (1926-1998) went to Paris after his apprenticeship at Blom and made a career in the famous fashionhouse of Pierre Balmain.

Jørgen Bender (1938-1999) took over the Salon of Blom after his dead  and created among other things, the royale weddinggowns for Queen Margrethe of Denmark, Princess Benedikte and former Princess Alexandre.

During this exhibition I was offered to do two weekend-workshops by the request of Cæcilie Ning Hage, the Head of The Collection of Time. Because she thought it would be a good idéa for the visitors to see how dresses like that are created. It showed to be a good idea and became a great attraction.

I was very hounered to sit there among all the creations of my heros and work on my own stuff. Though it was limited what I was able to do, because people were so interested, talking and asking questions. I even spoke with somebody who had known Holger Blom.

Apart from that, Jørgen Bender was one of the judges at the 1998 DM ( The Danish Championship ) for students of tailoring and clothescraft at Holmen, Copenhagen, where I was participating on the suggestion from one of my teachers.

In 1988, when I together with my friend Karen went to see the special exhibition "Stars in French Fashion" at  Designmuseum Denmark, and to hear Erik Mortensen´s  speak, we were so lucky to meet him and to have his biography "Ej blot til pynt" / Not only purely ornamental, signed.

KISPUS

Do you know the old danish movie, Kispus? The Movie by Erik Balling from 1956, was the first danish movie in color.
The movie, that was inspired by Holger Blom, one of the Great Danish couturiers of that time, is a sweet and subtle love comedie. A movie that I recommend, if you are into old danish movies and fashionhistory.

The fabulous costumes of the film were created by another danish couturier though.
That was Preben Birch, who did costumes for danish movies through many years.
These two were together with a third couturier, Uffe Brydegaard, named The three B´s.

The movie is about the excentric couturier, Mr. Marcel, played by Angelo Bruun. He is giving one of his nice dresses away to the daydreaming seamstress, Eva Møller, played by Helle Virkner, when he discover how well it suits her.
He is betting with the Actress, who actually ordered the dress, that he is able to present the seamstress as a glamour-girl wearing his dress at the coming premiere-party. And he is wright.

Eva meets and fall in love with Jakob, played by Henning Moritzen, that drives around in a big limousine. They both think of each other, that the other is rich, fearing that he is going to discover her modest background.
But Jakob himself is a poor student, that works as a chauffeur and has to sell his books to invite Eva out.
This leads to many misunderstandings and "kispus"-playes. But after many complications, love prevails over snobbery at last.
                                                                                                                            

FLAX JEANS

First, a warm welcome to new readers. I hope that you will be inspired and happy to follow me here on the blog.
My latest project have been a pair of summer jeans, because I am traveling to Montreal tomorrow. And there is a heatwave right now.

Besides that I count on to catch up some blogging while I am there, I am going to look for fabrics for a few customers.
Montreal has a very long street with only fabric-shops. So the selection of fabrics is quite big and there is something for everybody´s taste. But I will get back on that.

For these flax jeans, I actually took an old couple of my worn-out denims apart to copy the pattern and used flax instead, to be more comfortable. Here is the result.  

Photo: Daniel Clement