By Monica Sklar,
November 28th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(Uncategorized)
I realized recently that since I completed my research on modern craft in ’07 my posts on the movement have dwindled to almost nothing. Even though personally I am still a crafty shopper and can often be seen with at least one item on hand made in the DIY craft world. So, I figured on this shopper frenzied weekend I’d let you know about a few upcoming craft events to snag yourself some cute holiday gifts for someone you love or yourself of course!
In the Twin Cities there are three upcoming activities:
The store called i like you! is having their 2nd annual ornament show Saturday November 29th
from 4:00 pm – 9:00 pm. Handmade ornaments along with hot cider, wine and some snacks!
No Coast Craft-o-Rama which is always a huge blast is December 5-6 at Midtown Exchange. The show is always enormous and I’ve gotten gifts there every year I’ve been here in MPLS.
The Handmaidens present Craftsmas on December 7 at the Uptown VFW.
And of course if you’re not in the Twin Cities there are certainly DIY craft fairs in your town and there’s ETSY which has endless fun stuff!
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By Heather Vaughan,
November 26th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(History of Dress, Uncategorized)
Jalou Gallery has the entire L’Officiel de la Mode available online for researchers (The searchable database is an excellent resource for Fashion Historians). While I don’t really read or speak French, I found the site to be extremely intuitive and easy to use (you can even print out the articles you need in their original layout (complete with images).
You can also view the issues, as if scanning them on a microfische by clicking the “Plein Ecran” link. Seriously, this is an amazing useful resource. From the Plein Ecran view, you can zoom in by clicking on the “Freme” link (once the page is fully loaded) and read the text, look for references and much more.
Searching for key suppliers of textiles, little known designers, as well as the well-known ones yields fantastic results.Quirks and French notwithstanding, this is an amazing tool and one I plan to use extensively going forward. For more (including some great images), check out this blog, Design Typlo le Blog. Give this database a try and let me know what you think in the comments section below.
Until Next Time,
Heather
www.fashionhistorian.net
Heather is a contributor to the newly released Greenwood Encyclopedia Clothing through American History, 1900 to the Present.
1 Comment
By Monica Sklar,
November 25th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(Jobs, Uncategorized)
Royal Ontario Museum
Veronika Gervers: Research Fellowship in Textiles and Costume History
Deadline: March 31, 2009
The Veronika Gervers Research Fellowship, established in 1979, promotes research incorporating the textile and costume collections of the ROM. The Fellowship is open to Ph.D. candidates and scholars worldwide whose research can make direct use of, or support, any part of the Museum’s collections. Successful Gervers candidates are selected by a committee of museum and university scholars. ROM curator Dr. Alexandra Palmer, also a Gervers Fellow, chairs the committee and is the Nora E. Vaughan Fashion Costume Curator of our Textile and Costume Section.
Click here for more info including a download of the application
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By Monica Sklar,
November 24th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(Conferences and Calls for Papers, Uncategorized)
Call for Papers
Fashion & Fabric: Theory, Materiality & Practice
May 15 – 16, 2009
Material Culture Institute, University of Alberta Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
2009 is the International Year of the Natural Fibre. Inspired by this event, this conference will explore the history, culture and conservation practices arising from the world’s natural fibre textiles. The conference will be interdisciplinary in structure and address both contemporary and historical topics. Proposals are invited from graduate students across the disciplines researching issues related to the conference theme. All perspectives are welcome. Full panels as well as individual proposals will be considered. Applicants may be either Masters or PhD candidates.
Potential topics may include but are not limited to:
Textiles & Consumerism
Dress & Community
To Repair & Recover: Conservation Practice and/or Process
Practice of Production
Trade, Textiles & Culture
Fibre & Fashion
Design History/Practice
Proposals:
Abstracts of proposed papers (150-200 words) should be received by 15 December 2008. To aid us in the blind review process, please submit your abstract in the following electronic format: MS WORD document or RTF, composed of 3 pages. The first page should have your name, your university affiliation, program of study, your telephone number and your email address. The second page should have only your presentation title and abstract text, for blind review. On the third page we ask that you provide a 1 page short CV.
Please send proposals to Jennifer Beamer via email
Please use:
MCI Graduate Student International Conference Submission as your subject heading. Presenters will be contacted and a preliminary program will be announced no later than 30 January 2009. Selection Process: Submissions will be reviewed by an Editorial Committee composed of current graduate students and faculty associated with the Material Culture Institute. All proposals will be adjudicated in a blind panel process, and are therefore considered refereed. A limited number of bursaries will be available to assist with travel for presenters. Information will also be forthcoming about accommodation etc when the preliminary program is announced. Thank you for forwarding this call for papers to other interested graduate students.
For more information click here
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By Monica Sklar,
November 20th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(Uncategorized)
Over the past year WT has signed up to be a part of two fashion blog communities and we really think you should check them out!
Independent Fashion Bloggers is a hip and easy-going site that links you to tons of fashion blogs which are not part of the corporate system. There are forums, news highlights, and an archive. It is also a resource on effective blogging tips.
