Clothing as Metaphor

On Friday last week we went to the Katonah Museum of Art for the Exhibit 'Dress Codes - Clothing as Metaphor' It was fabulous. Items of clothing made from things like pennies, One dollar notes, nails and velvet, inflatable skirts, a burka made from souvenir badges, a dress from balloons and a suit from feathers. There were also recycled things like a vintage gown made from used patty pans and coffee filters. And, ordinary things like a shop clothing rack will different shirts and tops from all over the world, a metaphor for travel, and a pile of folded items which reached from the floor to the ceiling. Another, shirt collars aranged to look like vertebrae.

Usually I like to complete some sort of project at home after a trip to a museum, the museum always does an activity with the chn. This time I really had to rack my brains and this is what I came up with.

I have been collecting plastic bags for some time in order to try an activity that I saw on Australian Homes and Gardens TV show back in February. You take a few bags, bags, fuse them with an iron and then sew something - most commonly a pencil case or a toiletry bag. I thought, we could make some clothes instead.

They are not meant to be worn, as the clothes in the exhibit are not meant to ne worn. So yesterday the chn and I got organised and this is the result. Clothes made from the piles of packaging that is used to bring them home....

The chn and the pile of bags.



Cutting off the handles and the bottoms of the bags so they will lay flat and be almost the same size and shape.





Ironing the layers of plastic bags between the parchment paper.





J and the plastic 'fabric' pieces.




Making the paper pattern.





Pinning on the pattern and cutting out the plastic shape.



Sewing up the seams.






The finished products.