Roses are wood, Violets are...
I always found it a bit funny that someone would go somewhere or do something they normally did on a yearly basis, and immediately the day after start thinking about the next year and how to do it bigger and better. I was never one to do that, until last week.
Three of my coworkers and I formed a group and entered a charity competition/event put on by our local IIDA (International Interior Design Association) chapter, called Fashion Remix. Each team was randomly paired up with a vendor (or manufacturer's rep) and given the challenge to create an outfit out of that vendor's material. The vendors varied from carpet to wallcovering (including tile & stone, laminate, upholstery, furniture, and even resilient flooring). We were paired up with a custom furniture manufacturer-Coalesse. After brainstorming, we came up with a dress design and titled it "Coalesce in Bloom". We designed the dress to be made from wood veneers, reminiscent of Coalesse' custom furniture.
We started on the dress late spring/early summer, and worked on it, the hair accessories, and the jewelry (yes, even the jewelry was handmade from actual furniture hardware!) just about every lunch hour up until the day before the event. We soaked wood in water, cut, let dry, bias taped and sewed each petal on individually. After a few days we found a production line with each of us having a specific task worked best. The woods we used included ebony, zebra, walnut, and maple. The hardware were random pieces the manufacturer sent us-and we could not for the life of us name all the different pieces we were given. One thing's for sure though-they made beautiful jewelry and accessories!
One person from the team was to be the model; that lucky person was Andrae! It took A LOT of work, time, effort-and in Andrae's case-even some blood. After months of preparation, trial-and-error, fittings, and practice "runway walks" the evening of the event had arrived...
Loud music, crowds of people, bright colored lights, runway models, and LOTS of cheering and whistling made the night SO much fun. Not to mention a night out with my wife to an event neither one of us had ever been to or experienced before... Each model strutted her (or his) stuff and owned the runway! We clapped and enjoyed watching what other groups of designers created. Some were extremely creative, and in my opinion gave us some good competition. In the end though, we were and still are please to announce-our team won Best of Show! It was somewhat surreal, as we climbed onto the runway joining Andrae to take some pictures! Some of us asked each other "Did we really just win?" We were on cloud nine! You couldn't wipe the grin off our faces for days if you wanted to! All our efforts had completely paid off!
A few days after the event we went to lunch together, and among other things, started talking about next year's event and what we could possibly do with other materials. My wheels have been spinning and I am so very anxious to work with my group once again... on another winning outfit!
Me, Andrae, and Becky
One of the cool parts about the whole thing was seeing people after people come wanting to take pictures with Andrae. It was one of the best compliments we could've received. There was a professional photographer taking photos before, during and after the event. He posted his photos on his blog. Click here to see the evening's progression, from pre-event dressing room photos (nothing immodest) to group photos at the end of the evening. A couple other links were sent to us with more pictures from the evening; click here or here.
Becky and I before the show
The winning team... Gail, me, Andrae, Justin, and Marbe
Roses definitely were made of wood this year... next year? Who knows. All I know is I am anxious for next year's event, excited to see who we get paired up with and what product we'll have to work with!