Coutorture is a sophisticated collection of material culled from other blogs as well as their own original content in a magazine style. They highlight blogs (WT multiple times!), have links to numerous fashion sites, and use every resource to get you the fashion information you crave.
Now in all truth, I haven’t seen a big bump in our readership since we’ve joined either of these communities. I’m not sure how many people really scroll through the long list of blog names and click every link. I did once before I started WT to see if anyone was doing anything similar, but now I look to these sites as a news consolidator more than for their links. However, I support the idea of them tremendously and wish they had more in-person events regionally (mostly they’re on the coasts). I’d love to meet more serious fashion bloggers in person. For now, the online connections are great and hopefully more services of this nature will develop to link us together and help us learn from one another.
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By Heather Vaughan,
November 19th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(History of Dress, Uncategorized)
Original Caption: “An Apollo 12 astronaut stands beside the United States flag on the surface of the moon. November 19, 1969″ (Corbis).
39 years ago today, man landed on the moon for the second time. Apollo 12 followed the Apollo 11 moon landing on July 20, where Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin had become the first humans to land on the Moon. According to the Smithsonian’s online exhibition, the Apollo mission spacesuits were well-researched, and made with a mix of new and old materials. Some might consider these early techno-textiles:
“Many textiles used in space suits were invented prior to the space program. The Du Pont Company developed neoprene synthetic rubber in 1932, almost thirty years before the first manned spaceflight. Nylon and Teflon were invented in 1938. Following World War II, Du Pont introduced Mylar, in 1959, Lycra spandex fiber, and in 1963, Nomex. All of these materials were used in the Apollo space suit. Following the tragic Apollo 1 fire, researchers sought materials more resistant to very high temperatures. In 1962, the Dow-Corning Company produced Beta silica fiber, a material like fiberglass, except that it would not irritate the skin of the wearer. For the outer covering of the Apollo space suit, Beta silica fiber was coated with Teflon to create Beta Cloth”
APOLLO SPACE SUIT, MODEL A7L
The exploration of space led to a new interest in the future, and in a new design aesthetic: Space-Age Fashion. Movies had long been obsessed with the ‘last frontier,’ but the late 1960s and early 1970s produced a wealth of new designs based on this idea.
“1968 film Barbarella, with Jane Fonda in tights, bodysuit (with “exposed” right breast plate), cape, boots and holding a plastic helmet.” (Costume Design by Jacques Fonteray and Fashion Designer Paco Rabanne).
While often more interested in the aesthetic, that in the new textiles,designers such as Paco Rabanne, André Courrèges, Pierre Cardin and Rudi Gernreich created the epitome of space-age couture. Search for these and other designers, at the Met Costume Institute Collection, here.
André Courrèges
Dec. 1, 1967
Pierre Cardin, 1970 (Met, C.I.
Until next time,
Heather
www.fashionhistorian.net
Heather is a contributor to the newly released Greenwood Encyclopedia Clothing through American History, 1900 to the Present.
1 Comment
By Monica Sklar,
November 17th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(Conferences and Calls for Papers, Uncategorized)
CALL FOR PAPERS (note from Monica-I’m not going to spell out all these acronyms I’m unfamilar with, just go to their website-Thanx!)
Body in Movement 2
Deadline: 12-31-2008
This event is jointly organized by the I.U.F.M. of Montpellier’s local education authority, now integrated to the University of Montpellier II, and the Santésih laboratory (Health, Education and Disability Situations, JE2516), a team which was recently granted a seal of approval by the Ministry of Research. This team was also granted patronage by the Sports and Physical Education Sciences Faculty of Montpellier I. The reason this symposium is entitled Body in Movement 2 is that an eponymous symposium was hosted by the University of Pau et des Pays de l’Adour (France) in 2007, bringing together from different branches of the Social Studies domain. At present, the ambition of Body in Movement 2 is greater in that it proposes to include, if possible, researchers from domains going from Robotics, to Physics and to Philosophy, Linguistics and Psychoanalysis, via Life and Health Sciences and even Social sciences; in short, all domains of knowledge that take into account the body in movement and that attempt to formulate an intelligibility from it.
Moreover, this symposium aims at inscribing itself not in a national or European field, but in a planetary one. That is why it also obtained the support of the European Committee for the History of Sport and that of the International Society for the History of Sport and Physical Education. However this list is not all-comprehensive and the symposium can still, at this stage, receive international patronage. The organizing committee and I are glad to welcome you in Montpellier on June, 3d, 4th, 5th and 6th 2009, in order to work upon a real pooling of research in the domain of Human Body and Movement.
Presentations can be submitted as either oral communications (30 minutes including 10 minutes for discussion) or posters (presentation in the form of a collective forum).
Topics are:
Towards artificial and bionic bodies, monsters, teratology…
Interculturality, body & movement
Image and dramatisation of the body
Bodily education at school and elsewhere
Body and gender
Email.
Click here for more details.
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By Monica Sklar,
November 14th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
(Conferences and Calls for Papers, Uncategorized)
Well if I missed you at ITAA this year hopefully I will see you at a conference soon. I’m considering CSA, PCA, and ITAA all for next year, as well as a few other smaller ones.
