Category: General

Sources for Assiut, Fall 2016

Post author By Davina
Post date November 16, 2016

Hello Gang!

I’ve been PUMMELLED by requests for assiut! Not my book, The Cloth of Egypt: All About Assiut, but the cloth itself. The truth of the matter is that I buy assiut and I use it. I simply don’t stockpile to resell. However, in the past year, I have been purchasing modern assiut panels and dresses to start the costume build for an upcoming book that I’ll be working on in 2017. Now is a great time to share my trusted sources for purchasing assiut.

Besheer on eBay

My longest running relationship with a vendor of assiut is with the eBay vendor who goes by the handle Besheer. I have purchased more than 20 panels and three robes from this dealer in the past four years. The robe I’m wearing in the image on the left was purchased from them several years ago. It’s soft, has held up to numerous washes and still looks stunning both on stage and up close. I’m especially fond of their assiut triangles with crocheted beaded trim. These panels really hold up to the abuse that our dance gives them. This is the person I recommend most often when folks ask me who I buy from. They have a store on eBay, be sure to check them out.

Desirees Treasures on Etsy

A more recent addition to the vendors I’ve been shopping from is Desirees Treasures over on Etsy. Her store is filled with new and vintage assiut in a variety of colors and designs. I’ve only purchased a few pieces from her so far, but her service is fast and her items have matched their photos and descriptions. I especially love the blue assiut ensemble at right, that I put together with an assiut robe and shawl that were purchased separately, but come together to make a lovely ensemble.

21st Century Vamp on Etsy

If you are looking for exceptionally high-quality antique and vintage pieces collected with taste and care, you can expect to find the finest on the Etsy store of the 21st Century Vamp. Her exquisite pieces are delicious to behold, and often draw the highest prices – and rightfully so! Although I’ve only been able to make one purchase from her collection, it’s a great place to window shop for the most sumptuous cloth. If you are building your vintage collection, her shop is a must visit!

SaftiCraft Website

Perhaps my all-time favorite piece of modern assiut is a long narrow scarf with a rich diamond pattern embroidered into it purchased from SaftiCraft. I’ve made several purchases directly from their website and though I had to wait a bit of time for the item to arrive, the cloth they carry is glorious. They make rich, densely patterned soft modern assiut that rivals vintage pieces for the number and quality of metal stitches. You can see my scarf, affectionately known as “Waldo,” wrapped around my head in the image at left.

Melodia Designs Website

If you love the look of assiut, but find the metal is irritating to your skin, why not take check out the faux assiut cloth designed and manufactured by Melodia. This San Diego-based designer has created an entire line of day wear, practice, and performance pieces. Printed on high-quality stretch fabrics, the pattern is so authentic, at a glance, it fools the eye of even discerning assiut fans. I simply love my Melodia skirt! Though I adore real assiut, this skirt is so comfortable to wear, that I find myself reaching for it over and over.

If you would like to find out more about this fabulous cloth, might I recommend checking out my book? Over 20 years in the making, The Cloth of Egypt: All About Assiut is my most ambitious research project, turned book and it includes information about the history, technology, and use of this beautiful ethnographic textile.

Good luck on your own personal quest to find the assiut pieces that are perfect for your collection or costuming project!

Happy Costuming!
Dawn Devine ~ Davina
November 16, 2016

Belly Dance General Publications

Models & Books: Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage

Post author By Davina
Post date November 14, 2016

Over the weekend, we had a vending table at the Fabulous Fall Festival hosted by BABDAMA, a local Bay Area belly dance event-hosting organization. This was the first opportunity for us to share our new book Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage. We took a stack of pre-release copies to this event to share with the ladies and gentlemen who took the time out of their busy lives over the past two years to join us in the studio for photos for our book. Many of these dancers we hadn’t seen in a few months, so it was great to reconnect, share the finished book, and hear about the adventures they have been having since we met for photos!

I brought my book rack, Sara brought the books, Alisha brought her camera, Poppy brought additional awesome, and we spent the day hanging out and watching a fabulous show. We had a great view of the stage and enjoyed watching a fun mix of students and teachers, life-stylers and pros, troupes and solos, recorded and live music. There was something for everyone.

During the course of the day, folks came by to check out our new books. Along with Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage, I also had copies of my new book, Zills: Music on Your Fingertips, with photos by Alisha Westerfeld and Illustrations by George Goncalves. You can see a copy of it lying on the table next to my coffee.

We got a lot of great feedback about Becoming a Belly Dancer. What struck me was how much time people would spend flipping through the book, nodding and smiling to themselves. Several people mentioned how much the book resonated, and how they have lived through the phases of development that their dancing progressed through.

Another piece of very positive feedback concerned the variety of models. We asked our friends, students, event hosts, and local professionals we work with on a regular basis to join us in this collaboration. Our models included women and men from all walks of life, from students to pros, from young to older, from thin to curvy, from pale to deeply colored. The belly dance world is so diverse and creative, by the time we were finished we had nearly 50 dancers had participated!

