{Locavore}

Earlier this year, I was asked to collaborate with a non-fashion artist to create a garment Locavore, an event hosted by the Kirkland Arts Center. I was teamed with an artist named Deborah Scott, who creates contemporary interpretations of classical paintings, in the figurative narrative tradition. Our challenge was to take a painter’s dropcloth and turn it into a garment. We needed to feature the dropcloth heavily in the final piece, but we also needed to incorporate both our design aesthetics. I was inspired by an Emilio Pucci Pre-Fall 2012 piece I had in my inspiration folder and so we began!

This instructable outlines the steps necessary to create this dress, but more specifically, is a guide to how to create the cutout/reverse appliqué technique that is featured in this shift dress!

*note that the painting on the under layer of this dress is copyright Deborah Scott, but she has given me permission to compete in the fashion contest this June 2012 with her collaborative work. Instructables staff: let me know if you need the written permission she gave me sent to anyone on your side!

Image on the page courtesy of Rachel Sumner

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Step 1: Sketch

While you are welcome to free-hand your design on the garment, I found it very useful to plan the cutwork ahead of time. I started with a sketch in my notebook, but chose to create a graphic in photoshop to really get everything planned out and then I could see how it worked with different colors and patterns for the background image!