It was was fun and productive conference, although not without a few tweaks that could be made for next year. But overall, for me, things went without a hitch.
Of course being in Schaumburg, Il was absurd and I never made it into the city which was a drag, but some of my Chicago peeps came to me for some fine chain restaurant dining. I know, I know, it’s supposedly cheaper, but I’ve been to conferences within city limits of many major cities, including Chicago, and it was never more expensive than this one was.
Did my presentation on men’s workplace dress-wish I had a better powerpoint but…anyway, got that over with and now it’s under review with CTRJ. I was up for an award and didn’t win, c’est la vie. Saw a few good talks, including one where the student totally used arts based research methods (one of my dissertation topics) which was rad as she made reproductions of historical garments to represent everything she was learning about them, including exactly how they were produced. I also saw a good talk on hip hop (Courtney-I cannot find your email, if you read this, write me!), and of course my UMN friends had some good work represented.
I have no idea how the breakfasts/talks went as they are at an hour I detest mingling at, but, the lunches had good speakers and decent food. Sharron Lennon did a nice state of the art review over lunch reviewing topical trends in research. Looks like avatars are the future. I did have an avatar piece myself on the back burner, still in the brainstorm phase, but if everyone is going in that direction I might either jump start it or let it go (don’t need to reinvent a wheel that may already be in motion).
I attended a pretty strong seminar on landing a job, and got a lot of good information at the career fair about the oceans of available jobs. So many different issues though, teaching schools, research schools, religious schools, assistants or no assistants, research dollars or no research dollars, trips overseas or 5 days a week in the classroom, etc.
Had a good meeting getting things together for my future book…more info on that later
One of my fav parts was the final morning breakfast (it was a little later than 7am so I dragged myself there) and the “town hall-style” meeting gave a forum for suggestions, which provided me a lot more insight into my colleagues and what they are really looking for in an organization and events.
Below are some pictures (I had a bunch more but made the mistake of no flash so they didn’t turn out-Monica):
4 Comments
By Heather Vaughan,
November 12th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(Book Reviews, History of Dress, Uncategorized)
As it happens, I’ll need a few more weeks to put together that profile I was promising you, on the FIDM collection and its manager. I expect to have it up sometime this month or early next (the looming holiday season is starting to squash me with projects). In the meantime, I decided that a quick few notes about some recently released books would be a good idea. 
Influence
, by Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen has been making the rounds on a number of blogs, and they’ve been doing a good deal of press for it (Oprah, book signings, etc). It’s a series of interviews that the twins did with some of their favorite (and influential) designers. It also includes such tidbits, as the fact that pink is the highest selling color. Scholars Point of View: Might have some interesting quotes from important designers. 
Lucien Lelong, is the first book devoted to the designer and I would venture to say that it is would be an important addition to any fashion scholar’s library. Thames & Hudson produces good books, with high quality reproductions and solid research. I would expect nothing less from this volume. The book was just released at the end of October, so its hot off the presses. Being a scholar of the 1920s and 1930s, this is an extremely valuable and timely resource. It includes a plethory of black and white (with some color) images by the likes of Horst, Beaton, Hoyningen Huene, Man Ray, and Lee Miller, making it well worth the $30 price tag. Scholars Point of View: A must have. I’m adding it to my Holiday wish list. For examples of Lucien Lelong’s work in the Costume Institute, go here. Until Next Time, Heather www.fashionhistorian.net Heather is a contributor to the newly released The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Clothing through American History, 1900 to the Present
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By Monica Sklar,
November 11th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(Jobs, Uncategorized)
1.) The Seattle Art Museum is looking for an Asian Art Curator for a large collection which includes textiles. Masters required. Candidates should have an advanced degree in art history; two years of curatorial experience; excellent organizational and interpersonal skills; fluency in Japanese; strong leadership, conceptual, and written and oral communication skills; demonstrated ability to work successfully with colleagues and museum constituencies; and a proven ability to handle a variety of tasks concurrently in a complex environment. Click here for more info.
2.) The Los Angeles County Museum of Art posted looking for Fall/Winter costume and textile department interns. Selected interns will assist the curatorial staff with handling, documenting, and researching objects while gaining greater knowledge and hands-on experience within a renowned encyclopedic collection of costume and textiles. The intern must commit to the completion of 240 hours of work throughout the semester for academic credit towards a bachelor’s or master’s degree in art history, museum studies, or related field. Qualifications:Student currently enrolled in a bachelor or master’s level art history, museum studies, or related field program for an internship during the fall/winter 2008 semester. An academic concentration in costume and textiles is preferable.The ideal candidate is organized and self-motivated with the ability to multi-task, meet deadlines, and work as a team player. This candidate must have excellent written and verbal communication skills and a strong working knowledge of MS Office. The ideal candidate must also be a strong researcher. Duties include organizing and documenting objects through the cataloging process, managing digital images for documentation, researching objects, handling objects and rare-books materials, preparing archival storage units, and other such assistance to the curatorial staff. Email with your CV.
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