Hawks Sadness, Fur Fashion, and Pink Chiffon

Last weekend I started a post about the busy, busy week I had just had, and about how much I was enjoying the city-wide excitement about the Seahawks. It felt like Hawks joy was in the air and we were all intoxicated with it. As I was working on the post last Sunday I thought, "I should wait to finish it until after the game so I can mention the result..."

And then Sunday night I was too sad to do anything. Like the rest of Seattle, I spent the last week in reflective, silent contemplation.

Here are some of the pictures I was going to post...

*Snif*

SIGH

*SOB*

But the gloom is starting to lift and we can all return to our regularly scheduled lives. 

Two weeks ago (pre-davastating Super Bowl loss) I had two presentations in three days. Tuesday was member night at MOHAI-- an evening to get our supporters all jazzed about 2015.  I talked about the recent mannequin rotation, an upcoming program, and some fun finds in the collection. It went quite well and lots of interesting people came up afterwards to talk to me. One woman was very excited to hear about my background and where I had gotten my degree. One of her questions was if I had a speciality, a particular era perhaps or a type of clothing?

"Well!" I said enthusiastically, "I specialize in Seattle fashion history!" as I gestured to the museum around me.

And she literally gave me this look:

And the struggle continues.

To be fair, we were not standing in front of one of the costume cases I had just been talking about. As it happened, were standing in the "Idea Lab" in the Bezos Center for Innovation which I haven't spent enough time exploring. While I was waiting to talk, I noticed this fantastic idea proposed by a young visitor:

If you can't read it, it is an idea for a machine called "The Dream Cake Maker." The steps are as follows:
1) Draw picture of dream cake
2) Put in slot
3) Out comes dream cake

If this isn't proof that museums are inspiring places, I don't know what is.

On Thursday I gave a talk about fur and fashion at the Henry Art Gallery. It went well, and most importantly, no one showed up to throw red paint on me. I wasn't advocating for fur, but I wasn't trashing it either. Like most fashion topics, I think fur is really complicated, and you do a disservice when you boil it down to a single story. (I don't own any fur, but I actually got some offers from people to wear their family furs at the talk.  I politely explained that when giving lectures I usually do some hardcore sweating, so being swathed in fur seemed like poor choice. I settled for my beetle wing earrings instead.)

The week post-Seahawks loss was pretty quiet but also very productive. I resolved a really complex FIC and tried to catch up on some new accessions--which meant basking in the glory of this mega fabulous gown:

(Ignore the seams on the mannequin torso.
I didn't have time to "fully" dress this for the photo)

It was designed by Kiki Hart (a New York designer) and sold by John Doyle Bishop.

Over this past year I realized that I need to pull back a little and not accept every single JDB dress that gets offered. Even if someday I do an entire exhibit about him and his shop, we already have too many artifacts to display.  Before the donor sent me a picture I was about to say no, but then I saw it and was like...

It also has a matching pink chiffon cape!

Curse Words and Carpet

I have two unrelated stories to share this week. Deal with it. 

Pants and Shorts

On Wednesday I went to the main museum to help dress a small army of mannequins in soccer uniforms (file that under things that don't happen to costume curators at the Met). MOHAI was doing a Free First Thursday promotion with the Seattle Sounders, and the Sounders had gotten really excited and sent over a literal truckload of memorabilia to display. A few weeks ago I was asked about mannequins they could use for jerseys, but then it sounded like they were bringing their own so I sort of forgot about it. But then on Monday I found out that yes, they were providing eight mannequins of their own, but sending twelve outfits, so could they use four of ours? And if ours had legs that would be great because two uniforms include pants and shorts. 

WHAT? PANTS AND SHORTS?!?!?!?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Already I was dubious about just throwing some jerseys on random mannequins and hoping they didn't look saggy and terrible, but if there is one thing I've learned about dressing mannequins it is that men's pants are infuriatingly difficult. Suddenly the anatomy of male thighs and butt becomes the greatest mystery of the universe and you are caught in a battle between having the pants fall down, and sculpting a noticeably gigantic junk-in-the-trunk situation. So I practically screamed "PANTS AND SHORTS?!" when I found out. 

But sometimes there are advantages to working with things that don't qualify as high fashion. It was like "AUGH HOW ARE WE GOING TO GET THESE PANTS TO STAY UP oh hey elastic waistband. Done."

Later in the week I was working on a not easy mannequin with one of my longtime dresser helpers and was telling her the story. She laughed and said that coming out of my mouth "PANTS AND SHORTS" sounded like I was cursing. So I could start saying things like "PANTS AND SHORTS we have a lot of vacuuming to do" or "PANTS AND SHORTS that mannequin looks creepy."

Of Course He Did

This week I also had a very fun meeting at St. James Cathedral. I've been noticing that almost all of the Seattle fashion personalities I research (John Doyle Bishop, Helen Igoe, and Madame Thiry) were Catholics who attended St. James. In some cases they also donated things to the Cathedral, so there was some cool stuff to see. 

The BEST factoid I learned was about John Doyle Bishop. The Cathedral has gone through several renovations and sometime in the 1960s or 70s they were looking to put in new carpet. Apparently JDB offered to pay the full amount for the carpet, but with one stipulation: it had to be his favorite shade of green. 

My Money. My Rules.

And they were like "Great! Green it is!"

stjames-cathedral.org

Of course he did. Of course John Doyle Bishop didn't go to some local parish church. You better believe John Doyle Bishop attended mass at the Cathedral, and made sure that space was done up in his colors. I mean, why spend your Sundays in a place that doesn't match your own fabulousness? 

