Anti-beige

I have had it with everything beige, or gray, or dusty rose. Walls, sofas, mugs, pillows, pants, jackets and shirts, our material world has been washed out by an unstoppable tide of ecru. Good God, when will this end?

I am not asking for a return to the primary color craze of the early nineties but we could we allow ourselves a tiny bit of fun? A dash of bright red? A singing yellow? A midnight blue with some turquoise?

And could we be offered choices of clothes that make us happy?

I just spent two weeks making a shirt.

It's a very good shirt, made entirely from vintage material, including a yard of very precious antique linen hemming tape. I had meant for the shirt to be a rough prototype but one thing led to another and I ended up spending about 30 hours of work, embroidering and sewing, mostly by hand. In the process, I learned a great deal about how to make a shirt from a very simple but elegant pattern. I also had a lot of time to think about the function of clothes.

The embroidery work is extravagant, with an intricate field of red poppies but the shirt is extremely comfortable because the hand-embroidery technique ensures that there is very little tread touching the skin and I just used an extra layer of cotton for stabilizer. All hems are bound with tape and all seams are secured with whip-stitch. The shirt is meant to last. It is meant to be worn, not just for special occasion but because every day is a gift to life.

And yes, the shirt is as colorful as a flower garden. Because I no longer have time or patience for boredom and well-behaved beige.