Today's drama and yesterday's lovely time

First the drama.

This morning I was making our challah. I was pulverizing up freeze-dried apples in my coffee grinder to add to the challah dough when the outlet the coffee grinder was plugged into started shooting out sparks and then our kitchen and dining room went dark. Yes. I went to the fuse box to flip the appropriate fuses but alas that didn't work.

Our super came up to assess the situation and then sent an electrician to fix the damage.

I had a giant bowl of challah dough that was ready to be shaped and no working oven. I put out a distress call and my downstairs neighbor let me bake in her beautiful oven.

I gave her one of our challot as a thank you.

While the drama was ongoing I rejiggered our plans to serve meatballs and figured out a cold meal to serve instead. But with electricity restored, meatballs and roasted potatoes are back on the menu for tonight and are cooking as I type this.

Yesterday felt like the first day in eons that I wasn't either cooking or in shul. I decided to go visit the museum at FIT. There were three terrific exhibits all worth seeing.

The upstairs exhibit space is showing an exhibit called Fashion Unraveled. You can see it virtually here. One lovely element of the exhibit is the video of people talking about clothing with real meaning for them.


The exhibit is more or less about clothing with imperfections. This bodice was expanded as the wearer grew and new fabric was added.

A restored shoe is exhibited next to its unrestored partner.

A section of the exhibit was devoted to remade clothing.

 This 1920's dress was a made over men's robe.

Martin Margiela created a line of sweaters out of a cache of WWII era wool socks pieced together.

I am not exactly sure why this panel of a cut-out and embellished but not sewn together Vionnet dress was included in the exhibit but it was wonderful to see the process of creating a garment interrupted.

The section on the use of unfinished edges included this Oscar de la Renta dress that makes use of the selvage edge of the fabric as the main decorative element.

I no longer remember which designer created this laser cut dress but I am obsessed with it.

Yes, of course, I love this Comme des Garcons dress.

There were a few garments that were inside jokes on the construction process.

I then went downstairs to the big exhibit space to see the Pink Exhibit. The exhibit was curated by the brilliant Valerie Steele her probably brilliant audio commentary is available. I chose not to listen to her commentary on this visit and just see the exhibit with my own eyes this time and next time I visit I will listen to her probably really excellent commentary.

 I took photos of garments and details that caught my eye. Others may delight your eye or may be more compelling for me on my next visit. I love how the raveled edge fringe on this mid-19th-century dress recalled the exhibit upstairs- this is just one example of Valerie Steele's brilliance as an exhibit designer.

I love the cut of this skirt on this early 20th-century velvet dress. It looks more complicated than it actually is.

I believe this dress is a Dior. I loved the folded dart and the cool moire fabric.

Claire McCardle never disappoints.

Charles James called this a tree dress. 

Some dresses were from recent collections.

Other garments were from long ago.

I have been making some baby clothing so loved to see examples from the early 20th century.

I had dresses like this one.

If that wasn't enough for one exhibit I noticed as I was about to leave the museum that there was yet another exhibit of student work called Crafting Change. A number of pieces in that exhibit were mindblowing.

This portrait was done in straight stitching on an old pair of jeans.

I was enchanted by this neck piece made out of silk tubes of fabric.

The garment above the silk tube pocketbook was a digital print on silk of the woven tubes.

This "lace' is made out of heat sensitive leather appliqued onto tulle.

I am madly in love with this top made out of laser-cut wool lined in taupe silk shantung.

The guard asked me to notice how this garment is so much better for the two large buttons that are textured like the bottom of a sand dollar.

I left the Museum feeling as satisfied as if I had eaten a large well-cooked meal. I wandered the neighborhood a bit and then ran into what I had thought was a long lost friend.

Trumart had been across from FIT for what seemed like forever. it was always a complete jumble but run by the sweetest old frum couple. Mrs. Trumart had died several years back and Mr. Trumart died a few years ago. I was so sad to see their store now a fast food place. I was sad every time I had passed it by. But it isn't gone, it had just moved to 25th Street to an even smaller location.

The store is now run by their daughter.

I bought three yards of the purple silk in the silk-sale barrel (and two other fabrics as well). Their old sign has pride of place inside the store.

I was so delighted to see that my old haunt isn't gone but just moved a block away.

Shabbat Shalom!