Categories
Assiut/Assuit General

June Havoc in Assiut

June Havoc

in Assiut

As I continue my ongoing research into the history of assiut cloth, one of the themes I’ve been exploring is the use of assiut by Hollywood fashion designers.  One of my all-time favorite appearances of assiut in an American movie is this lovely dress designed by Peter Tuesday for the 1947 movie Intrigue.

Assiut Gown Designed by Peter Tuesday

Peter Tuesday is a mysterious figure in the world of Hollywood costumes.  He did the costume design for only two major motion pictures and while this dress is divine, the rest of the costumes in this rather long and slow film are just okay.

Legendary Actress June Havoc

June Havoc began her career in the world of vaudeville as “Baby June,” a singing and dancing child star and younger sister to the notorious Gypsy Rose Lee.  She went to Hollywood and became a screen siren through the ’40s but later returned to her theater roots to become a Tony award-winning director.

Intrigue: A Film Noir Movie

In Intrigue, June Havoc plays the icy blond and coldly sinister Mme. Tamara Baranoff.  Her dress is lusciously painted onto her star-worthy physique, which lends her statuesque frame a cool metallic quality that supports her hard-as-nails character.  In this publicity shot, you can see the striking late 40’s shoulder pads and the popular dolman cut of the sleeve both of which emphasize her tiny waist.

This scene is lit to showcase this assiut gown to the perfect advantage.  Although dark, the lights set the metal ablaze as she stalks around her office.  It’s the perfect gown to wear while flirting with Hollywood’s most popular gangster, George Raft.  There’s a clip integrated into a music montage, so be prepared for some pop music if you follow this YouTube link. If you find the full film, be warned, the movie is a bit slow-moving but worth the wait to see every angle on this magnificent assiut dress.

Movie Still: June in Assiut Gown

The image above captures June at the height of Hollywood glamour.  This is one of the movie stills released by United Artists to promote the film.  These were printed as 8 by 10 black and white glossies.  Included in press releases and sent to movie theaters for film promotion, you can occasionally find these popping up in the film collectors markets, eBay and etsy.

The montage to the left are screen captures from the film.  Notice how the assiut changes in tone and texture as she moves through the various lighting conditions in the room.

For more about my research on Hollywood and Assiut, check out this article over at Gilded Serpent.
Assiut and Hollywood.

Categories
Assiut/Assuit

The Merry Widow, Lucile and Lily Elsie

http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw73186/Lily-Elsie-Mrs-Bullough-as-Sonia-in-The-Merry-Widow

Over the past six weeks, I’ve been spending hours each day processing the hundreds of facts, images, and dates as I work towards publication of my book The Cloth of Egypt: All About Assiut. One of the many little “finds” in my research is this super sweet image I located in the collection at National Portrait Gallery, London. It’s rare when my research turns up an image where I know not only the person, in this case, Lily Elsie, Edwardian star of numerous musical comedies, but also, the role the costume came from, Sonia in The Merry Widow.

But the highlight for me, is knowing the name of the costume designer.  This ensemble was created by one of the first couturiers in London, Lady Duff-Gordon, who designed under the name Lucile.   As you look at these images, you can see that Lily, in her role as Sonia, wears an amazing assiut covered corselet with an assiut shawl draped around her hips and secured with a sparkling pair of rhinestone brooches.  The entire ensemble captures the worldly bohemian aesthetic of the character.  This costume is the origin point for the phrase “merry widow” used throughout the 20th century to describe a corselet.

Publicity Postcard of Lily Elsie as Sonia from The Merry Widow. Costume by Lady Duff-Gordon aka Lucile.

The Merry Widow opened in 1907 had 778 performances in London’s West End. Several prominent photographers shot Lily for promotional postcards during the run of the operetta. I was lucky enough to get my own promotional postcard of Lily as Sonia from the Merry Widow, but the photographer is unknown.  Although my image is sweet, it’s not as good at showing off the costume as the National Portrait Gallery postcard.  But in either case, Lily’s costume is an inspiration.

Categories
Design General

Essential Pattern Making Tools

Essential Pattern Making Tools

This fall I have taken in two new apprentices, Poppy and Misia. They are learning sewing, pattern making and design techniques.  One stitch at a time we are working on collaborative pieces, that employ the subtle nuances of building a well crafted belly dance costume.   They are learning that a big component of the design process is making custom patterns. Many sewers treat commercial patterns as if they are the word of law, rarely deviating from the way they are drawn. Pattern making allows a designer to work from an existing pattern, modify a sloper or draft something completely new. There are relatively few things that you need to get started pattern making.  Below are the essential tools that you need to make your own patterns.   Along with a few good reference books, and a class to get your started on the basics, pattern making is a very potent tool in the  costume designer arsenal.

