black white and read all over

from a session that actually happened back in february, here comes a handmade polka dot dress. i never post anything here until after Shua has posted it to his tumblr. therefore, sequencing is out of joint, but you can't tell because my hair stays the same. i don't get new tattoos, or tattoos at all. no piercings. most of my evolution is on the inside. (or not; i often feel just as confused and hysterical -- freudian def. -- as i did four years ago.)

SHUA!!

i'd date this handmade dress to the 80s. styled it with miu miu suede ruffle and plastic heel pumps, backseam stockings. (in retrospect, should have rockabilly'd my coiffure.) what you can't see are the buttons that climb up the side slit, and the pleating of the gauze on the bust. also, the neat-o gradations of each polka dot. i don't do spots, but this is the exception. another exception: red black and white -- i find this combo a graphic cliche.


in terms of combos that resonate (for me), however, let's muse on the 1980s re-visioning of the 1950s. even though i kept my eyes pretty much squeezed shut during my childhood (shit was fucking ugly on so many levels) there was some stuff that charmed me the way a flying brick charms a shop window. off the top, i'm remembering:


1. the contours - do you love me (now that i can dance)
this song had a resurgence in popularity, thanks to the movie dirty dancing, which i have never seen.


2. stray cats - rock this town
i heard this song, and the one before it, thanks to a televised disney special that my parents dubbed. i watched this sequence ad nauseum while skittering around on the living room's parquet floor.

3. dick tracy / archie comics
i read the funnies whenever my parents got the tribune or sun-times. i do not remember which paper syndicated the dick tracy strip, but i certainly read that and brenda starr. the plot lines were over my head, but the illustration style involved super-glamorous exaggerated lines. archie comics were nowhere near my favorite, but i was voracious, and read everything, especially if there was an accompanying image.


4. the goodwill / salvation army
one of the most formative aspects of my childhood was shopping at secondhand stores. i never had anything new, and the only place we went for non-used items was the jewel grocery on narragansett. my mom was way into thrifty living, but i could have anything found at maxwell street or a garage sale. i remember pushing a cart down the rows of many a goodwill and piling it high with water-stiff velvets and hole'd tulle. i fitted all my clothes to myself with safety pins and quick stitches, and i loved full skirts. the thrift store, more than any other place, is where i learned to be discerning about fabric, seams, craft, and getting a good deal. this is still how i shop, although now i shop mostly at buffalo exchange and crossroads. the "segunda mano" on 21st is fairly scabrous, though i still find decent stuff there occasionally, and is the best place to look for garments that i plan to deconstruct.


5. hairspray
i do not use hairspray -- or any kind of product, actually -- on my hair, unless there is a theme night about to go down. however, i saw people around me, kids my own age, and adults, getting into a more made-up look. my parents were very 70s people, very natural, and i was brought up accordingly, but the girls on the bus had velcro rollers in their bangs until we arrived at school. they also played with makeup and plastic jewelry. still, i totally love big-curled hair, or a full set whenever i see it in a fashion spread.


6. americana
this is something that i feel quite unqualified to discuss, as it is an enormous subject and i don't intend to give it the proper treatment, being that i'm politically inarticulate and undereducated. i will venture, though, that the jingoism of the 1980s, under reagan, imparted a different feeling than a child of the 1970s or 1990s would have come up on. when you're a child, i might blandly say that the world is bright and optimistic, even as it is terrifying and uncertain, and this seemed to be especially true while watching Sesame Street and seeing Keith Haring imagery everywhere. nothing seems more american than boldness and a lack of sophistication. maybe i should also mention regressive conservativism, for while the 70s and 90s seemed to reach for something more radical or more aggressive (respectively) the 80s seemed to be about shoring up old values. i feel way out of my depth here, and anyone reading this is either frustrated by my ignorance and should maybe sit me down and school me, but i'm trying to remember how i felt between the ages of 0 and 6, not give a historically accurate account. maybe if you were a teen in the 80s, or my parents age (30s) it didn't feel nostalgic. there's just something so gross and gung-ho about faded, ripped denim and the american flag -- combined.

ew.

palate cleanser/bonus: my aunt jody in saddle shoes, cardi, and cuffed dungarees. dog named freckles.

(editor's note: i am wrong about nearly everything. "do you love me" came out in 1962. "dirty dancing" is set in the early 60s. the fashions in the disney edit are early 60s too....except for the saddle shoes. swing dance, however, Totally Is a 50s thing, as is Jive.)