Fashion Week Salaries

I know Gisele makes a ridiculous amount of money to be human mutation but it's kind of fun to see what all the other staffers make who are involved in creating Fashion Week,.  I assume these are annual salaries.  I think it's funny that the "Anna Wintour" imitation is listed as making $67,500.  I'm pretty sure the real Anna gets more than that just for her annual clothing budget.

The graphic was designed by Shaun Sanders for Payscale.com.

common knitting terms

I really have to get myself on a better schedule of posting....  One of my many side jobs is giving individual hand knitting lessons to absolute beginners.  I created this list of common knitting terms (in plain English) that a beginner might need as they start knitting.  By no means is the list extensive, nor does it include more advanced terms like cabling, ssk, etc.  I think that's a separate list.

If you're a beginner at knitting just remember to relax, breathe and practice often.  Don't expect to be perfect within the first hour.  As my mom used to tell me ad nauseum, "Practice Makes Perfect!"  She was right about that.

Common Knitting Terms For Beginners:

Cast On – The method used to begin knitting.  There are a variety of ways to begin knitting.  Most patterns unless they specify otherwise, use the “long tail cast on method.”

Cast Off – The method used to end knitting.  This is also sometimes referred to as “bind off.”

Dye lot - The yarn label includes the “dye lot” number for each color of yarn.  Whenever you buy yarn to make a garment, make sure that EVERY skein or ball of yarn has the same “dye lot” number.  It is also critical that you buy enough balls/skeins of yarn to complete the project.  Even though many commercial yarn companies use computers to create dye colors it is next to impossible to create the exact same color each time.  If you have to buy another skein at a later time, you may end up with a streak of color that doesn’t match what you’ve already done.

Face Side (also sometimes referred to as the “Right Side” or “Front Side”)– The side of the knitting that appears when it’s worn.

Frogging – unraveling the knitting (also sometimes referred to as “ripping”)

Garter Stitch – Knit every row.  This creates a fabric, which has ridges and looks the same on both sides.

Gauge – The number of stitches and rows in a specific measured area.  For US patterns and yarns, this is usually a 4 inch by 4 inch square.  It will be listed as X number of stitches and X number of rows per 4 inches.  In order to measure the gauge it’s necessary to knit a small piece of fabric and count the number of stitches and rows over 4 inches.  For non-US patterns or yarns, the gauge usually refers to the number of stitches and rows per 10 centimeters.  To make it easier, you may want to have a clear plastic ruler that has inches on one side and centimeters on the other side.  The clear ruler will also make it easier to line up your stitches or rows as you count them. 

The number of stitches and rows per measured area refers to the “tension” of the knit fabric.  Some knitters naturally knit at a tight tension, which means they have more stitches and rows per inch than a patterns’ gauge requires.  If they knit a garment using this tight tension, the finished garment would be much smaller than the pattern.   Other knitters naturally have a looser tension, which means they have less stitches and rows per measured area than the pattern recommends.  If they knit a garment using a loose tension, they’d end up with a garment that is much larger than the pattern recommends.  If your gauge (the number of stitches and rows) is more than the gauge indicated in the pattern, switch to the next larger size of needle than the pattern indicates (from a size #10 to a size #11 needle for example).  If your gauge is less than the gauge indicated by the pattern, try one size needle smaller than is recommended by the pattern (from a size #11 to a size #10 for example).

Knit – The main stitch used in knitting.  To create a knit stitch, you insert the right hand needle tip from left to right (from the front of your work toward the back of your work) into the first stitch on the left needle, wrapping the yarn around the right needle and pulling it through the stitch (creates a loop on the right hand needle) and sliding the stitch off the left needle.

 Needle Size – This is usually indicated on the needle package as X US size  (US sizes can be from 000 to size 50) and X mm (X refers to the millimeter size of the needle and can be from size .5mm to over 25mm).  The smaller the needle size, the smaller the needle.  000 US needles are primarily used for knitting very fine lace.  The larger the needle size, the larger the needle.  Most knitting shops only carry up to size 19US or 15.5mm.  These are used for bulky yarns.  Knitting artists and designers may make their own extremely bulky “yarn” and use up to size 50 needles to create fabric.  