 

Essential Pattern Making Tools
Essential Pattern Making Tools by davinadevine on Polyvore

Categories
Assiut/Assuit Design General Publications

The Cloth of Egypt – The Storyboard

Story Boarding The Cloth of Egypt

I’m a one woman shop and I wear a lot of hats.  One of my least favorite hats to wear, (aside from bookkeeper, which just sucks) is that of book layout and production artist.  I know, I could hire someone to do this, but since I’ve spent all my money buying assiut , vintage ephemera like photographs and maps, and all the supplies to make more than a dozen costumes, I’m pretty tapped out.  What this means is that I will have to do all my own book production!  If that sounds like complaining, it’s not, it’s just the name of the game when it comes to self publishing.

Before I start laying out the material for the book using inDesign, I go old school and storyboard the entire project.  My approach is to work in “spreads” two pages at a time.  To make this go quickly, I’ve devised a two-page template that I use to sketch and notate the details of each spread.  I put these into a binder where I can effortlessly flip through the various pages and get a strong sense of what the final document will look like.  Oh yes, and I always always use pencil.  Once I have finished the entire book mock-up, I roll up my sleeves, grab a cup of coffee and fire up inDesign.   Are you an self-published author?   Check out my templates below.

Categories
Assiut/Assuit General

Vintage Modern Assiut Head Drapes – Photo Creation Tutorial

Vintage Modern Assiut Head Drapes

Photo Creation Tutorial

I’ve been spending practically all of my waking hours working on Cloth of Egypt.    Recently, I got together with local belly dancer/model Nicole Simone for a series of head shots.  My team spent a long hard day working to craft a series of photos for CoE.   For this shoot, I induced local Bay Area hair stylist, braiding artist and belly dancer Misia Rockte to do hair.  Nicole Simone did her own makeup, creating a polished belly dance performance face.  We were joined by Scheherazade, who helped style and keep watched for the details like flipping jewelry, shiny noses, issues that I (behind the camera) wouldn’t necessarily catch.

In about four hours, we shot just under 500 images, and had six costume changes.  Because we were shooting from the mid-torso up, Nicole didn’t have to change of all her clothes with each new look.  With Misia watching the hair, and Scheherazade watching costume and makeup, we set up in front of my front door with two diffused lights to my right (you can see the hot-spot on Nicole’s shoulder.)

What equipment did we use? My camera is an inexpensive Cannon Power Shot and the lights are a pair that came with a table-top studio kit purchased for a song on eBay years ago.  These are a pair of 11″ lamps with a diffuser covers and are still available on the manufacturer’s website. www.obnphoto.com  We positioned them one high and one straight towards Nicole’s face. For a backdrop, we used my front door, which is conveniently painted “I rent an apartment” white.

Photo One: Raw Image

Below is Nicole’s raw image.  My goal at this point is to create a side profile shot in the style popular at the turn of the last century.  We took about 12 shots in the series, and this is the one that I liked the best.  You can see that the image is a bit too dark on the left.  Just turning it to black and white just wouldn’t produce the best results.

Photo Two: Brightness & Contrast

My first goal is to adjust the brightness and contrast.  Photoshop is a big, beastly program, but I find myself using the brightness and contrast sliders on virtually every photo I take these days!   I boost brightness by quite a bit to bring the door to white.  I also boosted the contrast to emphasize the silver pattern in the assiut.

Photo Three: Skin Perfection

Nicole Simone is a lovely woman, but there’s always room for a bit of clean up.  I use the healing tools to clean up some skin imperfections, a few of the moles on her chest and some other details.   During this phase I also used the dodge tool to brighten up her face and then brightened up her eyes just a little bit more.   I used the burn tool to darken her lips and eyelashes.  Good makeup and bright lighting, and a model with gorgeous skin reduces the amount of “digital botox” needed.

Photo Four: Black & White with Tint

To enhance the vintage quality of the image, I convert using the black & white controls.   Using the b&w control, rather than grayscale, allows you to control the color channels, so I reduced the red channel to make Nicole’s skin tone look more even in the antiqued image.  I also upped the blue to darken the the deeper tones of the feathers and flowers.

Photo Five: Final Changes

I pulled out an actual vintage cabinet card from my collection and really took a good hard look at it.  I realized that my sepia was too pinkish.  So I played with the b&w sliders to find a more golden tone.  Then I clone stamped the peep hole out of the image.  I went back in with the burn tool and strategically darkened the shadows, especially in the hair flowers.  I used the dodge tool to soften the shadow on her cheek from the dangle of fringe.

I then called it DONE!  I placed it in a frame and added some market-y text to it and then uploaded it to Pinterest.