The Saga Continues- Forbidden Fruit Dress- Episode 8

Interlude- Pilgrimage to San Francisco

Forbidden Fruit Dress Saga- Episode 7

 SECOND HEAVE

So I left , to make a long planned pilgrimage to visit my Grandpa.

When I returned, to try to finally finish the thing, it seemed like some ot the staff at TSE was kinda burnt out on me. I was sad to find this, but not wholly surprised.

So, with a gracious loan of the dress form, to facilitate the dresses completion, I moved operations to my parent’s house down the way for the final haul. They were out of the town for the weekend, and needed me to tend the animals, so it worked out perfectly. I could now work continuously, with out interruption, which was in many ways what I had longed for. And this I did, from Sun up to sun down, to sun up, to sun up! I did have to go play a gig on Friday evening in Pittsboro. But on Saturday I worked 26 hours straight through the day and then on through the night, with out stopping more than 10 minutes here and there to fuel up my body (no caffeine, just grapefruit juice!)

It was just a matter of chipping away at a tunnel through a mountain, trying to break through to the other side. There was no getting around it, it was just a matter of continuously moving forward through the work of it. My thumb felt like it was about to fall off of my hand, the nail fall off of the thumb, it almost couldn’t be used any more, didn’t want to be, but of course was, had to be

Ive worked enough 14 hour days to know that working continuously, without rest, at any task, can be about as exhausting and ass whooping as any other.

Finally, at about 2 pm, I took a couple cautious hours of sleep, to make a safe drive to Chapel, for delivery by 5.

I am quite ashamed to say that when I finally did drop the dress off the good folks at FRANK Gallery, they basically had to chase me out, as I was still trying to attend to the seemingly endless details, each waiting in for their turn, in turn.

They did however park the brightly dress colored dress right in the window out on Franklin St. And this was a quite pleasure for me, in my somewhat delirious state, to this creation peering out of the window of its new home on E. Franklin St.

There was a lot of great work there, and it felt good to leave this thing in such good company of kindered spirits, and in the good hands of the Staff at FRANK.

I guess, not surprisingly, I am like any parent, dropping their kid off at the first day of kidnergarten. Waive “Bye bye!”  

Forbidden Fruit Dress Saga- Episode 6

And so the march wore on...

I started to become kind of a fixture at the Scrap.

Gotta give some love to my main men Kyle Knight, Daniel Bagnal, and Jack, who were very sympathetic and accommodating!

Eventually, I moved myself out (to give room to some other crafters- knitting club, a raucus lot) into the more open area near the fabric area, where a circle of couches enclosed a small work table.

Madeline seemed to enjoy and appreciate the sort of Roman Collosseum aspect of my self-imposed installation there (where shoppers could witness the gory spectacle of a man being devoured by time and a dress). 

Against all odds, I did get some good 'blows' in out there, on the colloseum floor.

And the pressure was on. For I realized that I was not to be afforded a second draft. And so I moved, with steadied nerves, straight from Nicole and I's sketch in rubber, to what was to be the final piece.

This added a level of tension, and exactitude, to be sure, but also, for me, an element of excitement.

To the outside eye, I must have seemed to be moving at a snails pace (and boy did they tell me about it). But from my own perspective, I could finally start to see what the thing was really going to look like, when DONE RIGHT! And this precission, while hard won, and tedious, was really where the dress began to gain its glory.

So this was rewarding for me to see, though I had to ignore the nagging and jeers of nay-sayers up in their colloseum parapets. Romans indeed.

I did also recieve some heartfelt encouragement from some of my beloved allies into the stands.

My dearest Jessica happened by, and what borage blossom of courage is she to a warrior in the thick of battle.

I also made the good aquaintance of a new friend, Hanunah! Who not only liked my dress, repeatedly! but promised to maybe teach me some skills on the Design Center's industrial sewing machine. Hanunah knows all about them!



