In my last post I talked about my new Janome sewing machine (I love you) and the projects that were put on the backburner due to the old machine braking down (I love you too, just not as much as the new one).
One of these projects were to make a kimono and easy obi, I had already cut out the fabric and all the other bits and pieces, they just needed sewing. The first project I tackled was the easy obi, The fabric I used was in my fabric stash. Actually I had bought this fabric last year with the intentions of making the obi but for some reason it never happened till now. Anyway with the new sewing machine it took me about 1 1/2 hours to complete the obi.
The second project was a new ironing board cover, this was completed in less then a hour from start to finish!
The third project was to make a kimono. I had just brought a book which showed how to make kimono out of normal fabric, so I decided as I had the new sewing machine and the book I had no excuse not to make a kimono. The fabric was brought years ago with the intention of making it to a kimono but I never got around to it. I bought this fabric because I saw one on Mamechiyo's blog and I thought it looked quite good to wear.
In all it took me about nine hours to finish the kimono and 4 hours to finish the obi. I'm quite pleased with the result, the obiage is the one in the short post post, the bat obiage. The obi is the reversible easy obi mentioned above.
The book I used is this one
Now I do have to warn you even though this book has a pattern for the kimono, I found this book quite difficult to use, of course it's in japanese and there are some photos of the steps in making the kimono however most of the instructions are written. If you can read japanese that's fine, I don't, so I was relying on the photos. Also it only shows you how to make the kimono and has a small section at the back for making the obi, I brought this book hoping there would be a pattern for making tabi but it does not have one. I paid £17 for this book and I don't think it's worth it.
2 comments:
WOW, that's a mighty fine looking kimono. Congratulations. Love the bright green obi in combination with the B&W kimono.
And you did that with a book that was just soso ?
Imagine what you could make if you had a really good book.
The mind boggles :)
All hail the mighty Hong.( and her sewing machine)
Actually, I found a free tabi pattern at
http://www.angelfire.com/planet/mcshelpsite/sewingstuff/freepatterns.html/
( somewhere in the bottom under socks : there's the instructions on one link and the pdf on this link
http://gulumun.sakura.ne.jp/sblo_files/layer/image/tabi-26.5-A4.pdf )
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