Recycled sari scarves:

T-shirts with the Kate & Hanna logo:

Blouses with embroidered decoration:

Pretty embroidery:

And many more!

My outfit consisted, from the toes up, of fairly fancy sandals, the dress I made, a vintage handbag, and an inexpensive scarf.

I wanted to talk a little bit about this dress, a Kate & Hanna style. We’ve been testing the final version of the pattern using different fabrics, finishes, trims… and it’s just lovely.

One of the varieties I made is the little black dress I’m wearing above, in a silk-hemp charmeuse, with a lovely scallop trim around all the edges.

The dress is so flattering: it has a slightly high waist that makes your legs look real long, the summer version’s got a cute lightly gathered sleeve, V-neckline that elongates your neck, upside-down V front inset that accentuates the waistline, and a waist tie you can wear tied in the back or the front. It is also super fast to sew because: no closures! The front inset and waist tie shape it, along with a tiny bit of elastic sewn into the back of the waistline.

This dress, in a choice of several floral-print cottons, or linen with embroidery on the waist inset is another one of our Kickstarter pledge rewards. You can choose it ready-to-wear or in a ready-to-sew kit.

(Cross-posted here.)

I love vintage sari fabric. Well actually I love all kinds of sari fabric but something about the vintage ones I’ve been finding lately is really special. Sadly, not all are silk, and even some of the ones that are silk have some damage. I’ve been hoarding these for a while, scouring eBay for them or wherever else I can find them, and whatever is a good silk I’ve set aside for the Kate & Hanna Kickstarter. Take a look, you won’t be sorry!

The saris that turn out not to be silk? I’m planning to use them for blouses and so forth. Like this one I made last summer, using the Violet pattern by Colette Patterns:

I wore this blouse virtually every day, the breezy cotton is just so comfortable. I’ve also been making samples for our current collection out of recycled saris, like this slightly damaged yellow-mint green-purple silk sari:

The pattern is a variation on the blouse in The Rose Collection, I  simply changed the center front insert. We will be releasing sewing patterns, with several variations (like  long and short sleeves so you can make the blouse for winter or summer), for all three items in this first collection. I think this variation will be one of them. What I love about this blouse the most: the neckline.

We will also have sewing kits for this blouse, using more vintage saris, in all sorts of materials – cotton, poly chiffon, etc. – whatever we can get our hands on that would work.

I had a Hungarian peasant blouse I’d gotten in the Great Market Hall in Budapest, the shape of which I wasn’t crazy about, and which had mysteriously acquired some stains in the back (I’m not naming names but let’s just say stains tend to be the work of a certain almost-4-year-old resident in our apartment). I cut around the embroidery on the front, keeping that part of the neckline intact, and pieced it into the front inset of the Tova top. The only other changes: I made a short sleeve (summer is coming, plus, ahem, I didn’t have quite enough of the black fabric for a long sleeve), and instead of sewing the front in one piece, I made two seams at either edge of the front inset that go all the way to the hem. It was much easier to sew this way as there is a slight curve I had to add to the bottom of the inset because of the shape of the embroidery. Behold:

The embroidery is blue-on-black in the Matyó style of Mezőkövesd, Hungary. The sleeve band is made of a matching blue cotton.

Clearly, I like peasant blouses – here’s one of our, Kate & Hanna’s designs, also with a front inset and the two seams all the way down the front:

Both these versions are two of the choices for rewards on Kickstarter, either as ready-to-wear blouses or as ready-to-sew kits. I love both – the classic light blue shot cotton with the very stylized rose, and a classic white-on-black Kalocsa rose paired with an over-the-top playful Anna Maria Horner voile. Here’s a closeup:

Isn’t it pretty?

Look how pretty our logo is:

Kate & Hanna logo

I love it. I’ve also been staring at it more than allows me to be objective, probably. I love it anyway.

It’s been busy-busy-busy ever since – we found suppliers, contractors, wholesalers, planned, scrapped plans, made samples, scrapped samples, made more samples, drafted, redrafted, didn’t get nearly enough sleep, tended to sick children, made a web site, made a video, made pictures, remade them, and finally, after more work than I could have imagined it was possible to do, especially with two little children who are almost always around, we got to A Point.

An important point: our products are available for preorder on Kickstarter!

We are starting with three classic styles: a maxi skirt, a dress with a fitted bodice, and a peasant blouse. Each will come in a variety of fabrics, with several options of rose-themed embroidery hand-made by Hungarian artisans who are, if I do say so myself, INCREDIBLE at their craft. They are from a region of the country particularly well-known for its intricate and gorgeous embroidery: Kalocsa.

A sample sewing kit:

Each kit comes wrapped in a reusable unbleached cotton bag you can use as a lingerie bag, produce bag, etc. We recommend laundering embroidered pieces in these bags, or a pillowcase or lingerie bag. The embroidery is colorfast but may snag in the wash otherwise.

Take a look!

(Like E helping out with a photo shoot)

The older one goes to preschool four days a week but this week school was out so there she was too, all day, every day.

Z adding decorations to the waistline of a skirt...

Z is particularly fond of the embroidery we're adding to some of our upcoming designs.

Oh, and check out her outfit: she is GREAT at coming up with outfits for herself, they’re wild but so cool she gets compliments from strangers on the subway on them. Z has not permitted anyone to help her get dressed in, oh, over 6 months.

The blouse on the mannequin is made of vintage sari fabric, one of our products-to-be.

She likes the embroidery so much she’d prefer we put it on EVERYTHING. Preferably in all purple… Note the purple Dora backpack she’s sporting (I made it for her for Christmas).

Funny thing is, I can afford starting a new business or a regular babysitter but not both! So we juggle watching the children as needed, or else just keep an eye out while we work. Mostly the latter. I won’t say there are no interruptions but with two of us around, it works out.

E insists on being in the middle of everything - like photo shoots in the single well-lit corner of our apartment.

The girls have always been very good at finding ways to occupy themselves and I think that watching their adults work encourages them to focus on their own activities.

Z feeding the youngest member of her penguin family.

The only time we need a third person’s help is when the two of us need to go somewhere together. Like the fabric expo a couple weeks ago – where dogs were allowed but (naturally) not children.

I am very lucky that I get to work in my children’s company.

Gage Hill, ca. 1947 (image source: mariskakarasz.com)

She wrote an embroidery handbook that just makes you want to get down and stitch away; in it she says

Most women draw the line at creative design, but I want you to take that line and draw it on cloth instead.

Which I take to mean: make something, it will set you free.

There’s also a book about her entire career that contains some gorgeous images of her fashion work:

I want the jacket on the right.

The fabric on the right is a hemp-silk blend, the one on the left a hemp-cotton-silk. They exist in other colors but these are the samples I have on hand. Both look elegant in an understated way, both feel amazing to the touch, both are lovely to wear, and both seem pretty durable. The only problem is that  they’re a bit hard to get.