Jealous?

The carpet was removed in the 1990s as part of yet another renovation, but apparently they still have pieces of it. And holy PANTS AND SHORTS am I going to borrow some of it if I ever do a JDB exhibit. 

The Seattle Spirit

Right now I'm working my way through Bill Speidel's Seattle history classic Sons of the Profits. This line struck me as highly accurate:

"The lovely thing about local spirit is that nobody outside of the area pays any attention to it."

Truth.

Whatevs.

Occasions for Muppet Arms

You guys, this has been a heady week for Seattle. The Superbowl win was CRAZY and we are all kind of in a euphoric daze about it. I hear that for non-Seattle fans the game was "boring" but SWEET MERCIFUL CRAP was it exhilarating for us. We were worn out from doing the Muppet arm flail like every five minutes.

Also an acceptable reaction to the ending of Pride and Prejudice

There have been some great articles written this week about what it feels like right now in the city. I recommend Lindy West's Seattle is Suddenly a City of Winners and the piece in the Stranger titled Seattle Has Stolen the Microphone. You should also watch the "Seattle rioters don't jaywalk" clip if you haven't already.

And now to add the the disorienting nature of this week, I am currently snowed in at my parent's house, because everyone assumed that it was a joke when we heard snow was in the forecast for Saturday evening. We got about three inches last night, which in this part of the country means the roads are impassable and no one will even think of venturing out until it melts.

The last couple of weeks at work have also been great. My fashion lecture actually seemed to go over pretty well with the unsuspecting audience. I only had one person sit down, read the title of the talk, and say "Um...I think I'll go explore the galleries instead." I mustered all of my maturity and was just like, "Yes, sure, it is your choice, go enjoy the exhibits." 

 

This week I also managed to start the long delayed INVENTORY process, starring our friends, the tippets. Putting that box back on the shelf with it's new label and knowing all the contents were photographed and accounted was exciting. Nearly Muppet-arm worthy.

Definately Chandler dancing worthy though 

I Can't Help It. Go Hawks!!

"Seattle is basically a city of losers, so as soon as someone or something from Seattle starts to win or do well, the city just goes ballistic"  -- Seattle-raised actor Rainn Wilson

If your attitude about the Superbowl is like mine virtually every other year, you might not know that the Seattle Seahawks are playing the Denver Broncos in a big football game later today. And Seattle is having a total civic pride meltdown about it. "12th Man" flags are popping up everywhere, businesses are closing so their employees can watch the game, and when I went to the dentist on Wednesday it appeared that Seahawks jerseys had replaced the regular dentil hygienist uniform.

Usually I would get upset at being called "a city of losers," but to some degree Rainn Wilson is right. No one questions our tech credibility or our history of producing talented musicians, but in other city awesomeness categories, we feel like we are constantly treated like a joke. Sports is one of those categories. And for me, fashion is another big one. I mean, when I was in grad school I had a professor ask "why would anyone care?" when I floated the idea of researching something from Seattle, and now I am attempting to build a career out of proving her wrong. Seattle angst runs deep.

If the Seahawks win today, I can't even imagine the elation and cathartic release that the city is going to experience. And if the Seahawks lose, we will all just spend the rest of the day in devastated, quiet contemplation.

(You know what is weird about this? 1) If I was reading this post about any other city/sports team I would be rolling my eyes about how worked up people get about a stupid game and 2) by the time most of you read this the Superbowl will be over and you will know the result)

But on to the most important thing: WHAT WILL I WEAR???

I'm told that oversized "jerseys" are the standard. Unfortunately the only oversized shirt I have has raccoons on it.

This is not the shirt to wear when demanding respect for Seattle sports teams and our sense of style. I'll work on it.

--------------------------------------
Sunday evening update:

DID SEATTLE JUST WIN A NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP??????

I have basically been making this face for three hours now. 

Tolo: The Coolest Regional Word Ever

This week I took a donation at the museum of a dress that was worn to a school dance in the 1950s. It had three cool stories attached to it. 1) The owner bought it at local department store Frederick & Nelson, and it was a big deal because it was the first thing that her parents allowed her to buy on her own and charge to their account. 2) Her Catholic school had modesty rules about dresses, so her mother had to add a strap around the shoulders to pass the censors and 3) She wore it to Tolo.

If you were not raised in Seattle, you are probably thinking "What on earth is TOLO?" and if you were, you are thinking "Doesn't everyone call it that?"

Tolo is a dance where the girls ask the guys, and it is a regional word in the truest sense. People from here don't know it by any other name, and it draws blanks stares from just about everyone else. The reach of its usage extends only to Western and Central Washington-- apparently not making it to Oregon or B.C. or even to the far East side of the state. But within it's area it is totally pervasive. When I was growing up, absolutely every single school called it that and when I got to college in Indiana I was shocked to find out it wasn't called that everywhere. My Seattle transplant parents had talked about "Sadie Hawkins" but I just assumed that was an outdated term from an older generation.

It turns out "Tolo" is a word from the Pacific Northwest trade language Chinook Jargon. It was used among Native tribes centuries before the arrival of Europeans, and then added French and English words once those groups showed up. Up until the early 20th century the language was still very much in use by people from all parts of Seattle society, with even the wealthy elite bragging about their knowledge of Chinook Jargon as proof that they were "real" Seattleites.

