Making some colorful haneri

During my semester I had the urge to make something. The time was limited so I had to do something that is not so big. I decided to draw some pictures on a haneri as practice before I start the big project. Embroidered haneri can b quite expensive. I had already ordered several white ones last year and I have a few colored one, too. I already shoe you what I have done last year with the ro haneri. Now most of the fabric is polyester. I started with some flower themed one:

The pictures next to it was the inspiration I took for the one I made. I’m a bit lazy when it comes to new designs, so I look for nice one on the internet and than copy it.

The next one is a two in one cat haneri.

You can use both sides. Which ever fits the purpose most.

The third one was bunny inspired one.

And the last one was bunny, too , but this time on a red background. I was curious how well the paint works on darker colors.

The colors I used where textile colors from javana. So far everything turned out quite well. I made a patter out of the original to trace the lines better under the fabric. This way I did not have to worry about lines which might not vanish when the colors is added. The colors are quite thick and can be annoying when you have to draw thin line. Putting water in it will make the color more smooth but at the same time it runs more when applied to the fabric like silk colors. So it all depends on you calmness and patience.
In future I will make more haneri but for now I’m busy with the big project and that will take a while. Not only big cause it is a lot of work but also because I won’t have much in the next months.

New Items Nr.25 and Kitsuke challenge Nr.3 + 4

Beginning today with the two kitsuke challenge from last week ( Nr.38) and this week.(nr. 39) these are the third and fourth week in a row. First we have this brand new cream colored synthetic hitoe komon, which just arrived in that week. It was still warm enough to wear hitoe. I choose the blue nagoya obi with falling momij. For the obiage I choose a pink chirimen with and dark red to light red gradation obijime. I would have liked the blue haneri a bit more bold in color, but I don’t have one.  The fabric of the kimono is quite thin and the pink juban I used is shining thru. I have to take that into account next time I use that komon.

For this week I wanted to use my only tomesode I have. I made it myself and love it. As for the the obi, I choose a very bold silver gold one. This fukuro is one of the first things I bought online. for obiage and obijime the colors are set as white for an tomesode outfit. I finally got all of it. Well not all, if you go for a full outfit there is a little gold fan missing that you put into the obi. And sometime a little charm. The tomesode usually has 5 mon , mine has only the blank spots. If I ever have a mon I will be able to add it there. It shouldn’t be free , when wearing it outside.. but well, its not japan here 😉

For myself I wanted to dress up in the new kimono I traded for some hairpins and the new hakata obi I got. And I wanted to try for japanese style hair as well. some days ago I already practiced a bit and today I wanted to got with the whole assemble. The blue komon is synthetic or wool in a blue shade which is really hard to get right in pictures. The white hakata obi is made of synthetic, too. I matched it with pinkish accessorizes.
For my hair I watched some youtube tutorials to get the main points on how to do it. I don’t want the bows on the side to be to big and I used a ribbon to hide the rest of my bun. I think I did quite well, but m fizzy hair would need some wax to stay.

And in the end, all new Items together:

 

 

my new mannequin for dressing up

After weeks of already owning it , I introduce you to my new mannequin. I bought it for practicing kitsuke without having to dress me. And it is a nice decoration for the room. My plan is to change the outfit every week. In the FB Group there goes a challenge around called “kitsuke challenge”. The conditions a exactly what I’m planing. Dressing up me or the puppet every week.

I left out some weeks now, because I had a lot to do and lots of things are happening at the moment in my surroundings. But this is a kitsuke blog and I won’t tell to much about these private things here.

So here are the outfits I got so far.

Outfit 1 (week 28): light green awase homoungi with green maple leaves; silver fukuro obi with pastel chrysanthemum , pink obiage and obijme

Outfit 2(week29): green ro kimono with scatered flower petals, red hiraki obi with swallows and light green ro obiage and white summer obihime, swallow wisteria han eri

Outfit 3(week 32): black.white furisode with red plums and cranes, gold-green fukuro obi, green shibori obiage + green obijime, red-yellow obiage with dark pink obijime

Outfit 4(week 36): blue hitoe kimono with instruments, silver nagoya obi with cords, yellow obiage and obijime

Outfit 5(week 37): blue hitoe kimono with loooots of pattern, red flower arabesque hiraki obi, red-blue-yellow colored obiage and yellow obi jime, red chirimen haneri

As you can see I had some trouble keeping up the outfits every week so far. But I started new now, hopefully with more success. The furisode you see on the pictures is not anymore in my possession. I do still love it very much, but I don’t see any opportunity that I will be able to wear it any more. I sold it to a friend. I still have one other furisode which I won’t be selling ever (I think). To many emotions are in that one.