Purl – The second most used stitch in knitting.  To create a purl stitch, insert the tip of the right hand needle from right to left (from behind the stitch to the front of your work) wrap the yarn from the front, over the needle and pulling it through the stitch, creating a loop on the right hand needle, sliding the stitch off the left hand needle.

Stockinette Stitch – Knit all the stitches on the right side, purl all stitches on the wrong side.  This creates a smooth “jersey” fabric on the face side and a rougher bumpy looking fabric on the wrong side.

Swatch – a test piece of knitting that allows you to determine whether the needles you are using, create the correct tension of stitches and rows per inch or centimeter.   Some yarn stores will let you knit up a test swatch of a yarn so that you can see how the yarn looks and feels when it’s knit up.  Swatches are also a great way to test out stitch patterns that you’ve never tried.  Knitwear designers make many, many swatches as they develop color and stitch patterns.

Weaving in ends – When you’ve finished knitting a piece there are loose ends of yarn hanging off where you started and finished knitting and wherever you added new yarn along the way.  These have to be woven in using a large darning needle.  Ends can be woven in along seams or within the knit structure on the wrong side following the looped structure of the fabric.

Wrong or Reverse Side – The side of knitting that is on the inside when it’s worn.

 Yarn Weight – Yarn comes in different “weights” from very fine “lace weight” yarn to very thick “super bulky” yarn.  The label on the yarn will indicate the weight of the yarn in both ounces and grams.  The label will also indicate both the number of yards and number of meters in the ball or skein of yarn.  The pattern you choose will indicate the specific brand and weight of yarn they used as well as how many skeins/balls you’ll need to complete the project.  If you use a different brand of yarn than what is indicated by the pattern, you may need to do some math to make sure you will get the same gauge as the pattern and that you’ll have enough yards or meters of yarn to complete the project. 

A learning experience...

A couple of weeks ago, I posted pics of some embroidered lace that I did for another designer.  Since this blog is intended to detail my journey as I develop my business, I thought I should also include information about things that don't go so well for me along the way.  I will refer to them as "learning experiences."  I don't know if anyone out there actually reads my blog but I'd love to hear anyone else's thoughts on this experience.  First of all, I've had this post in my draft folder for a few weeks as I debated whether I should post it or not.  I finally decided that it's much more realistic to post both the good and the bad experiences since every business runs into glitches along the way.

For this lace project, I got the job via a referral from a former instructor of mine although he didn't know the designer personally. I made a number of mistakes on this job that I hope I will not repeat.  I was excited to work for someone new, so I didn't know the appropriate price to charge for this project.  I accepted the price the designer offered because I hoped to work with her again and/or use her as a reference.  A week later, I found out that the appropriate price for the work would have been 2 1/2 times what she quoted me.  This was disheartening since I'm just starting out, I'd just made one REALLY stupid mistake.  I decided to honor my agreement with her because I felt it would be more professional than whining about the price.  In hindsight, I'm pretty sure she knew that she was grossly underpaying me since she made numerous comments throughout the process, about how she wished she could find people who would work for her for free (with a professional level of skill of course).

I found an app for my phone that allows me track the number of hours worked per project.  I can track the time spent on numerous projects even if I'm working on them during the same time period.  So using my handy dandy time clock app, I calculated that I spent over 150 hours on this project!  This doesn't include the amount of time spent sourcing the beads and sequins as well as the time spent on the development swatch, stretching the fabric on to my embroidery frame, or any of the extraneous prep work like stringing beads or cleanup (clipping threads, knotting loose ends, etc.).  Since each embroidery project is different, it's difficult to know how many hours each project will take so I still think my willingness to accept her offer without negotiating was my own fault.

Of course, in order to do the job up to my standards, I had to do everything perfect, clean and as professionally as the "petits mains" of L'Atelier Lesage would.  I take my job very seriously and always try to do the most professional job that I can.