Some ladies who are taking control

"Tolo" means "to win" or in some contexts "to take control." At the turn of the 20th century there was a women's organization at the University of Washington called the "Tolo Society" that sometimes organized events and dances. It is thought that that is how the term came into use for a girls-ask-guys dance.

Not all Tolos are reverent, rule-abiding occasions

If you want to know more about Chinook Jargon (and join me in bringing back fun words like "skookum" and "iktus" into everyday speech) wikipedia has a pretty good page on the subject, and you can find some of the info on Tolo on this discussion board here. MOHAI also has a really cool interactive feature about the language in our core exhibit at the new museum.

And yes, all the included pictures are of yours truly attending Tolo in high school.  

And Now...Here Are Some Can-Can Dancers

Woo boy. This week. Right? If you can forgive the liberal use of expletives, doesn't this pretty much sum up what we are all feeling? (Thank you fellow Northwest Girlchoir alum Lindy West)

But work-wise it was a pretty good week for me. I had several appointments with people wanting to donate artifacts and tell me their stories, and every one of them was a delight. Two who came in were there about John Doyle Bishop, so I got to hear tales of him dressing society weddings and sweeping around the Washington Athletic Club in a cape and gloves. But it was hard to top Tuesday, which was when I had two women who had just turned 70 come in and tell me about their careers as "Barclay Girls."

The Barclay Dance Studio had been around in Seattle for a while, but the "Barclay Girls" troupe became famous in the early 1950s when they started putting on shows for troops returning from the Korean War. Every time a ship docked in Seattle, the Barclay Girls were there. Rain or shine, doing a kick-line on the pier in fishnets and heels.

After the conflict ended they were mainly known for their performances at Seafair. Each year had a different theme and they would dazzle the crowd with various musical numbers and quick costume changes. And they weren't just shimmying and lifting their skirts: they were talented, versatile performers trained in multiple styles of dance.

The girls were quite young-- usually in high school or early college. Sometimes they would have to get dressed up and greet a ship early in the morning before school, and the two I met talked about getting a special ok from their teachers to sew sequins on their costumes during class. Wherever they performed they always had a chaperone with them (usually one of the girls' mothers), so while they may have gotten lots of hoots and hollers, watchful eyes kept anything more questionable from happening.

Ok, so there are some icky gender roles going on here with the men fighting a war and the women putting on a saucy show, but I'm going to lay that aside for a moment. Regardless of your gender or theirs, wouldn't you enjoy seeing a bunch of talented people in sparkly costumes put on a dance extravaganza? Isn't a cheerful kick-line just what we need during a week that has been as confusing and upsetting as this one? It doesn't fix anything, but it is a reminder that as dark as this world can be, it can also be full of feathers and ruffles and fun.

Austen Translation

If you know me, you know that I love Jane Austen.* Even if you don't know me or Jane Austen, you probably know that her works are something of a pop culture cash cow. I have mixed feelings about this. Sometimes I take a purist "don't mess with Jane" attitude, but sometimes I willingly buy into it. I mean, I own a modern-day Pride and Prejudice movie made by Mormons which I have watched more times than I'd like to admit. There is a right way and a wrong way to mess with Jane, and I'm going to lecture you on it now.

Last Sunday, my roommate and I decided that we wanted to enjoy all the fun parts of the Super Bowl (snacks, spending time with friends, sitting around in oversized shirts, Beyonce) but skip the boring parts (football). So we bought some food, rented some Friends (the TV show, not the social concept), put on some Destiny's Child hits, and danced around in our favorite dumpy clothing (for me it was a gigantic shirt with raccoons on it). Our video store rents everything 2 for 1 so we had to get another show or movie. I advocated for Lost in Austen a miniseries in which a modern day fan of Jane Austen finds herself transported to the world of Pride and Prejudice. I thought it might be fun.

It turned out to be pretty unwatchable. The main character was unpleasant and obnoxious and as she wreaked havoc in the P&P world, I just got more and more disgusted.

Her period-inappropriate bangs were particularly grating

I resolved to give it a full hour, but only made it 40 minutes. I then tried to skip ahead and see if it got better, but instead ended up at a point where Jane was miserably married to Mr. Collins and Bingley was running off with Lydia. Ugh. Bleh.

Strangely, in the same week, I had a second opportunity to be entertained by the mangling of Miss Austen. Local theater company Jet City Improv is donating something to the museum collection, and the guy facilitating the donation told me about their latest "improvised play" called Austen Translation. It sounded intriguing, so on Friday I went.

Photo from the Jet City Improv website

There was a narrator and every actor had an assigned first name, but how they were related to each other, their social status, and who falls in love with whom was all made up that night.

It was awesome.

My night was the tale of Elinor Quackenbush, who was courted by new-in-town clergyman Frederick Fredericks and local braggart Walter Cavindish. Scenes were regularly stolen by her dim-witted twin sister Harriet, and elder sister Violet who was of "a sickly constitution and often near death." In the second act, Violet kept appearing with new arm-slings and eyepatches, and when Elinor said something particularly cruel to her she ran off stage sobbing "You know I'm allergic to my own tears!" It really looked like Elinor was falling for Mr. Thomas, but after a twin-based mistaken identity marriage proposal, Thomas and Harriet ended up together and Mr. Cavindish made a surprisingly charming declaration of love ("All my life I've known I was better than everyone else, but that changed when I met you"). It was ridiculous yet satisfying at the same time.