Models like Basinah above, stopped by to pick up their copies and Sara took their photos holding a book opened to one of the pages featuring their photograph. It was pretty hard to pick just one sometimes! Basinah came to about half a dozen photo shoots and consequently, there are dozens of images scattered throughout the book. But she loved this dramatic pose with veil.

At the last minute, I was asked to substitute for a fellow dancer who was under the weather and couldn’t make it, so I had the opportunity to perform in their gala show. I was so glad Sara was on the ball while I was putting on makeup and getting ready because she captured many more dancers picking up their books!

Thank you to all our friends and models. If we haven’t gotten your copy of Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage, yours is waiting for you! Also, we have two days left of our fundraising Kickstarter to help us get the final funds together to help us make that hurdle from manuscript to printed book. If you’ve already pledged, thank you! If you are thinking of picking up a copy of this book – now is the time – because it’s probably $10 cheaper than the final MSRP will be when it appears on Amazon.com.

What a great event – What a great weekend!
Now I’m back to processing the thousands of photos we took on our UK Belly Dance Book Tour!
More Pictures and Posts to follow.

Until then, Happy Costuming!

Dawn Devine ~ Davina
November 14, 2016

Me – hahaha. @basinahdances caught this perfect moment #BellyDance #veil #bustamove #spin #propeller#turn

A video posted by Dawn Devine (@davinadevine) on Nov 12, 2016 at 11:26pm PST

Assiut/Assuit Belly Dance General

Kickstarter Campaign for “Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage”

Post author By Davina
Post date October 18, 2016

I’m so pleased to announce that we are finished with the manuscript for our upcoming book “Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage.” The text is laid into the document, it’s been edited, formatted, and all the photos are in place. The book is just a few steps away from being published. However, this is where we hit the biggest financial hurdles, covering the expenses of making the leap from a finished .pdf to a printed book.

With that in mind, we’ve put together a Kickstarter campaign to take pre-orders for our book!!! We’ve created a menu of enticing options from simply buying a signed book for the nice price of $35. The ultimate MSRP is still TBA, but I think it will be somewhere around $45 on Amazon. But we’ve created a few other levels that offer our new book, “Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage,” bundled together with some fun costume accessories like hair flowers, Saroyan coin earrings, and Jean Jinglers. Poppy Maya and I are also offering a few custom crafted costume pieces as well!

We are asking you, our friends, fans, and supporters to take a moment and visit our Kickstarter page and consider helping us achieve our goals by backing our campaign and pre-ordering a signed book, or picking up a hand-crafted costume accessory too!

I want to thank you for your time and continued support of my projects!

Dawn Devine ~ Davina
October, 18, 2016

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/letsbellydance/becoming-a-belly-dancer-from-student-to-stage-the?ref=user_menu

Here are a few of the bundles available. Visit our Kickstarter campaign page for our complete list.

For more information about the Kickstarter Campaign for “Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage” visit our page and check out the rest of the menu of offerings. Thank you! ~ D

Belly Dance Costuming DIY General

Turquoise Student-Grade Belly Dance Bra

Post author By Davina
Post date September 19, 2016

Turq-Coin-Bra1 Hello Gang!

As we finish up the last few segments of the final chapter of our upcoming book, Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage, I’ve been making a few extra “samples” of simple and affordable student performer quality bras. Because I’m strategic, I purchased base bras that are the size of one of my co-authors, Sara Shrapnell, so perhaps these samples will one day take the stage, even if it’s just an informal student hafla.

I like to divide my my costuming into three levels of production. I call them “Student,” “Lifestyler,” and “Professional.” Student grade costumes, in general have the least bra transformation, keeping the straps and band intact, and look like what they are, an embellished lingerie bra. Many purists find this style to be unacceptable because the bra hasn’t been transformed enough. But the modern reality is that many students want to make simple, quick and affordable costumes to wear to informal performances. The student grade bra is designed to be beautiful for a few wearings in student shows and community events.

In the photo below, you can see that I used two rows of this sari trim from India. When working on a larger bra, this is a great way to cover the upper-cup, and take the trim to what I call the “drop zone.” This is that place on the bra where the cup curves under. It is the ideal space to suspend fringe, coins, and jewelry components allowing them to swing freely. I like to sew with a long milliners needles from the company John James. They are more expensive that many, but worth it if you’re doing a lot of hand sewing.

Turq-Coin-Bra2 A “Professional” grade costume is just what you would expect. It’s a firm, solid garment that keeps everything in place and is durable enough to stand up to the rigors of long, vigorous performances and the endless packing and unpacking of the pro-dancer’s life. There is a lot of structure to the professional bra band, the straps and the cups that takes a lot more time and materials to build a sturdy base. Then over the top of this base, are the time and expense of layers of embellishments that give the costume style. Professional grade is a balance between tough and durable, and beautiful.

I personally use a lot of jewelry in my designs. As you can see in the close-up photo below, we’ve chosen a pair of very affordable knock-off India Arts necklaces. For a pro-quality costume, I might choose more culturally specific jewelry components or use more upscale and sparkly rhinestone pieces. I like to use very long, quilting pins to weave in and out of the chain

Turq-Coin-Bra5 The “Lifestyler” grade is geared for ladies who want a costume that is beautiful and durable, yet comfortable. These costumes frequently will use the original bra band, but covered to resemble a professional quality bra. Often, bras in this category will feature firmer, more professional straps and more opulent embellishments. Lifestyler grade costumes are built to last, but with comfort and budget in mind.

