Month: February 2017

Judy : Vol. 31, 1882 Plate 4

Judy Tuesday brings you a variety of greenery as a little pre-welcome for the spring! These two costumes appeared far apart from one another in the original journal (July and October). But through the magic of themes (that occasionally make sense), we get to see them side-by-side.

Chasemore recycled a lot of ideas throughout his time producing costumes for Judy, but they typically had enough variation in them to make them each unique. Here he uses fern-like plants to decorate and to form features on two dresses of very different styles.

The bustle dress is pretty traditional for the time, but Chasemore seemed to enjoy a straight shift-like silhouette. A lot of his work features this style–which won’t become fashionable for another twenty years!

I didn’t realize how crooked I plated this set until just now looking at the thumbnail. Sometimes things will drive me crazy enough that I have to go back and fix them. Other times I just shrug and carry on. In this case, I think I’m shrugging.

[click this link or the image to download a printable .pdf of these costumes]

 

Catwalk Couture: Meet Ifu and Xia

At last! Two lovely ladies to kick of this series!

Ifu is from the Southern African province of KwaZulu-Natal. She was abandoned as a baby and grew up in an orphanage, but studied hard and won a scholarship to study abroad. Now twenty-one years old, she has a bachelors degree in political science and is modeling to support herself as she begins a masters program in public policy.

Ifu is cheerful, but serious-minded. She likes bright colors and percussion music, but adores quiet reading most of all. She is very frugal. Ifu is a vegan and will only wear fake fur. She campaigns for human rights and against animal cruelty. Ifu enjoys yoga, running, and arthouse films. Even though she is afraid of horses, she wishes Lonan would invite her to go riding. Her Zulu name means cloud.

Xia is the youngest of the models, at nineteen. She has modeled since she was a child and won several beauty pageants growing up. She has always wanted a career in fashion. Raised with a very Americanized family in California, she loves the beach, junk food, and big summer parties. But she takes good care of her health and guards her delicate skin from the sun.

Xia enjoys animated films, pop music, and is studying Chinese so she can speak with her grandparents in the Jiangsu province of China, which she has never visited. She loves flower and birds, and keeps scrapbooks full of pressed leaves and colorful feathers. Xia means cloud in Chinese.

Despite their differences, Ifu and Xia are good friends and share an apartment in New York. Xia has taught Ifu a lot about fashion and modeling and helps her with her English. In return, Ifu tries to keep Xia out of trouble given the pitfalls and temptations of the industry. Xia still has a lot of growing up to do and Ifu has a natural protective and motherly nature.

I had originally designed the bodies of the women to mirror each other so that they could wear one another’s clothes if you flipped the image horizontally, but that idea went out the window with the revision.

Apologies for their Barbie-like nakedness. I went through a dozen debates about underthings for them and decided this was the easiest way to go.

I’ve mentioned before that I modeled Ifu (vaguely) on Lupita Nyong’o, though her character in my head is very different. As I was thinking about their personalities, I knew I wanted to give them contrasts: make Ifu more tailored and studious, and Xia more avant garde and bubbly. Their wardrobes will likely reflect this.

[click on the pictures to download the plates]

Housekeeping!

Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow yesterday morning: six more weeks of Winter! I have no problem with that and will be sorry to see the cold weather go. The impending threat of Spring, however, made me think I should do some housekeeping around the blog.

First, updates for what I’m working on:

  • The Catwalk dolls start posting this weekend!
  • Force Friday is back next week for a short spell while I post my leftover Star Wars backlog.
  • There is a plan to share bits and pieces of my personal collection. This is a 2017 goal I failed to make any progress on last month ~ ha!
  • I also started painting some new dolls because I can’t stick to any one thing–ever. More on that soon.
  • I added an Index page. I don’t like my tag/category system, so I started to clean it up and remove things. An index is easier to customize in the manner I prefer and prettier to look at!
  • Lastly, I added a couple of paragraphs to my About page regarding paper doll tabs. It’s not the apologia I originally had in mind, but what’s there to say, really? Here are the reasons I don’t use tabs. The rest is just shrugging and sheepish looks.

All that said, I always welcome discussion about all things, so feel free to ask questions or nag me–especially about why I’m completely wrong about tabs and ruining it for everyone.