Austen Translation was more irreverent with Jane's work than Lost in Austen, yet somehow it was way better.  I think Lost in Austen went wrong because it messed with things that make Pride and Prejudice good in the first place. Watching the story unfold incorrectly because Elizabeth Bennett has been replaced by Annoying McStupidBangs wasn't fresh or exciting, it was just sad. But Austen Translation poked fun at Austen tropes while creating something new. It was goofy, awkward, romantic, funny, and exciting because no one knew exactly where it was going.

I'll leave you with one of the best "yep, this is improvised" moments from the show. The characters we had already met were going to church, where they were encountering people who weren't yet identified.

Un-introduced male character: I find these meetings so uncomfortable. I hope I can say as little as possible.
Second un-introduced male character: Are you going to start the sermon soon?

Apparently next month they are making up a Gilbert & Sullivan opera. YES.

*I should get points for resisting the urge to start this post with "It is the truth universally awknowledged..."

Keeping It Casual

This week I faced a serious clothing conundrum: What to wear to a meeting at the corporate offices of Tommy Bahama? I wanted to look professional, but I didn't want to show up in my favorite "I mean business" dress and discover that the person I was meeting with was wearing a sarong and flip-flops. I found the issue so comical and intriguing that I posted it to facebook and even uploaded one of those narcissistic pictures in the mirror of what I eventually chose.

To my credit: No duckface

The bottom line though was that I was really, really excited about this meeting...which made it all the more embarrassing when five minutes before I was about to leave I got an email saying they would have to reschedule. As I banged my head against my desk, one of the the people I work with said, "Well, I guess they have a casual approach to keeping appointments, too." Ooooh! BURN ON TOMMY BAHAMA.

So what was I so stoked about? Since when is "resort casual" my aesthetic? Well, it isn't. But I've only recently found out that Tommy Bahama is a Seattle-founded and Seattle-based company, which means it is suddenly fascinating to me. I mean, it seems strange that Tommy Bahama is from Seattle, right? Our region isn't exactly known for its warm, beachy climate. In fact, there is only one Tommy Bahama store in the city of Seattle, and it opened around a decade after the company was founded. So what gives?

Well, there is a much bigger story about the jeans and casual wear industry in Seattle. It started with Brittania in the 1970s and then Generra and Union Bay in the 1980s. Brittania is credited with being one of the first to market faded denim in the US, and all three were innovators in teen wear.   The companies took advantage of the port and Seattle's proximity to Asia, and they were some of the first to have designers stateside and production overseas. That particular innovation would eventually be devastating to the US garment industry, so while it is difficult to applaud, it is also impossible to deny that it was an important and influential business model. These days, almost all of our clothes are made overseas.

But let's talk about something more cheerful. Remember Hypercolor?

Original Hypercolor clothing was invented and made by Seattle-based Generra. And you thought our only contribution to 90s fashion was grunge!

Brittania and Generra have since fizzled, but Union Bay is still kicking and has its headquarters in a building on Lake Union. There are also several companies that have been started by former employees of the big three. Tommy Bahama has three cofounders: two of which had started at Brittania and then were major players at Generra, and one who was the former vice-president of Union Bay.

So it turns out Seattle wasn't a risky, off-the-map choice for Tommy Bahama, it was was an obvious and easy one. Seattle actually ranks fourth in the nation as a center for fashion design and apparel talent according this fascinating article.

The jeans industry and the companies that grew out of it is something I'd like to know more about, and I'd like to see that story represented in the MOHAI collection. Of course, recently-made casual wear is never what someone thinks to donate to a history museum. I think most people would be shocked to hear that I roll my eyes when I get an offer for yet ANOTHER 1880s wedding dress, but would jump for joy over some 1980s Seattle branded jeans.

Scratch that. Not jump for joy. I would do one of those dance moves from the Hypercolor commercial. Running man with extra side-order of flailing arms.

Freude Schöner Götterfunken!

This week I celebrated the anniversary of my return to Seattle. One year ago I arrived by train from New York and started my fantastic job at MOHAI. I still miss many things about NYC, but overall being in Seattle has been wonderful and I still feel blessed to be here doing what I'm doing.

In recognition of my happy, celebratory feelings, it was appropriate that on Friday I got to sing Beethoven's 9th symphony at Benaroya Hall. This summer I auditioned for the Seattle Choral Company, but had second thoughts about joining when the audition alone was way more intense than I expected (to give you an idea: I scored a zero on the French portion of the language exam). Instead, I decided to join their "festival chorus," a group of singers they call upon occasionally for larger choral works that require a bigger sound. This year, they needed extras for the choral finale of Beethoven's 9th. I've never sung it, but my German is ausgezeichnet compared to my French, and I already knew the basic tune. You probably do too.

I've listened to the full 9th Symphony before, but that was pretty much how I pictured it. Lots of fun German words, a big cheering crowd, and John Lennon on the harmonica. Well, I was in for a shock. Sure, the chorus gets several refrains of the "Ode to Joy" but there are a lot of other parts too, and for most of it the sopranos are at the top of our range, trying to belt out text and high As at the same time. Flip to about the 8:30 mark in the video below and you'll have an idea of how ridiculous it gets by the end:

The orchestra is sawing away as the choir tries to hastily screech out words like "umschlungen," "Sternenzelt," and "Götterfunken." I heard choir members joke that Beethoven must have hated singers, and after a few grueling rehearsals I was pretty convinced that his genius was best enjoyed as an audience member.

On the night of the concert, our director told us to "leave nothing on the table." The choral part comprises about 15 minutes of singing and it's over. Our rehearsals lasted for 2 hours and thirty minutes each, and so learning the piece felt like a marathon. But in performance it was more like a sprint, and so he was telling us to push toward the end and have nothing left after the last measure. It was stirring advice, and in performance the piece finally felt like the joyful thrill it was intended to be.

