Sewing the Paper Dress

 My latest project, The Tea Party Dress, made up almost entirely of spent tea bags, will be on display at the Burlington Art Center in Iowa for the month of April during the 2025 Group Fiber Show. 

See the post at my RECOMPOZED blog HERE.

Costuming for Alice in Wonderland

Reta Callahan and Richard Arp as the Queen and King of Hearts

For the past year I have been the costume designer for Wolf Creek Players, a small community theatre in Dysart Iowa. This past February we staged a performance of Alice in Wonderland based on the 1915 Alice Gerstenberg adaptation of the story by Lewis Carroll. It was the first time Alice in Wonderland was performed on Broadway.

 

Garrett Ryan, Jana Ryan and Sandi Hulst as the 6 of Spaces, Alice and the Duchess

This was my last contribution to this theatre. The costuming was a great challenge given a limited budget and, as can be expected, time constraints. But the task was an enjoyable one and the finished garments were quite stunning, if I may say so. The role of the costume in a theatrical production is to help transform the actor into their character. I think I did my job.


 

Ryan Riefenstall as the Knave

Paper Runway

In 2006 I collaborated with papermaker Julie McLaughlin to produce two paper wearables to enter into the Robert C Williams Paper Museum exhibition titled Paper Runway.

The corsets were designed by Julie. They are welded rod armatures covered with pigmented paper pulp and tussah silk. The corset is designed exactly like a fabric garment. Pattern pieces are drafted and the wet sheets of paper are "cut" and fused together. They are then attached to the armature while wet and as the paper dries it shrinks to fit the armature snugly. When dry the surface is finished with a wax coating to protect and bring out the luster of the fibers.

My part in the project was designing and sewing the paper skirts.  These very thin sheets of paper were hand tinted with several light applications of pigment sprayed onto the surface. 

5 layers of these large sheets (about 60" x 80") were sandwiched together and plaited with copper metallic thread.

 I hand spun tussah silk and strips of this paper and plied it to make the cord that laced the sides of the corsets. 

This is the second dress we produced. The paper is the natural color of the fiber and is pin-tucked with gold metallic thread.

It was fun to revisit this project because I have been thinking about a bit of a delve into the manipulated surface once again but this time in fabric.