Nisa-Con in Brunswick

2 Weeks ago here in Brunswick the little Anime Convention Nisa Con was held. I took part in it as Seller and in a Workshop. As seller I tried to sell my kanzashi there to get some extra pocket money. I need to save some money for the trips I’m planing next year. Well,  sold some but not as much as I hoped for. But it was still interesting and fun. My workshop was a kimono workshop . I told them a bit of the history of kimono and than everyone that wanted to could try to put an yukata on. I got some with me and most of the people were willing to try it. I wanted to them to try it them self under my instructions. I had some people helping out Anna and Rinni. I got some positive feedback afterwards and hopefully I created some new kimono addicted people 😉

And because I wanted to be a got example for a kimono wearer I put on one myself. It was a really hot weekend I  go my thinnest kimono out that I have. For the first day I choose one of my favorite kimono the kansai sha kimono.   I just love the color. As obi I decided to go for the orange fukuro obi. It is the only summer fukuro obi I have and the orange is just pale enough to go perfectly with my turquoise kimono. It has chinese bell flowers on it. For obiage I went with a pink ro obiage and a light turquoise obijime. As Kanzashi I just made a pink turquoise one with a small crane on it the night before. I was in such a hurry that I burned myself with the hot glue. But the kanzashi turned out really nice.

On the second day I wore the emerald green ro komon. It has a flower petal storm on it. As obi I went for a dark bright pink hiraki obi with silver clouds. The obiage is just pale yellow and the obijime is light green summer weave. For both days I just an obi tool which makes it easier to put on the obi. Well easier if you are used to use it. But I wanted to use it , because than I had the feeling that it would be more secure. And I think it worked really well. Both pictures of the first and second day were take at the end of the day and my obi still sits perfectly. Only my ohashori is mad ad me. Due to the heat I did not use as much padding as I would need, and than my ohashori wrinkles…. damn hips.

It was still a nice experience and if everything works out fine with the timing next year, I will attend again.

Japanese Culture Day in Düsseldorf

yes, it has already been a while now that the annual japanese culture day was, but as I said before. I was quite busy lately.

I was not sure, if I would be going there this year, but two days before the weather forecast was quite positive about sunshine, so I got my kimono out of the drawer. I decided to wear a synthetic hitoe komon in turquoise with a pale pink nagoya obi a purple accessorize. I was quite pleased with my color choice. So I got up 5 o’clock in the morning to have enough time to get dressed and to catch my train. The whole journey to Düsseldorf takes 4 h 30min with one or two train changes from Braunschweig. During the journey the train got more and more full with anime kids, all wanting to go to Düsseldorf. I was happy to get a single seat. In the end, not people would fit in there any more two or three stops before the final stop.

The weather forecast did not lie about the sun. It was quite warm and when I got to the place where the celebrations were, it was full with people, which heated up the place even more. After 2h of waling around without fining my kitsuke friends I had to get some water. At that time I regretted to have not chosen the ro kimono.  But than I found one friend and they showed me were the others were. So now I was not alone anymore.

Together we walked of to the japanese shinto shrine in the japanese quarter of the city to chat and calm down a bit. On the way we made a stop at a japanese grocery store and got some ice cream to go. And than it was already time to leave for me. I had to catch my train back quite early, because the back tour took even longer. In the end my second train had a delay and I was standing at a train station in nowhere for quite a while in the middle of the night. In that moment I did not regret my kimono choice and would have liked a jacket , because it got quite cold with out the sun.

It was all a very very long day but a very nice day. With new friends and nice weather.

color change

Last week a new package came with three obiage in it. It was a bundle , and what you always have is, one thing in the bundle isn’t what you want.  With this it was a , what I thought was a white obiage, late I saw it was very light shade of pink. Well, both colors I already got in my collection so I decided to dye it. It decided quite quickly on a berry color. Well , but dyeing just one little obiage seemed to me like a waste of color. I decided than to put a pair of white tabi, a white han eri , white old obi jime and a bra ( which looked ugly from washing it wrong). For me I was very curious which color which item would be in the end. I read before that silk tends to be get muted color when dyed and polyester types don’t take the color at all. Well the result you can see here :

The bra is not on the pictures but it turned into a dark violet. Totally different from the other shades you see here. But nice. As you can see on the pictures the tabi and the obi jime got the color like the dye promised. The haneri… well… a very light shade of purple. But the obi age turned it to purple berry and I’m really happy with that. What I wasn’t happy about, I had to clean the washing machine afterwards. All the dirt inside turned purple 😦

Okay than we have some new item, too, a yukata in indigo and a new hanhaba obi with rabbits on it :)and the other obiage from the bundle. The red-yellow one has silver threads on one half and gold threads on the on the other.