For this turquoise bra, we wanted to use up all the materials, so we took the chains from the two necklaces along with the hooks, and created a double swag tummy accent. I reached into my jar of bits and pieces, and pulled out a handful of additional coins left over from a past project. These hooks can go into the chain at any place the owner prefers. I always have two pairs of smooth pliers handy to open and close jump rings and chain loops.

In Chapter 10 of Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage, we present some quick and affordable student-grade costumes to inspire the crafty dancers who want to dip their toe into the process of belly dance costuming. This turquoise bra would fall into the “Student” category here at Studio Davina. Sadly, only one photo of this bra made it into the book. Luckily I have these photos to share that might inspire your next costume.

Happy Costuming!
Dawn Devine ~ Davina
September 19, 2016

General Makeup and Appearance

Help – My Depotted Eyeshadow won’t Stick to Magnetic Palettes!

Post author By Davina
Post date September 7, 2016

One of my projects for the month of August was to declutter and organize all the bits and pieces of makeup that are in my life. Usually I conduct an annual makeup clean up in January, but this year, I wound up waiting until I completed a makeup challenge.

Throughout the month of July, when I took on the “31 Day Belly Dance Makeup Vlogging Challenge.” All the looks and videos are up on my YouTube channel and the videos range from “informative” to “OMG, What was she THINKING?” It was a fantastic learning experience and an amazing challenge to tackle and complete!

However, quite frankly, I made a big mess! There are lipsticks in every corner of my home, and boy, I never realized how obsessed with concealer I am! The things you learn when you challenge yourself when you’re challenged! Over the course of 31 days, I touched every drugstore-priced makeup product I own. So now it’s September, and I thought I would take some time to share some of the smaller “projects” that fall under the larger umbrella of decluttering my makeup collection. Without further ado, here’s how I conquered my broken palette!

Happy Costuming and Dance!
Dawn Devine ~ Davina
Sept. 7, 2016

Transforming Aluminum Makeup Pans
for Use in Magnetic Containers

For my 31 Day Belly Dance Makeup Vlogging Challenge in July, 2016, I made a few rules for myself. My principle mandate was to use affordable drugstore and internet products to keep the costs down. Many women wear makeup every day, and dialing it up the intensity for stage requires an investment in new products. Other ladies might never have been involved in cosmetics and suddenly find themselves needing to put together an entire makeup look from scratch. Either way, makeup can be very expensive and learning new techniques can feel daunting. So in my challenge I wanted to share some of my favorite discount products.

However, budget products can be very hit or miss. While there are many brand loyal women, in my experience, there isn’t one company that can solve all of my cosmetic challenges. So, my goal was to share the products I love with students of the dance who are working on perfecting their perfect performance look.

One of the affordable products that I love for belly dance performance is the BH Cosmetics Foil Eyes Shadow Palette. These shimmering, shiny, colorful, and crazy affordable eyeshadows are almost always on sale. At the time of this writing, it was only $12. When I purchased it, it was made even more affordable with a site wide sale. As you can see from the photo below, I’ve tried, used and loved many of the colors. Over the course of the 31 days, I featured this palette in nearly every look.

While the eyeshadows in this super-affordable palette are fantastic, the packaging itself left something to be desired. In less then two weeks of daily use, the frosted top of the packaging broke off and the pans of eyeshadow began to spring free of their cheaply made molded plastic tray. “No worries,” I thought to myself, “I’ll just pop this in a magnetic palette!” However, I soon discovered that the pans are made from aluminum and are non-reactive with a magnetic surface! What’s a girl to do with her eye shadow pans popping out?!

My mission, glue washers onto the backs of my eyeshadow pans and place them in a magnetic container. So I raided the tool shed with a magnet in hand and found a bag zinc washers with some iron content so they would stick to the magnet. I also located some glue that would hold metal to metal together.

This process is super simple. Turn your depotted eyeshadow over on a piece of paper, in this case, I used paper towel. I like to make four small dots of glue and then place the washer onto the glue. It’s good to read the label on your glue for dry times. This glue did a fine job for this project, but there are many different formulas and brands that would work, just be sure to get an adhesive that works for metal to metal purposes.

Once the glue dried, I placed my shadows in a magnetic palette from the company Shae Moisture, purchased through Target on line. My next step is to pick my favorite colors from the BH Cosmetics Modern Mattes eyeshadow palette. While I love, and highly recommend all the shadows in the Foil Eyes palette, I found that the colors in the Modern Matte palette were very hit and miss, so I’m only going to pick the colors that worked for best for me and fill in this tin!

Besheer on eBay

Desirees Treasures on Etsy

21st Century Vamp on Etsy

SaftiCraft Website

Melodia Designs Website

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Transforming Aluminum Makeup Pans for Use in Magnetic Containers

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Transforming Aluminum Makeup Pans
for Use in Magnetic Containers