At this point I might mention that their was a little bit of a design intervention by my good model / design partner and myself. It started to become clear that this dress needed a little more.... uh, dress to it...

So, at some point, perusing the piles and files of Scrap, I came upon

FRIENDS AND FAMILY SHOW AT TSE

As it so happened, I got it ‘together’ in time to enter it into the Friends & Family Show.

Various members of the TSE crew had been gently dropping this to me for weeks- are you going to put anything in the show Travis? Gee, I’d think, I don’t really have anything to show. Well, Duh, sometimes I can be a little myopic, to the point of not seeing the nose on my face, ya know? So as I watched Jack and Daniel and Kyle and Sara all the rest busting ass to put the show together, and started to watch a really top notch exhibition beginning to coagulate, I thought, well Damn, maybe I can enter my dress in the show!...

And that I did, wheeling it in on its graceful gurny. 

The piece was in great company. As many of the staff noted), and Art Critic Blue Greenberg as well (in an article about the show in the Herald-Sun (LINK)), this was one of the best Friends and Family shows yet.

It seems our artisan community is really honing its chops!....

Unfortunately, the (FIRST) opening night of the show was very much hampered by tornado warnings (the show was so good it will be held another month, and this coming opening promises to be SPECTACULAR! Scrap car, spoken word scene). This made for an unusually and disproportionately thin crowd, with out perhaps the due buzz and hype that comes with larger herds of animals.

So, in some ways, it was an inglorious demi-debut for the dress.

And while this did afford me a chance for some much needed rest (on one of the very comfy couches there), the dress did receive an explosion of interest from two style savvy gals from Jersey, which, well, really made my nite.

It was actually me who spotted THEIR style first. Brie was walking by in a knock out outfit.

Somehow we got to talking about her wild and tight pants, which she refered to some special hybrid of tights and jeans. The more I spoke with the two sharp young ladies, the more I began to size them up as two serious (big city) Fashionistas.

Hey, I want to show you to something I said, levitating from my deathbed on the coach.

So I led them over to my new Forbidden Fruit Dress, fresh off the creative vine, and they just Flipped!



They couldn’t get enough of it, walking, Stalking around it, like hyena’s circling their prey. And you can bet that I could not get enough of that!

I slept better knowing that, whatever luke warm reception Forbidden Fruit might get in NC, with Jersey Fashionistas, it seems this gown has got MAD STREET CRED!

(God Bless Assistant Store Manager, Jack Thegan-Crowely for allowing me to work late into the night that night as he tallied up the totals, and for all around just being a Bro).

Forbidden Fruit Dress Saga- Episode 5

THE BIG PUSH 1

Worked in Design Center

So, my first job was to sell Nicole on the dress...

This was to be a challenge, for both me and for her, as Nicole is, by her own description,
 a pretty shy person...

However, the fashion designer in Nicole seemed to appreciate the sophistication of the design..
and she quickly warmed to the challenge!

It was exciting to see Nicole digging into to the tires.
Nicole and Reptire Designs have known one another from a distance for quite many years now, perhaps 8 or 10!..
So it was exciting to introduce this seasoned designer and craftswoman to a material that is also close to my heart. Like introducing two good friends to one another!

Our first task together was to string up a hanging lattice work of tires and innertubes, winding and criss-crossing around the body. This was to be the scaffolding, from which the dresses veil like material would hang.

Once we had this (more or less) in place, we could begin to play with the other fun part!..
And that was bringing in the netted produce bags.

This is a material that I have been collecting for some time now, with no particular use in mind, except a blind faith that this collection would someday find its purpose in life, and I knew that when it did, a glorious one it would be.

Well, stretching this material out, imagining it softly containing a bulging bussom, set off against the opaque black rubber, this netting sure did not look to be letting me down!

Finally, came the time when this thing could possibly pass for some suggestion of a dress...!
And, the Moment Of Truth!..

Nicole was kind enough to don ye garment!