So happy anniversary Seattle! You fill me with Freude.

Let Me See Your Quaker Face

I couldn't think of one story worth a long post this week, so here are several short stories, resulting in one giant post.

Quaker Face

Yesterday I did something I've never done before: I went to a high school football game. My roommate (a teacher) invited me, and I was strangely intrigued by the prospect. My high school didn't have a football team, so everything I knew about the experience was from TV and movies. Admittedly, the Seattle HS football scene isn't exactly like small-town Texas (probably 'cause, you know, there are other things to do here on a Friday night) but it was pretty fascinating nonetheless. There were cheerleaders, a marching band, and the team even charged through a big piece of paper when they came out after halftime. I was watching the Franklin Quakers, so the only thing missing was some sort of terrifying Ben Franklin mascot.

Or maybe just the skeezy one from that episode of The Office

Near the end of the third quarter, the cheerleaders started this cheer that everyone seemed really excited about. They chanted something, and then said "let me see your alligator!" and everyone did snapping jaw motion with their arms. Next they said "let me see your dougie" and then some little dance move thing happened. And last they said "let me see your QUAKER FACE" and then time stood still as my brain was like "What is happening right now? What is Quaker Face? What could it possibly be??" All my Quaker friends from Earlham materialized in an apparition before me as I threw up my hands in confusion.

Then time started again. It turned out to be some sort of motion with hands on the side of the face. WHAT DOES IT MEAN, CHEERLEADERS? WHAT DOES IT MEAN??

Welcome to Bellevue

On the other side of Lake Washington stands a city called Bellevue, which is a strange land that Seattleites make fun of. The feeling is mutual.

As I crossed the bridge and took the first exit, right away I saw something I had never seen before.

"Huh," I thought. "So THAT is what a Mitt Romney yard sign looks like."

Girl. No. 

This week I bought an awesome vintage dress that I had tried on a few days earlier and came back for because I couldn't stop thinking about it. Seriously, this dress is going to blow everyone's minds when I wear it. Get ready.

Anyway, while I had it on, the woman at the store was, of course, trying to convince me to buy it. That's what salespeople do. At one point she pointed to the beading and said, "This is very nice workmanship. It is definitely couture." I was like:

Girl. No. That does not work on me. Don't use words you don't understand.

Things Dmitry Said Today

Yeah, you saw it coming. I still want to talk about Dmitry. The problem is, I usually watch Project Runway either Friday night or Saturday morning, so when I blog on Saturday, it is all I can think about.  

Remember when I was excited for him to serve up sequins for the Rockette challenge? Well, it was awesome. First of all, we got treated to hearing him say "Rahkyette" about 10 times, and then he started snarking to the camera about how boring another designer's dress was. He actually said this: 

Hilarious. I'm going to make that a daily affirmation. 

This week they had a sort of dumb challenge to design baby clothes, and as part of it they gave them all baby dolls that cried constantly. They even made them take them home to their apartments that night. In the morning, they showed the babies all screaming, and the bleary-eyed designers scrambling to calm them. Dmitry was glaring at his baby over his pillow, and then said to the camera:

"I forgot. I am a father now."

When they made it to the workroom, Tim came in and said, "Good morning designers. How was your evening and night?"

Dmitry responded: "I barely had time to put my pants on."

Yeah, So I Figured Out How To Add GIFs To The Blog

I think it is really going to spice things up around here. 

Thanks, Michael. 

Your New Favorite Movies

I just couldn't resist writing an extra post about Dmitry and his rickrack, but I promise this isn't going to turn into a Project Runway recap blog. This here is my real post for the week.

This week at work it was back to pushing boobs around and building beer guts. You know what I'm talking about--mannequin dressing.

When the new MOHAI opens in December, our first temporary exhibition will be about movie theaters and filmmaking in Seattle.  For the show, we are borrowing costumes from a local company that dressed a number of recent films that used Seattle as a location. The only problem is that most recent films set in Seattle actually use Vancouver for filming (something about taxes), and so actual films made in Seattle tend to be sort of obscure and little known. So, to get you all hyped up about the costumes I'm dressing for Celluloid Seattle, your assignment is to become obsessed with the following movies:

Stephen King's Rose Red

This was a 2002 made-for-TV movie which ended up being forgettable for everyone except those involved in Seattle-area historical societies. The story about a haunted Seattle mansion was totally fabricated, but the marketing campaign tried to get people thinking it was a true story--much like the Blair Witch Project had done a few years earlier. They set up a fake University website and had a faux documentary about the history of this non-existent building. The result was that lots of people were fooled and started contacting places like MOHAI try to find out more. When told it was just made up, some became angry and assumed that we were either misinformed or part of the cover-up. Historylink has a pretty hilarious run-down of all the inquiries it received, which includes comments like "If the story of Ellen Rimbauer is not true then where did the photos come from?" and "The unaccounted for bodies of those who visited the mansion should be proof enough...who are you to depict which are true and which are false?"

The movie is mostly set in the present day, but luckily the costumes we have were worn by ghosts from more fabulous historical eras.

Grassroots

Grassroots came out this year and is due on DVD soon. It actually looks kind of great.