In the small business fashion world, there is very little credit available.  For the most part, any couture work would not be released to a client until they pay.  After spending over 150 hours on this project over the space of about two weeks, (with numerous status meetings during which the designer requested more and more embellishment), I took the finished project to the designer, expecting to receive payment at that time.  Did I mention that I paid for the beads, sequins, thread and tulle fabric out of my own pocket, with the understanding that the designer was going to reimburse me (I kept receipts of every single penny I spent).  Since I don't have a lot of cash and thousands of beads and sequins can quickly add up to a couple of hundred dollars, I used my credit card to pay (really stupid mistake number 2).  A month later, I was paying INTEREST for those materials but hadn't received a penny of reimbursement.

Upon delivering the finished work to the designer, she told me that the client for whom the outfit was being made, had not yet made her final payment (to this day, I have no idea who the end client was).  The designer told me that when she received her final payment, she would pay me.  She instructed me to send her an invoice.  Feeling slightly nauseous, I had no choice but to leave and hope for the best.  Since I had another couture project for a fashion show and only a week to complete it, I had to focus on my next project.  It happened that my second couture project was followed by an out of state trip and other work that kept me busy for another two weeks.  I worried that I'd never get paid and had all sorts of scenarios running through my head which included that she would use an excuse like she'd been in the hospital if I ever did hear back from her.  After three weeks with no contact from the designer, I followed up with her.  I, of course, wanted to know when she was going to pay me.  She got a little snippy in her response and told me she didn't like the tone of my email and that it wasn't very professional.  At that time, she said she still hadn't received her payment from the client, that it had been "lost" but that she expected another payment by the end of the week (I had emailed her on a Wednesday evening but she waited until Sunday afternoon to respond).  By the following Friday and still no payment, I'd had enough.  While I was stressing over what miniscule payment I was expecting, I had my husband and father-in-law (a lawyer) yelling at me for being so stupid as to hand over the work without demanding immediate payment.  My stress level increased daily and I felt like the world's biggest idiot.

In order to take on this lace embroidery project, I had to hire another embroiderer to do work on my second couture project in order to complete it in time for the fashion show.  I also had to get an intern to help me with sourcing, prep work and errand running while I sat for 20 hours a day doing embroidery on the lace.  Both of these people had to be paid, and in fact were paid, as soon as they finished their work.  This left me out of pocket for over $500 because of the lace project.

By the end of the week that the designer had assured me she would pay me, I'd begun researching both collection agencies and small claims court.  It turns out that collections don't usually get involved until something is at least two months overdue.  Small claims court was probably going to be a better option.  I carefully crafted a final email (I used email so that I'd have clear documentation of every step in case this ended up in court) telling her that I'd completed her work, she'd had no complaints about my work and I'd been very patient but was not going to be taken advantage of.  I gave her two days (which was then 30 days from the date I'd handed over the completed work) by which I demanded payment in full or I'd begin charging her interest.  It was a very polite but firmly worded email.  The next day, I got a nasty response from her telling me that she'd received her payment from the client and that she would work with that client again but would NEVER work with me or recommend me EVER!  She went on to tell me that I was the most unprofessional person she'd ever worked with and that I'd done nothing but complain the entire time I'd worked with her.  As I mentioned, I was juggling two couture projects at the same time, so I worked crazy hours on this lace project in order to complete it as quickly as possible so that I could get back to my other project.  This left me exhausted with no more than two or three hours of sleep a night.  She's right, I did complain about being exhausted and I was a little stressed over how long it took me to finish her work.  I didn't think I was complaining a lot but I suppose this was a valuable lesson that I should never say anything in front of a client that doesn't directly relate to the job at hand.

By this point, I thought she was completely crazy so I forwarded the entire email trail (from the invoice submitted to her the same night that I handed over the finished work all the way through her final ranting nasty response), first to my husband and then to my friend Bob (the former instructor who'd referred her to me).  Both of them were completely appalled at her nasty tone and both told me that while I'd been stupid to hand over the work without payment, I'd done nothing unprofessional or inappropriate in this situation.  The way she became so angry over nothing, was really bizarre.    It seemed clear to all of us that she'd never planned to pay me and was probably hoping that I'd just go away.  Since she plans to blackball me, I made sure that my former school found out about her behavior so that other students or former students aren't taken advantage of like I was.  She asked me to send her my invoice again (which clearly shows that she never looked at the first one I'd sent her a month previously).  When I'd first taken this job, she mentioned another student who'd been doing work for her but who had left her in the lurch by moving out of state.  I now wonder if the student really moved or had also had a bad experience and not been paid.

