Color of the Day - Alexandra blue

Alexandra – Born at Copenhagen, Dec. 1, 1844. Daughter of Christian IX. of Denmark and wife of Edward VII., king of England, whom she married March 10, 1863.
Century Cyclopedia of Names, 1904

Alexandra blue, 1863 – The beautiful colour which has received the name of Alexandra blue,
What-Not, April 1863

Alexandra blue, 1872 – It is worth noting that ultramarine, in a very deep shade (when it borrows the name “Alexandra,” “royal,” &c., according to the period), is one of the most unbecoming colors that can be placed near the face in masses. Its brilliancy lends a yellow hue to the skin, while its deepness withholds the gray shadows cast by pale blues, which are so valuable to delicate complexions: it should be shunned alike by the florid and the fair.
Every Saturday, November 16, 1872

excerpt from: Elephant's Breath & London Smoke
A Dictionary of Color in History
edited by Deb Salisbury
Available at http://www.mantua-maker.com/

Book Giveaway

Happy Halloween, everyone!

My publisher, Lorina of Five Rivers Chapmanry, is giving away four copies of Elephant's Breath & London Smoke at Goodreads!

The contest ends on 11/30/09.

Join in the fun! Just click on the Enter to Win button.

Best of luck to you!

Introducing - Yipe!: the Costume Fanzine of Record

I just received an email from the magnificent costumer Kevin Roche:

Yesterday my friend Jason Shachat and I released the first issue of our new online 'zine, YIPE!, dedicated to the art and craft of costume. Our goal was to produce the look and feel of a glossy pictorial magazine in every way but the "printed on paper" part.

You can download the inaugural isue as an Acrobat (PDF) file at http://www.yipezine.com .

Hope you enjoy it; this is definitely a labor of love.
Kevin

P.S. If you have the bandwidth and storage, I recommend you opt for the high-resolution (25M) version. It's really spectacular.

P.P.S. If you are interested in contributing to future issues of YIPE!, contact us at editors@yipezine.com

I just finished reading it, and I'm very impressed. I highly recommend it!

The Mantua-Maker in Creative Machine Embroidery

Creative Machine Embroidery magazine was kind enough to put a photo of one of my patterns in the November/December 2009 issue!

1500 - 1630 Spanish Loose Gown is on page 72, on the Fashion Forecast page. I'm part of the latest trends!

This issue also has Last Minute Gift Ideas, Stabilizing Secrets, and ways to Wake Up Your Winter Wardrobe.

Blog posts for writers

On my other blog, I've been posting links to help writers with the business of publishing.

Deb Salisbury, Magic Seeker: Blog posts for writers - Oct 8

Here I am testing to see how Create a Link works. Does anyone know how to create links to multiple posts in the Create a Link section?

I'm confused!

Etsy Corsetry Guild

Electra Designs has announced the creation of an Etsy Corsetry Guild.

"The Etsy Corsetry Guild is made up of a group of very talented corset makers who sell hand made corsets on Etsy.com.

"Our philosophy is non-competition between corset makers. Instead of competing against one another, we will all work to promote the work of other corset makers on etsy.

"The Etsy Corsetry Guild will also collaborate to produce educational information to help consumers make informed decisions about their corset purchases and to help them to distinguish between high quality, hand made corsets and inferior, sweat shop "corset" lingerie.

"If you or someone you know is a talented corset maker on Etsy, please invite them to apply for membership to the Etsy Corsetry Guild."

Please click on the link above for more information.

More on spider-silk cloth

Thank you to Robin Netherton for this link with a much better photo and more details.

1 Million Spiders Make Golden Silk for Rare Cloth from Wired.com / Wired Science

This fabric is far more beautiful than I had guessed!