On the long list of things I could never have guessed I would do in life:
#438: Scrutinize a movie trailer in order to better understand the body proportions of Jason Biggs

Ira Finkelstein's Christmas

Also looks kind of fun, right? It was filmed partially in West Seattle and in nearby Bavarian-themed town Leavenworth.  At about 40 seconds in you get a great view of Elliott Gould's grandpa costume which we have for the exhibit. Hardly haute couture, but the printed shirt is Tommy Bahama which is a local brand. I think it's a nice touch. 

With this movie and Grassroots, it's a reminder that most costume designers don't spend their time churning out Elizabethan gowns. Generally they work with ready-made pieces, and have to put outfits together that match the life and personality of each character. If you make the wrong choice with a period piece, only nerds like me will notice.  But if you dress a contemporary movie, you have to tap into people's present understanding of what certain styles and colors mean. If you put a dark toned, structured blazer on a retired Floridian, everyone is going to feel that it looks wrong. 

The movie was made in 2011 and was shown at the Seattle International Film Festival, but I think it has yet to have a general theatrical release. It might be coming soon to a theater near you!

True Tales of the Antiques Roadshow

About two months ago I got an email that the local PBS station was looking for people to volunteer for Antiques Roadshow. The deal was you had to be willing to show up at 6:30 am on a Saturday, and then work on your feet for a twelve hour day. In payment you would get a free Antiques Roadshow polo shirt, two meals, and two appraisals by the experts. I thought, "You had me at free Antiques Roadshow polo shirt."

(Just as a warning- this is a long post. If you have always wanted to know the inner working of Antiques Roadshow, this is your lucky day. If you barely care, skip to the last paragraph for the #1 best part of the story.)

We had training on the Friday before and got our jobs assigned. Some assignments seemed uninteresting, but also low pressure (standing at the front door and greeting people) and others seemed exciting and high pressure (working with the camera crew but wearing a headset and running around all day). In the end, I played my cards exactly right and found the perfect job: working on the set, directing people into the line for the Rugs and Textile appraisals.

When the day started, I chatted with the appraisers and tried to casually let it slip that I knew a bit about fashion and was sort of an expert on local stuff. One of them was actually interested, and before I knew it I had him jotting down notes about John Doyle Bishop.

The set at the beginning of the day before the hoards arrived

Most of the day consisted of managing a line of people. Basically the Antiques Roadshow set is one big circle, with tables of appraisers along the interior perimeter. In the center of the circle is the filming crew and the areas for the on-camera appraisals. The appraisers are divided into categories (pottery, furniture, Asian art, prints), and there is supposed to be a short line in front of every table. When you watch the show, you see lots of people milling around in the background: these are people lined up for appraisals and the volunteers trying to jostle them into the right position. On the outside of the big circle are much, much longer lines for each category. My job was to walk people from the longer hidden line, into the shorter on-set line, and to keep people from sneaking directly into the shorter line. Going to the Antiques Roadshow means lots and lots of waiting (6,000 people came through with two items each), so the main thing that was stressful was dealing with grumpy people in the longer line. By the time they saw me, most had been waiting in different kinds of lines for several hours. But after a few seemingly-tense situations, I discovered that the biggest grumps transformed into cheerful, wide-eyed folk as soon as I led them on set.

Speaking of waiting, I realized that if you were excited about the possibility of getting an on-camera appraisal, you should be careful what you wish for. If an appraiser thought you had a TV-worthy story they would call a volunteer like me over, I would go to the volunteer in my section with a headset, and he would send in a request for a producer to come to the table. The owner of the object was sent away to wait, and when the producer came over the appraiser pitched the story to them and they decided if it is camera-worthy. Getting on television is also the goal of the appraisers because it means exposure for them and their business. So at any given time, there are a number of appraisers wanting to speak to the producer. At one point, there were people with objects waiting an hour and a half just to have the producer come over and decide if they were going to get filmed. IF they were picked for filming (sometimes they weren't) they would go into the green room to get makeup and wait to be called onto set. That wait could also stretch into an hour plus.

One thing that really surprised me was how much time the appraisers at my table spent with each person. I had three experts: Connie and Steven who specialized mostly in vintage clothing and accessories, and Jim the carpet guy. All of them spent at least five minutes, and sometimes what seemed like as much as 15 or 20 with each person. It made the line move excruciatingly slow, but I don't think anyone walked way unhappy from the table. Never once did someone get a "Meh. $10. NEXT!" appraisal. No matter the value, each item got the appraiser's full attention and they told the person as much as they could.

When it was time for my own appraisals, I found out that not every table worked that way. The line for textiles was long, but some of the lines, like painting, were INSANE and so the appraisers had to work very quickly. I brought in two pottery pieces that my parents owned that we had reason to believe were somewhat interesting and possibly valuable. I saw a different appraiser for each one, but I felt like both pieces were dealt with hastily and dismissed as unimportant. I was told one was "the type of thing you see a lot at garage sales" and the other was "only $300 to $500." I walked away defeated, but later realized that they could have told me all the same information in a better way and I would have felt a lot better. $300 to $500 for a tiny tea bowl that my Dad got for free?? Hot dog!

The day ended up being longer than planned. At our 6:30 release time there were still some substantial lines, so we all just kept going. Finally at 8, when most of the lines were done or at least down to the people inside the set, they told us to go home (the appraisers apparently stayed until the last appraisal was done). I was exhausted, but it was an awesome, fascinating, totally worth-it day. They said they would make Seattle into three episodes, airing sometime in early 2013. I think there is a good chance that the back of my head will be in a shot somewhere!

