Our Atlantic Sewing Guild met in a new space at the Msgr. John Campbell Centre at St. Agnes’ Church on April 11.  Attendance was at an all-time high with some guests and members who have been unable to come for a while.

Tory LeBlanc gave a talk and trunk show about Zero Waste.  She modeled her beautiful blush silk Asian-influenced jacket, navy jacket and pants and a wrap-around dress all created with no wasted fabric at all!  Pretty impressive and stylish.

After Tory’s trunk show, the guild members were invited to try to figure out the construction process using paper and tape.   The results were amusing 🙂

We had our monthly show and tell including a variety of garments.  A challenge from a snowed out meeting earlier this year was to sew something “red/read”.   A couple of the “red” items created were the newly released Jalie cardigan pattern, Helène, (with it’s much touted ‘clever’ pocket construction and sewn up by several members) and a beautiful trench coat from a OOP Vogue 2915 from the 1970’s.

Other creations included a moto jacket, t-shirts and two iterations of the recently released Farrow dress from Grainline Patterns;  a top and a dress.

Anita MacDonald reported on the charity sewing day on April 22nd:

“The community sewing day was a great success. 9 volunteers made 42 fidget muffs for Northwood and St. Vincent’s Nursing Homes!  Thanks to all who helped and all who donated items for us to use!”

A reminder that elections for vacant positions on the Executive Committee are in June.  Are you interested in being our treasurer, librarian, membership co-ordinator or president?  Here we all are (Marcia Swanston taking the picture) enjoying a glass of wine at the Agricola Brasserie.

The next meeting will be on Tuesday, May 9 and Amy Negus will give a talk and trunk show about her clothing line. 

…Or so we are told by TORY LEBLANC…

…This is the theme of Tory’s collection of Zero Waste garments for our Atlantic Sewing Guild’s April 11th meeting (which is 9 days from the posting date of this message).
Come join us to find out why Zero Waste garments are a growing fashion trend and how you can make you own!

Tory is going to enable us to have participation fun and asks that we bring our own paper scissors & scotch tape.

APRIL 11, 2017 7:00 PM.Meeting at our new venue: The Monsignor John Campbell Centre, behind St. Agnes Church at the corner of Mumford & Chebucto: 6903 MUMFORD RD., HALIFAX – enter Mumford Rd. driveway only.

I GOT NAWTHIN’!

Zero Waste clothing…

What is it?

Why are Zero Waste garments one of the latest “it” trend trends in fashion?

How do you make Zero Waste garments of your own?

Join us for the April ASG meeting when Tory LeBlanc will share her experiments with Zero Waste clothing.

APRIL 11, 2017 7:00 PM.Meeting at our new venue: The Monsignor John Campbell Centre, behind St. Agnes Church at the corner of Mumford & Chebucto: 6903 MUMFORD RD., HALIFAX – enter Mumford Rd. driveway only.

Mother Nature has not quite finished with us yet for this winter.

Sadly, we have decided to cancel our meeting this evening, March 14 due to the weather forecast statements/warnings for snow, wind and rain.  We want you all to be home safe, dry and warm.

Our first meeting at the Campbell Wing of St. Agnes’ Church will be in April 11th.  We will try to reschedule Amy Negus and her trunk show for later in the spring.

See you all in April!

AS OF OUR NEXT DATE, MARCH 14, WE WILL BE MEETING AT A NEW VENUE: THE MONSIGNOR JOHN CAMPBELL CENTRE, BEHIND ST. AGNES CHURCH AT THE CORNER OF MUMFORD & CHEBUCTO ROADS, 6903 MUMFORD RD., HALIFAX – enter Mumford Rd. driveway only.

After graduation from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in 2010 with a minor in fashion and a major in textiles, Amy Negus began the line All My Fashions. Negus’ goal is to create one-of-a-kind fashion pieces (up-cycling second hand fabrics whenever possible) that are comfortable but also allow women to feel beautiful and unique.  She has developed her skills over the years from her studies at university and from her mother who taught her to sew at an early age.

This year is the 7th year Amy has presented at the Atlantic Fashion week.  In 2013 she was invited to showcase her work at Plitz New York Fashion Week – her first international show!  She also works with clients to create custom dresses.

You can find her on FaceBook under All My Fashions or on her website: amynegus.wixsite.com/All-My-Fashions/about

We are excited to have Amy speak to us about her fashion journey and give a trunk show presentation of her designs.

Thank you, Minh Tan for suggesting Amy give a presentation to our Guild!