The final straw is that the client, never even knew that I existed.  The client had approved the design based on a sample of embroidered lace that was created by a studio in France.  Since the studio needed eight weeks to embroider the lace, I was hired to create a similar version of the lace in 1/4 the amount of time.  The designer, however, thought the client would be impressed if she thought the lace was being embroidered in New York so she was told that the lace was being Fedexed back and forth to New York to be worked on.  Not only did I get to work crazy hours for literally, slave wages, I got NO CREDIT for my work which I had intended to feature prominently in my portfolio!

Exactly 30 days after I completed the work I finally received the check in the mail.  As one last attempt to screw with me, she'd made it out to my business name instead of directly to me.  I took it to her bank but they refused to cash it unless I opened an account with them.  I managed to get special permission from my own bank (since I don't have a separate tax ID# for the business name) but they also wouldn't cash it, instead insisting that I deposit it first and wait for the funds to clear.

While I'm proud of my work, I regret so many things about the way this project played out.  I did however, gain some valuable lessons from this.

I have now created a business invoice.  I know now how important it is to discuss payment terms up front, BEFORE I begin any work.   Yes, I was raised that it's not polite to discuss money and therefore, was very uncomfortable with this part of the job.   In the future, I will have clients SIGN my invoice/proposal, in ADVANCE of any work, to make sure that they understand my payment terms.  As many friends and family members have since screamed at me, in no retail environment is a customer allowed to walk out with products for which they haven't paid or at least been pre-approved for credit.

I am about to open a separate bank account to allow me track my business expenses and receipts much easier.  The bank account will also be set up under both my business and personal names so that I wont have to jump through hoops just to cash payments.

Most importantly, I will NEVER hand over my hard work until I've received payment!

I was supposed to receive photos of the finished garments since I handed over the work as embroidered pieces of lace, I never got to see the finished goods.  Obviously once my relationship with the designer went south, I was never going to get pictures of the client wearing my work.  I still have a lot to learn about properly photographing my work in the best light but at least I took lots of pictures of the work in progress, even if it is in pieces.

If only one person reads this blog and learns something from my mistakes, then maybe this was worth it.  I'd love to hear from anyone who has tips on how to avoid similar stupid mistakes.  When you're just starting out in business, you don't know what you don't know.  I know I still have so much to learn but hopefully my next lesson wont be quite so painful.

Couture Embroidery

In the past two months, I've had two couture projects, going simultaneously.  I had started on the condom couture project for Project Inform's Evening of Hope fundraiser (more on that later) and had the muslin and most of the pattern finished before a new job came in that was supposed to take two weeks at most to complete but ended up taking more than three weeks to finish.  A designer hired me to do couture embroidery on lace for a mother of the bride dress she had designed.  The original plan had been to order the lace already embroidered, from a factory in France.  Unfortunately, by the time the lace was ordered, it was August when factories in France close for a month's vacation.  So the lace arrived locally, un-embellished.  This constituted a "fashion emergency" to get the lace embroidered in time for the wedding on October 22.  All I had were some photos of the original embroidered lace sample and the blank lace.  There were two garments to be embroidered, a corset and a lace bolero to wear over the corset.  Since the lace was very expensive and fragile, I stretched out tulle on my embroidery frames and then basted the lace on top of the tulle and embroidered through both layers.  Since the tulle was very lightweight, it's nearly invisible once the garment was constructed.

This is the lace bolero before I took it apart to embroider it.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a photo of the garment once it was reconstructed after embroidery and my relationship with the designer has since deteriorated (more on that another day).

These are the two sleeves which wrap around and become the front of the bodice.

 

This is the embroidered corset basted together.

I think it turned out beautifully.  I'm just disappointed that I wont have pictures of the finished garments.  That's not unusual when you do this type of work and someone else is responsible for the construction.  It's also disappointing that I don't credit for all this work (over 150 hours!) because the designer told the client that she was having the embroidery work done in New York.  Apparently she thought the client would be more impressed with that.