Ok, but I saved the best story for last. In the middle of the day, the appraiser I had connected with in the morning called me over by name (to be fair, I had a giant name tag on) to come look at something. In front of me was a woman with several hats. "What can you tell us about John Eaton?" he asked.  I couldn't believe it! As a museum person I couldn't say anything about value (I didn't really know anyway) but I talked about his store, his career as a milliner, and his legacy as a teacher. I even slipped in something about Gigi and Voulez-Vous. I shared my knowledge with this nationally recognized appraiser and got to tell the owner of the hats something interesting that she didn't know. Totally worth waking up at 5:30 am and standing around for 13 hours!

Couture For Sure

Last week I led a walking tour about the history of fashion and retail in downtown Seattle. I spent a lot of it babbling about department stores and John Doyle Bishop, but the highlight of the tour was a visit to Luly Yang, Seattle's own couture house.

"Couture" is a word that gets thrown around a lot today and is usually used improperly. In fact, in my grad school class on fashion myths, my friend Ariele did her whole paper on the subject. Titled "Haute Couture or Not Couture" she explored the real meaning of the term and tried to figure out when it all went wrong (fyi: should you ever have to walk past a Juicy Couture store the proper response is to shudder and avert your eyes).

So when I first heard about Luly Yang I was a little skeptical. Couture? In Seattle? Sure, sure, Luly Yang designs beautiful dresses, but that on its own, doesn't make something couture. In addition to innovative design and high quality technique and materials, couture needs to be custom made for the wearer in an atelier--not churned out of a factory in standard sizes.

During the tour we met an assistant designer who showed us the "couture room." She explained how the garments on display were runway samples that served as inspiration, but that she worked with clients to design something unique. Some come in just for special occasion gowns, but some have their entire wardrobes done--including swimsuits and casual wear. Couture houses of old would do this as well: I remember hearing a story about Valentina making gardening aprons.

At the end of the tour we went down to the sewing room. I can't emphasize enough what a big deal it is that Luly Yang actually has a sewing room on site. As our tour guides talked, a master seamstress was sewing dress pieces together for a fitting that was to take place the next day. She flitted back and forth between a machine (machine sewing is not a couture deal breaker) and a padded dress form. This was actually the part that got me the most excited. In fashion history class I remember seeing a photograph from some couture house--I think it was Dior--where they kept padded torsos for each of their clients so they could always have the right shape to work on. Our tour guides confirmed that they do the same thing--certain dress forms are kept padded to exact shape of their return clients.

I should clarify that in order to be "haute couture" (rather than just "couture") you have to be part of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture in Paris. But other than that, I am giving my official fashion historian seal of approval to Luly Yang's use of the word "couture." When the tour was over I just wanted to float home on a cloud of tulle and figure out a way to have all of my clothes made by Luly. (The first step would be to make some more money, so I should probably get going with my plans to create an "i can has cabbage" Amish meme empire.)

Did I mention that Luly Yang has been in business just ten years? Which means that while the historic couture houses in Paris are seeing a shrinking number of clients, Seattle is home to a successful new couture house. So go ahead. Tell me that story again about Seattle style only being about flannel and rain gear.

Wait. Revision to earlier plan: when I have the money to buy something from Luly, my first request will be to have her make me a plaid flannel shirt with the "Luly Yang Couture" label inside. I will then be the owner of the coolest, most ironic clothing item in this history of Seattle fashion.

Schiaparelli and Seattle

Yesterday I returned from a trip to New York. I caught up with friends, attended a fantastic symposium about fashion and music (presented by students from my FIT program), and caught the new Costume Institute exhibition at the Met. Last year was the blockbuster Alexander McQueen show, and this year it is all about two female designers: Elsa Schiaparelli and Miuccia Prada. Both are Italian, both use surrealist elements in their designs, and both exude general female awesomeness.

As per my calling in life, I need to make some sort of connection to Seattle. In this case, it actually isn't so hard. First of all, Seattle-based online juggernaut Amazon.com sponsored this year's exhibition, and CEO Jeff Bezos was one of the chairs of the Met Gala--one of the most star-studded fashion events of the entire year. Not everyone may consider Bezos a hometown hero but he has done at least two things right with his life: 1) given tons of money to the museum I work for and 2) orchestrated a scenario in which he gets his picture taken with Anna Wintour and Miuccia Prada. (Apparently it costs extra for them to look happy about it, but whatever. Cheers to you Mr. Bezos for making Nuclear Wintour bow down to your Seattle-based moxie.)

But the Seattle connections don't stop there. Thanks to another rich person with a fondness for museums, there are several Schiaparelli pieces in Seattle collections. Guendolen Carkeek Plestcheeff was a fabulous Seattle socialite who travelled to Paris to buy clothes. She donated her wardrobe partially to MOHAI and partially to the Henry Art Gallery. The Henry even has one of the trompe l'oeil sweaters responsible for launching Schiaparelli's career in the late 1920s (pictured at the top of this post). They also have this super cool suit:

MOHAI's collection includes a butterfly dress almost exactly like this one from the Met, only in with a slightly different neckline:

I don't have any evidence that Schiaparelli ever visited Seattle, but I do know she met one of my favorite Seattle fashion personalities. You know who I'm talking about: John Doyle Bishop.

In 1973 he made a big splash by showing up to the Spring Bill Blass fashion show with Schiaparelli on his arm. He also presented her with one of his signature "chicken wire" scarves, which she wore to the show.

I could stare at this picture all day.

See You At The Fair!

Last week MOHAI opened an off-site exhibit celebrating the 50th anniversary of Seattle's 1962 World's Fair. The exhibit looks great and includes some dressed mannequins, so you should definitely check it out if you live in Seattle.