Next Atlantic Sewing Guild meeting is  Tuesday, March 14, 7pm at The Campbell Centre (behind St. Agnes Church), corner of Mumford and Chebucto Road, Halifax

Our January meeting

covered many items  (including heads & shoulders): notes for upcoming classes; a small challenge for next meeting (see below); Nancy showed us notable notions; Pat talked about intriguing feet and we enjoyed some interesting showing & telling.

Nancy presented a mind-boggling array of fascinating smalls & went on to interview Pat about feet

(note the great pin-cushion which originated as a teapot at VV)

SHOWING AND TELLING

Lorna is so resourceful.  Here are her husband’s mitts she made from a leather skirt remnant.  She wore a great vest created from the lining of a Lundstrom coat, while interviewing our youngest guest, Suzanne’s DD Leocadie, about her tiny, tiny sewing adventures.

And then Suzanne, wearing a fab party dress she dashed off (Butterick Gertie pattern), peaked into her bag-of-tricks & pulled out Sydney Swoon bags she made for herself & a lucky friend.

Few are as prodigious as our Edgar, who is producing The Shirt Wardrobe of Envy. One of his faves is McCall’s 6044.

When Minh isn’t showing us how to do shadow puppets, he’s got something else up his sleeve, such as a hidden credit card pocket with which he can wave his hand in the vicinity of a card reader to pay his bills.  Love our Nova Scotia tartan (did you know it was the first provincial tartan in Canada?) – always makes grand gifts!

Anyone for nesting(!) with Nancy & Pat- both showing Little’Uns clothes & quilts?

Our final treat for the night from Ingrid.  We sincerely wish for better photographic skills to showcase the fine craftsmanship of her stitched works of art.   Even with magnifying eyeglasses, most would not even accomplish the stitches, never mind the overall beauty of her oeuvre!

The Small Challenge for next meeting

Your soundtrack, should you choose to accept it:
Red red wine
Or maybe Dino’s Red Roses
Red Rose Tea

As someone we know is often not perfectly clear in her rambling & mental ring-around-the-rosies, the following is some attempt to clarify, if not further confuse (although from confusion, often sturdy oaks are born).
The challenge was suggested by a couple of our members & proposed by the executive.
/’red/ /’red//’red/, speaking phonetically: aka red.   This three letter word could be used as a starting point to ignite your creativity for a project to show at our next meeting on St. Valentine’s Day. The colour itself can be rendered in many shades & tones, from crimson, to Canadian flag red (who remembers the great debate 1963 & 1964?), to scarlet, to raspberry, to pink , to even burgundy.
And colours are just literal interpretations of our challenge.  How about using red as a jumping off point & doing the opposite?  Maybe green would be a better inspiration, as that is the opposite to red (i.e. a combo of blue & yellow, the other 2 primaries).  Or how about an anagram instead of an opposite?  The only one I could come up with is erd, which is an area of shifting sands in the Sahara, bringing us obviously to sandy thoughts – all those colours of sand around the world – black-grey-pink sands.  Or styles of clothing for the desert-?  Anyone seeing red yet?  What about styles from the ’70’s -Redd Foxx’s Sanford & Son, anyone? No? Then maybe movie style from the ’30’s Red Skelton style?

No rules -oh goody, read & red!
Ready?Fire! Aim!

Next Atlantic Sewing Guild meeting is February 14 2017, 7:00pm at St. Theresa’s, Dublin St..  EXCITING NEWS IS COMING YOUR WAY

We are excited to give you a little preview of the guest speaker’s topic for the February 14 ASG meeting.

Brenda Boudreau will do a presentation of her husband Bob’s quilted wallhangings. She will show how he constructed them, supplies he used and the inspiration behind the nature and people-themed works. 

A few examples of Bob’s beautiful work.

Bob is unable to be present at the meeting himself….he will be out shopping for supplies to make his next wallhanging!

See you on the 14th!

In December, John Pennoyer, gave a wonderful talk to the ASG.  A few members of the Guild asked about the production of Mozart’s Magic Flute, performances the first week of February, for which John is the costume and set designer.

The design concept is based on the work of the surrealistic artist, René Magritte, and many these images will be seen throughout the opera.  The production is an adaptation in English originally created for the Canadian Opera Company touring company and perfect for an undergraduate voice program.

All performances in the Sir James Dunn Theatre, Dalhousie Arts Centre and are $15 for adults, $10 for students and seniors available in person at the Dal Arts Centre box office or by phone/email as detailed on the poster below.

I’m told tickets are going fast!  (psst!  John himself is appearing onstage in a very special cameo!)