sarah in nyc

I’m done! Daphi’s tallit is complete.     I had gotten the pinot/corners done a while ago.  It took me a long time to figure out how to get the atara/neckband sewn on neatly. I don’t know why but sometimes simple tasks have me completely flummoxed.  This only (!)  took three tries. If you notice some variation in the color it’s because the atara is made up of three layers of sheer silk. The color shifts depending on the position of your eye. It’s like a quiet little light show. I also just completed a dress that is a loud little light show. We are attending yet another Florida family event with a black tie reception.  My friend Marcia had bought me the fabric while we were on an adventure in the garment district last year. I was too chicken to cut into it last year, but  I was ready this time.     My house is now completely carpeted in teeny iridescent sequins. As a New Englander it feels completely transgressive to wear s...

Sometimes I will work out a plan of action with a client during our initial meeting. It all makes sense to me during the  meeting. I know exactly what I’m going to be doing. As I think about the project in more detail, some aspects of the process seem truly terrifying.  During the couple of weeks that Rahamim’s tallit bag was in my apartment it seemed to get more papery. I was terrified that my plan of fusing the useable parts to interfacing would be a disaster. I was afraid that the useable bits of tallit bag might really be too old and shredded to use. Today I carefully cut out the largest useable part of the tallit bag and fused it to the  tricot interfacing.  The worn spot in the middle was where Rahamim’s mother sewed on the snap. This is what the back of the bag looked like. I guess this photo helps you to understand my fears about working with this fabric.   I also salvaged two more bits of useable fabric from the under-flap. Here are...

Please forgive the relative silence.  Amazon.com Widgets For the past couple of days I have been involved a a complicated back and forth discussion with Michael Broyde  about this posting . Read through the comments. You will see some of my public replies. Rabbi Broyde and I have also been involved with an extensive and difficult email conversation. This has been exhausting. It makes me sad that some people are intent on re-writing history. It makes me sad that some people read Jewish law in a narrow limited  and limiting way.   One of the great things I learned studying Talmud at Maimonides School is what a dynamic flexible and thoughtful thing halacha/Jewish law is. How it is the easy way out to just say no to innovation,  and how the truly great Talmudic minds were committed to answering the hard questions in creative ways that were true to the Talmudic method.  Another fabulous thing about halacha is...

One of the real benefits of having this blog is that it sometimes brings me just the right clients.   A few weeks ago I got an email from a woman in Florida who had seen some examples of my work via Google. She said that her husband, Rahamim had a tallit bag that his mother had made him for his bar-mitzvah.  Rahamim was given his grandfather’s tallit to use at his bar-mitzvah. ( in the Sephardic tradition Grandpa was also named Rahamin. So as you read, realize that we will be talking about  three men named Rahamin over five generations)   Rahamim’s grandson ( also named Rahamim) is having his bar-mitzvah this spring. Rahhamim and his wife planned to give Rahamim the bar-mitzvah boy the tallit as a gift. They wanted me to make a tallit bag for the bar- mitzvah boy that incorporated the old tallit bag.  Rahmim’s mother made the tallit bag out of her old living room curtains. Rahamim’s older brother  got a store bought bag.  Rahmim felt he had g...

I made this dress yesterday. It has a  twisted cowl neck  and nifty extended sides.   I have been seeing lots of garments on the street where the hem is extended to the full  selvedge to selvedge width of the fabric. You get a top or a skirt that looks really complicated but is in fact quite simple to  both draft and construct. You can see direction for  a skirt made with this principle here table cloth skirt . Here is an earlier example of using the same concept . The skirt is cut wide at the hips and creates a lovely vertical cascade.   I was also poking through a Japanese sewing magazine ( a constant source of good ideas) and found this. I realized, perhaps influenced by the very graphic Japanese sewing magazine, that I could more easily explain the process with pictures than with a whole lot of words.   I cut the dress as usual from shoulder through high hip. Then I cut straight out to the selvedges.   Here ...

A few months back a friend admired a shrug I was wearing to synagogue over a sleeveless tank dress.  My friend’s daughter was getting married and they were trying to figure out a shawl for the  bride’s attendants to wear. They had been looking for something appropriate but hadn’t had any luck.   Several weeks later we met to figure out what was needed for the wedding. The bride asked all of the bridesmaids to wear black dresses of their own choosing. I was really impressed by that choice. It means that this is a dress that either the bridesmaid actually already owns or one that she will actually wear in the future. As anyone who has ever been a bridesmaid knows, most of those bridesmaids dresses are not at all wearable after the initial wedding.   I showed the bride and her mother a few shrugs and also some infinity scarves that I have made. They loved the versatility of the infinity scarf. For those of you not hooked into the term infinity scarf . basicall...

B’s son’s bar-mitzvah is on the 27th. I had agreed to complete the atara in time to mail her the atara in time for her to wear it at that great event. I backed the arara with white silk, which will never be seen, and topstitched in gold. I then sewed it onto the tallit. I used a lavender rayon thread because it worked with both the orangey/pink sky colors and the blue of the ocean. One thing that irritated me about the atara that came with the tallit is that the same color thread was used in both the bobbin and the needle. The white thread was jarring and a bit cheap looking on the blue. I hope that B is happy with the result. I certainly am.

I did work today.  I will have to show the photos tomorrow, but I also made dinner. I guess if you scroll up and down really fast  it can look a little like a bagel making  movie. But you can’t just eat bagels. So I also made whiting and pickled vegetables.

I made this challah cover a few years ago.  The text is an intentional prayer that some people recite before kiddush. I did the calligraphy on a beautiful light weight wool. The border is an upholstery fabric.   Most of the other challah covers that were made during the time period I made this challah covers have all sold. This one has languished in my completed objects suitcase. There is nothing wrong with it. It just wasn’t great. Yesterday, I decided to revisit it.  In the heyday of Yiddish theater Shakespeare's plays  were advertised as being  farteicht und farbessered   “translated and improved’ . That expression is often used  to described the process of fiddling and improving  of anything. So in short, I  farteicht und farbessered the challah cover. I added leaves to the  half hearted trellis-like designs on the sides of the text. I also added  scrollwork that was farbessered   with a bit of glitter in t...

I had made this atara/tallit neckband several years ago for the father of a client. My client's father was a Cohen .  I chose a text from the blessings we recite before the recitation of the Priestly blessing in synagogue.   for You alone we worship in awe In the center of the atara I created a stylized priestly breastplate. We don’t really know the stones used in the breastplate (despite  the certainty of fundamentalists).  I chose to represent the stones with twelve mirrors. Each mirror was embroidered using a different stitch pattern. The person sitting behind the wearer of the tallit sees their own face in the atara.  You can create your own bit of exegesis here.  I like how this piece involves both the wearer and his fellow worshipers.   In the next couple of days I will find out if I am to make  another of these atarot. I hope I do.

Sometimes as I write these posts I think about how often I cook variations on the same theme. I wonder if it’s boring for you to see yet another photo of challah  or of chicken  or meat balls cooked dead.   This week, I made something new, at least new for me. I figure that you are smart enough to figure out which vegetables are in the bowl. I didn’t cook the cauliflower though, I made an old fashioned marinade and poured it over. When I pass the bowl I stir the bottom vegetables to the top. I didn’t follow a recipe but this is inspired in equal parts from my older Jewish cookbooks from the 1930’s and 40’s and from Claudia Roden’s excellent chapter on Sephardi vegetable cooking in her terrific book “Jewish Cooking'”.   I love that these vegetables are both Eastern European and Middle Eastern.   This is a really old fashioned way to prepare vegetables.  You can use essentially the same marinade to pickle fish. Clearly you can change the spice...