Outfits of the last weeks

It is this time of the year again, when students have not much time due to examinations. And this time is now over. I had not many chances to wear kimono lately or to practice it. There was only one thing, the tribute party to athletes in our town for last years accomplishments. I decided to go there in kimono to attract some attention for our sport 😉 I choose the lavender colored iromuji and the sakura obi with silver threads. It was all very springish.

and last week my new pink iromuji arrived. Usually I’m not so much into pink but I really like that salmon pink. The color fits so nicely to a lot of obi I got and lately I’m more into pastels. This week I finally had time to try it on. I paired it with a sparkly beige, green blueish obi.

I haven’t bought much kimono stuff lately because I but a limit to my budget. I want to save money for the sport seminars this year, which will cost a lot of money. And I sold some things that I don’t wear or which don’t fit me. Well, yes , that happens, when the sell gets the measurements wrong or sometimes you get presents. Or sometimes it’s just an item you bought at the beginning of your collection, when you bought everything you could get your hands on and later you realize that it doesn’t suit you.

Refurbishing of old geta

Some years ago I bought some geta I really wished for. They were old but looked quite sound. Only the hanao (straps) were really worn. I exchanged them with some straps I made myself , but a new layer of black lacquer on it and wore it to the meeting at the Japan Day in Düsseldorf. It was a fun day but the cobblestone pavement did no good to them. One  tooth got in a gap and split. I was very very sad. A friend of my did repair it for me. But of course you still could see were it was split. I had to renew the lacquer. Well of at first I thought, I will only do one tooth and than everything will be fine. I started with lots of energy to remove the paint and it  was done when the sun set. The next day I started the spraying the new black paint on it and repeated this step every second or third day. After the 3rd layer I thought I was finished …. buuuut …even after one week of drying it was still so soft even touching would leave a finger print on it. I was devastate. So I started again to remove the paint. But because it was so soft, it nearly ruined my sandpaper. While removing I noticed the bad job I did before when I painted it. I did not remove the lacquer before. I just sprayed over the holes it the paint. Well and you could see it very well. In the consequence I started to removed the paint from the whole shoe and from the other, too. Oh, wow, what a lot of work it was. I filled some holes and started the paint process again, with a different lacquer. And this time everything worked out fine. To add some stylish touch I sprinkled some gold lacquer over them. I really like that effect. From far you can’t see it but when you look closely you will see it. Also before there was layer beneath the black lacquer to smooth the surface. I didn’t buy any under lacquer and now you can the structure of the wood, which I really like. I had to make new hanao as well. I made them a bit thinner thinner this time but with the same fabric and with some inlay to strengthen it a bit.  I still have to get them in to the holes but I’m already looking forward to wear them soon.

my long term porject

I have been working on some projects lately, but not continuously. Because of the exams coming up soon I haven’t managed to finish even one. But I want to introduce you to one of my long term project. I bought this lovely meisen kimono with the intention to pimp it a bit and than wear it. It had the right size when I came to sleeve length. It was to short in the body, but I find it less bad to have no ohashori instead of to short sleeves. There was a major stain on the bag which did show on the sellers pictures.

When it came I was very sad. The fabric was/is so bridle that it tears open very easily. And it already had a some holes. Than I noticed that is was really really short… so I had to lengthen it with some spare fabric. … Well it was the first time that I lengthened a kimono. On the back I did everything right but on the front I made the cut to high. Which means you will see the different fabric when worn. 😦 Well but now I can wear, but still no ohashori is possible.

Now to be able to wear it I bought some lining for silk which you ion on it to strengthen the silk. It works but I will have to sew it on to the kimono and eventually make a proper lining .

I already started to fill the holes with embroidery. On top on that to hide the stain I bought some lace to cover the stains. I put some in front of the kimono as well , just for fun. Today I put it on to see how it looks and I think it is just fine. My boyfriend doesn’t like the kimono much. He says ” granny kimono” to it, but I like it. Even so it is so fragile. I hope I can wear it soon.

My hand sewn iromuji

I wish everyone a happy new year. I hope you celebrated the upcoming year. It was an interesting but stressful year for me. Just before Christmas I had the time to finish my long term project. The dark pink iromuji is really lovely and I can see that I get betting in attaching the lining. It is still far from perfect and I really have to practice it more to make better ones, but only when I have time. With this iromuji I was planing on a mono color look. In order to achieve that I bought that plain obi and I already had a obiage and obijime that matched. I think with iromuji are one of the most versatile kimono type. First, it is much easier to find a matching obi , when there is just one color to match it with . And second, the is not much a seasonality with them. With my dark pink one I can use a lot of light obi. I do have a lot of light obi, but also a lot of light colored kimono.

I tried a bit of kitsuke before Christmas. With my light purple iromuji and with my dark pink one. I did not use padding , so the kitsuke is not very clean… but well just the fun of it.