But most importantly, I looked amazing at the opening party.

I wore a bright pink vintage dress with black tights, and my roommate wore a contemporary bright yellow dress and black tights, and together we looked like a pair of highlighter markers.

But back to the fair. Seattleites are pretty proud of their '62 World's Fair, and with good reason. The theme was the future and space, which was exactly what everyone had on their mind at that time. Within a few years, 1960s fashion would be all about futuristic looks and blasting off for life on the moon. It was also one of the last financially successful World's Fairs in the 20th century, which is fun because it gives us the opportunity to feel superior to New York. New York held its own World's Fair in 64/65, and because of the close proximity of time, there was a bit of a rivalry between the planners. Both fairs were attended by millions and had lasting impacts, but New York's nearly ended in bankruptcy. Also, never ever believe anyone who says Belgian waffles were a product of the NY World's Fair. They were a popular hit there, but the American debut was in Seattle.

If you have 14 minutes and a passion for old phone technology, you should probably watch this video:


I assume everyone in the 60s was this excited and happy about everything. Extra exciting: Asian clothing, peep shows, DNA, and beepers.

An emotional, smelly day

This morning, I was extra excited to go to work. Instead of reporting to my regular desk at the old museum, I got to go to work at the new museum. I had only been there once before since I started my job. The construction was still in full swing, it was cold, and I was forced to wear an orange vest and a hard hat. Not a good day.

But this morning it was lovely out. I took the bus part of the way and walked the rest. I walked through the revitalized South Lake Union neighborhood, passing lots of hip Amazon.com workers on my way. As I approached the park, I almost got choked up with giddy tears.

The building is beautiful and the setting of the park, the water, and sky is really breathtaking. I felt so, so lucky to be part of the transition to the new space.

The main task of the day was to set up the room where all of the artifacts will be unpacked and organized before they get installed. Myself, three other members of the collections staff, and several members of the packing company arranged tables and talked logistics. Once we had a plan, we set to work. One of the tasks was to cover each table in a padded blanket. It would later get covered with a thin sheet of ethafoam, creating an archival-safe, soft surface for the objects to sit on. Us collections people were a little wary of the blankets since they were just regular moving blankets, not some acid-free, bleach-free, chemically inert, Oddy tested, blessed-by-the-director-of-the-Smithsonian product that we are used to using. But, figuring the ethafoam would provide a safe-enough barrier, we went on our merry way. That is until we started discovering that some of the blankets smelled musty. Some of them reeked, and some of them only stank softly. Were all of them bad? We couldn't tell. Before we knew it we were sticking our noses in each blanket, calling people over to offer second opinions, debating which part of the blanket was best for smell-testing, and eventually confusing our noses so much that we couldn't tell if the smell was on everything or if we had just gone crazy.

The final assessment? We had a big batch of musty blankets that could absolutely not be used with artifacts. Instead we ordered thicker ethafoam to cover the tables.

But that was all beside the point. The point is, in a few weeks I am going to be showing up regularly to install artifacts here:

So awesome.

Good Bubbleator, Bad Bubbleator

As I've said before, if a mannequin is dressed well you focus on the clothes. If it is dressed poorly you get distracted by how weird the whole thing looks. Today I have a concrete example for you.

For our upcoming exhibition about the Seattle World's Fair my interns and I had to dress a Bubbleator uniform. The Bubbleator was an attraction at the fair that consisted of a round, glass elevator that took people up into an area with a bunch of screens and audio that talked about the future. I'm probably not describing it that well, but I don't really understand it fully myself. What I do know though is that the men who worked as operators and ushers had super awesome futuristic uniforms to wear. When we completed dressing one, it looked like this:

Not terrible, but just sort of strange. The shoulders are huge yet the arms and legs seem spindly and empty. And you can tell something is wrong because the jacket is pulling strangely.

This is proof that sometimes it helps to walk away and see it again with fresh eyes. We had thought we did a great job with this, but then when we looked at it a week later we could tell that it was just distractingly off.

So, we tried for round two.

So much better, right? My interns had an epiphany regarding shoulders and the fact that they often slope down rather than going straight out. We also filled out the arms and the legs so that they didn't look as empty. The fit looks like it is for an actual human now rather than a linebacker with the legs of a ballerina.

Causing disorder in the neighborhood

One of the outfits we are displaying at the new museum is a jacket worn by local TV icon JP Patches. All we have is the jacket, but the designers want the mannequin to be fully dressed, which means I have to create or track down prop pieces to complete the look. I really wanted a red and white clown tie like in the picture, so I purchased this great fabric (from the Dr. Seuss fabric line--no joke) and sewed a prop tie. When I put it together though, it looked wrong because the jacket is worn and faded and the tie looks brand new. So I set to work "distressing" the tie to make it look older.

My education taught me a lot about how NOT to treat fabric, so I figured that all I had to do was the opposite. First I washed it in super hot water using a detergent that contained bleach. When that didn't do much I decided to just hang it up in my window so it could get some light damage.

I chuckled a little bit about how it would look to people who might glance at my window from the street. To me it looked a little like a scarecrow, or like some sort of mysterious or creepy message I was sending to a person in the apartment across the street.

It was up for about a week when an apartment-wide notice went out, reminding all residents of a few rental agreement rules, including:

"No tenant shay display any decor (curtains, art, stickers, etc.) on windows or doors that are visible to the public."

Wa wah. I guess no one likes clown ties.