Talk about dress design- triple Xs. Series consequtive xs.

Bell flower shape.

Comfortable- Nicole said it was.

Would some times go out into larger space, cool

\

Forbidden Fruit Dress Saga- Episode 4

BREAKING POINT

And finally, as the fatal fork in the road, the breaking point of no return quickly approached things did fall into place, as they often will, with a force of pressure applied.

Going in for a mandatory refresher training for Outreach Events at The Scrap Exchange, as a last ditch effort, afterwards I approached my supervisor about modeling the dress.

She was actually at the top of my list, followed by a series of voluptuous, statuesque dark haired beauties who I have the privilage to occaissionally work with at Scrap Exchange. Perhaps most volouptuous and statuesque of all being Queen Bee herself!

Sup pointed me straight in the direction of number 2 on my list, none other than my good friend of some time, Nicole Hogan.

THE WAY YIELDED A BOUNTY- Nicole and The Scrap Exhange Design Center

Nicole was (and is), a natural fit. A tough punk rock attitude, tempered gratefully by a sweet disposition. Much more relavently, Nicole has a solid background in the world of both fashion, and Scrap (and yes, Scrap Fashion), which was to prove indispensable in the course of the project.

As the Store Manager for The Scrap Exchange for many years, beyond her years, Nicole had seen us all through the perfect storm of the Tsunami that came crashing through roof of Liberty Warehouse 2 years ago, forcing the The Scrap Exchange (with all of its many barrels and shelves of things), fleeing in a hurried exodus, that almost proved fatal to this good organization of 26 years. (see post- LINK!) 

While The Scrap Exchange HAS managed to resettle itself in a new space, to much good advantage of reorganization of said stuff, as Store Manager, this epic operation has consumed every drop of Nicole’s time and energy. And so she confided (as I hope that she willl not mind me confiding with you, the wide world), that she was ready to dig back into her own realm of fashion, and perhaps this could be a first stab of the scissors, to find purchase, and peel back the creative parts of herself that have been starving for the light of day.  (I extrapolating a little here, but I think that is accurate..).

Additionally, Additionally MIRACULOUSLY, Nicole pointed out to me that The Scrap Exchange itself is privileged to own its own dress form, a dress form it so happens that are almost exactly Nicole’s own good dimensions (donated by a seamstress friend who moved to Russia). And to top it off, not only was this perfectly fitted form located right on the premises themselves, but it resides in…The Design Center!!!.........

THE DESIGN CENTER

Now, I have waxed elaborately and extensively in this very blog on the virtues of this special new space that the Scrap Exchange provides to the good public, should they need such a space..  (BLOG LINK to another awesome experience at the Scrap Exchange Design Center). Herein is a studio equipped with all manner of equipment, from hot t-shirt presses, to industrial sewing machines, to die cutters, to dress forms!!!

CRAFT FRICKEN MECCA!!!

And so it was that things did begin to fall into place for this improbable dress....

Forbidden Fruit Dress Saga- Episode 3

HANG UPS AND SNAGS

What followed were a series of protractions.

Many obstacles lay before me. How to build a dress, without an armature to build it on?

100% recycled materials? Did this include such fasteners as thread, etc?

Could I even pull off a dress (at least in the proverbial sense), without any sewing skills to speak of? Indeed, as I found, to pull off a dress requires a certain stealth matched with steadfastness, and I indeed, I was much a virgin in the realm of making such this a garment!

So I toiled, and tarried. Burdened with a slew of other commissions and commitments, I failed to tackle the questions head on, and properly communicatate with the gallery. The truth was, I didn’t really have time to do the project, and I remained on the dysfunctional edge of dropping out, right up to the very edge.

But meanwhile, somewhat inspite of myself, I continued to collect supplies… I had a big jar (that had once been full of UTZ pretzels. This became the tidy temporary home for these supplies- a ‘dress in a jar’...