Granny Goes to Hollywood, part 2
Well, despite the lovely comments and emails supporting me in my bid to be the best-dressed home-made munchkin at Oz in LA next Saturday * — thank you! — I'm going to have to go shopping.
The shimmery, floaty, kimono-inspired creation has not turned out at all well. No fault of the pattern, which was easy-peasy and a joy to put together. But working in devore velvet, no matter how gorgeous it may be, is an unbelievable pain. It shifts when you're sewing right sides — nap sides — together, and it shreds if you so much as look at it.
So I'd struggle to keep the edges together accurately to sew a seam , and then, while ironing it open, the seam would start to come undone.
I did not swear, though.
Well, yes I did.
The result, daahlings, was a disappointment in brown. And, it has to be said, frumpy to boot.
To make matters worse, I've found out that this do is actually A Big Deal. And on the formal side of formal.
I went to dinner at the Bondi on Friday with Leah and Damien, some of our other Australian friends who live here and have been to three of these Hollywood galahs**. Leah, who is funny and gorgeous and writes music for movies (and is a voting member of The Academy — as in The Academy) leaned over during dinner and said, 'Have you got your frock for nest weekend yet?' And when I told her I'd been trying to make something to wear, she looked at me a bit weird. Then she explained that at this do, there was a real red carpet. And limousines. And paparazzi.
'So,' I said, 'my notion of dressing in something comfy and dark and sitting inconspicuously up the back — unrealistic?'
'Well,' she replied, grinning at my obvious Perth naivete, 'we may well be sitting up the back, but, Les, you need a frock!' So Fashion Valley here I come. I'll keep you posted.
* Incidentally, if you click on the link at the beginning of this, you'll see how excited Our Kylie is about Saturday night.
** I know gala is spelled gala, not galah. But my mates and I always called these posh, overdressed stuffy affairs galah affairs, in honour of our most common Australian parrot, the (pink and grey) galah (pronounced with the stress on the second syllable, gu'lah). A galah is also Australian slang for an idiot.