Vintage everything

Following five weeks straight of working without a day off, my family and I hopped a plane to the midwest to visit family and hubby's alma mater.  While there, hubby dragged us to what I was sure, would be the second most boring three hours of my life visiting the Sindelar Tool Museum in Edwardsburg, Michigan.  (The second after the 10 hours we spent at Musee de l'Armee in Paris while on our honeymoon.  Ok it wasn't really 10 hours, it just felt like it.)

I was pleasantly surprised by the Sindelar Tool Museum.  Hubby wanted to go because he collects hand tools for woodworking.  Apparently, this is a world famous tool museum.  You wouldn't know it from the outside.  It seemed to be just another industrial building, next to the train tracks, in a tiny town, literally so small, you would miss it if you blinked while driving through.  I expected to see  maybe a hundred or so tools but not much else. Instead, disguised in the boring looking industrial building, is literally one of the world's most important collections of hand tools.  There were tools dating from the Stone Age to around the 1930s or 40's.  Some of the tools are antiques dating back to ancient Egypt and are the only one of their kind anywhere on earth.  Mingled in with the tools are all sorts of fascinating other items like these shoes which were from somewhere in Northern Europe and were used to husk chestnuts.

He seems to just collect whatever catches his eye which could be an old radio control boat made by the chief carpenter for the Queen Mary, or this pair of clogs. I didn't get a chance to ask what these shoes were used for.  I just loved that they reminded me of Japanese Geta sandals but have a cool shape on the upper shoe too.








Antique Stirrups:








A small collection of irons


Vintage hats


Finally, I was very interested in this armour from a Mongolian tribe made of some type of leather.  the little scales on the bottom were individually laced together before being attached to the

I think if you're going to drive from New York to LA or vice versa, this is one of those places you should go out of your way to see if you have any interest in the history of tools.  It becomes overwhelming after a while when you start to realize how important everything is and how old some of it is.  The owner travels the world collecting all sorts of stuff.  Some of it goes into the museum and some is sold to fund future purchases.  It made me want to start collecting antique sewing implements.  So far, I have two pairs of ginormous shears used to cut heavyweight fabric for military uniforms.  

Dutch Fashion Academy video

I found this gorgeous video on Trendland (my current favorite blog) that compiles a variety of work from graduate designers at the Dutch Fashion Academy.

I've always hated when fashion photographers choose to shoot their subject in poor lighting, blurry focus or style the whole shoot in such a way that it's next to impossible to see the clothes.  While I love creative photo shoots and am frequently amazed at the way a fashion magazine can create an entire story from the fashions of twelve different designers, I get irritated when the story of the photoshoot becomes more important than the clothes.  This video does exactly the opposite.  The models, become  surreal, amorphous, unrecognizable blobs while the clothes are very clearly and beautifully photographed to show the incredible details of each look.  Truly beautiful work here, both in the fashions and the way the video was created.

ModeBelofte
 2011

When it rains, it pours!

As usual, I have more work than hours in the day.  I've had to put my condom couture dress aside to do some work for a paying client.  The fun part of being a freelance fashion designer and couture embroidery service is that every project is completely different from the last.  I get to learn something new.  The bad part of the job is that the distance between paying jobs can be a little longer than I'd like so I take jobs that can give me good contacts lead to future jobs or challenge me in a new way.  The "tools" above have been occupying my time lately.  It's a couture embroidery job for a mother of the bride dress.  It's really quite stunning but has been an astounding amount of work.  In the past week, I've probably had a grand total of 12 hours of sleep.  Yesterday, I was so exhausted that I managed to sleep through the incredible volume of the Blue Angels, flying over head while a crew ground up and repaved the road in front of my house!  I have about another week or so of this sheer exhaustion before I can finally get back to some semblance of sanity.

I've taken lots of pictures of my work and will post them after the wedding.  Meanwhile, I'm catching up on old movies (currently watching Breakfast at Tiffany's for the umpteenth time.  Wow she had the most amazing wardrobe of any movie I can remember) as I work.