Paper Stories

Hopefully everyone was able to make it out to the Depart-ment show this weekend!  I definitely could have spent all of my money there on items for me, but I forced myself to think of other people.  There were tons of great items produced by hand by local artists- one of my favorites was Paper Stories. The four crew design team makes cards, invites, journals and also does custom projects mostly on a vintage printing press.  My personal favorites include the “Bittersweet Collection.”

So spruce up your holiday card selection at their etsy shop and the recipients of your cards will be grateful!

 

Bridesmaid’s Dresses!

Finally, the big day has come and passed, but I have to say that I had the hottest bridesmaids ever.  And I’m not just saying that because I made their dresses.  It’s just too bad the aisle wasn’t really a runway and then the wedding could have been multi-purposed.

I wanted to photoshop out me in this picture, but so far it’s the only one I have of all us together (thanks Aunt Anita & Uncle Sam!), so just pretend I’m not there and focus on my super hot models, ur, I mean bridesmaids:

Me & the Girls

So, Haley, standing next to me is wearing a V-neck in both front and back with a gathered 3/4 circle skirt, her sister, Maddie is wearing a scoop neck in both front and back and wearing a double box pleated 3/4 circle skirt, Andrea, the maid of honor, is wearing a straight/square neckline with a deep back scoop and a double inverted box pleat 3/4 circle skirt. The dresses were made out of a rich, sapphire faille and each girl wore a petticoat in berry.  I didn’t make the petticoats- they came from a square dancing company in Texas.  They were very comfortable, so if you want to trade in your scratchy crinoline I would highly suggest ordering a Sam’s Petticoat. More detailed pictures of each to come soon!

One last thing- why I am still the shortest person there? I was wearing 3 inch heels! Oh man…

 

pretty pretty paper

So now it’s exactly one week away from my wedding and really, the only thing I hear from people is how awesome my invitations were.  They didn’t want to send in the RSVPs because they were so pretty.  I think they are so excited about the prettiness of the invitations that they’ll be disappointed by the actual wedding.

A former co-worker of mine, Christine van Duyn,  has sadly left the Chicago area and has headed out to California to start her own custom invite studio. No worries about the distance- she’ll ship everything to you in a really cute box that you won’t throw out and use it to store anything you can think of and more.

Here’s what she did for my save the dates- I’ve been really bad and haven’t sent her a picture of the invites yet, but it’s on my list:

Check out her collections:

 

Farylrobin

Over the weekend I got to meet Faryl of Farylrobin and it was probably the greatest day of my life!  I am OBSESSED with her shoes and not only are they awesome, but they are comfortable too! My bridesmaids and I are all wearing Farylrobin shoes at my wedding in less than two weeks now…

Here are our shoes: I’m wearing the plum ones and the bridesmaid’s are wearing the pearl ones:

And just wait til her spring line hits the stores in February!

 

Plush Offerings

Also at Depart-ment is Pterodactyl Pants– designed by my friend, Jessie Mansbacher.  Be sure to fill your holiday with orna-monsters like this one:

 

Depart-ment Holiday Show

Depart-ment’s Holiday show is almost two weeks away!  Stop by to pick up local, handmade gifts, or to pick up an awesome, handmade Audacity skirt or dress for you holiday party!

 

Custom Fabrics!

A friend emailed me today with news of a custom fabrics company out of North Carolina!  Oh, all the possibilities…

The company is called Spoonflower

Here are some fabrics people have designed:

This one was created by Rachel Galloway

And this one by Shannon Benavidez

Check it out and order some custom fabric!

 

Name Change

Unfortunately, the name Audacity is already being used for women’s clothing lines, so I am forced to change my name. I wanted to see if anyone had any suggestions.  My first inclination is just to use my last name, Audey, but I’m open to anything else. Please feel free to comment and let me know your thoughts.

Thanks!

Jess

 

Polyvore

First off- my apologies for not posting anything sooner- I guess this whole wedding planning thing is taking up a lot more time than I had thought, but I’m almost done with the bridemaid’s dresses and I’ll be posting those soon!

I was recently introduced to this site called polyvore and I have to say that it has consumed much of my time.  The site lets you browse through tons of products in various colors and you can even add your own images.  Needless to say, I think this feeds the shopping addiction by introducing me to new sites that sell items that I want and can ship them directly to me.

Jewel Tone Set by jaudey

 

Audacity Dresses

Hi!

I want to officially introduce myself now that I am finally putting my fashion degree to use and starting a clothing line!

First off, I’m really excited that anyone is reading this, if anyone is.  Please email me any feedback you have on my dresses or site to jess@audacitydresses.com and be sure to check back often for new additions!

My full name is Jessica Susan Audey and I was born on September 23rd, 1983 in Cleveland, OH.  I knew I was destined for fashion at a young age when my Uncle dressed me up as a gypsy for Halloween and I wouldn’t stop wearing costumes since.

Me and my dad Halloween 1986

And, it didn’t stop there.  My mom’s prom dress from 1975? Found it and destroyed it I used it so much. My Grandma’s wedding dress?  In pieces.  I was pretty much in costume everyday.

As you can see from this gem, I did not shy away from current trends. If neon was hot, I’d be wearing it. To top it off, neon was hot when perms were hot, so being the trendsetter I am, I got them both at the same time.

My brother and I loving the neon

Moving on to high school, I took things up a notch and started embroidering my uniform skirt much to the dismay of both my teachers, who kept giving me demerits for uniform violations, and also to my mother, who had to pick me up late from school after I worked off my demerits.

While rummaging through the linen closet I found the key to my future: placemats from the 70s in matching patterns.  I quickly cut up squares and, with the help and learning expertise of my grandma, made probably the ugliest bag known to mankind. But kindly enough, no one said that to me.  So I just kept sewing things and they got uglier and uglier.  I started making five panel skirts and using a different fabric for each panel.  I should have caught on earlier that my mom didn’t appreciate my keen eye for fashion when she kept “accidentally” getting bleach spots on my garments therefore rendering them useless.

Finally, I refocused my efforts and for my senior project in high school I made my prom dress under the excellent training of Barbara Seidel in Cleveland Heights.

Prom 2001 - still dating the same guy

That gets me up to when I came to Chicago for college. I was originally a business major at DePaul, but quickly switched after I started working at a custom handbag shop in Chicago.  At 1154 Lill Studio I met Jamie Hayes who started working at 1154 Lill at same time as myself and was finishing up her second degree at Columbia College Chicago in Fashion Design.  Seeing that it was possible to make beautiful garments and have a job in the industry, I decided to transfer to Columbia to start four years of fashion training.

After cutting fabrics at work all day, and then sewing all night for school, I got pretty burnt out and stopped sewing for about a year.  I made quick dresses out of work fabrics for work parties.  I set them up in Lill’s store on Armitage and was amazed when people commented that they actually liked them!  I really didn’t start taking any of the comments seriously until one customer, Jackie, called and wanted me to make her wedding dress.  After some initial hesitation (I tried sending her to the place that is custom making my wedding dress!) I agreed to make the dress for her.  Jackie lives here in Chicago, but coincidentally grew up in the Cleveland area as well! Here’s her awesome dress on her wedding day (and I copied off of her and got the same farylrobin shoes in every color they had available).

Jackie's Wedding May 2008

Making Jackie’s wedding dress really inspired me to start sewing again. Thanks, Jackie, for being my first customer!  After her wedding dress I made some skirts for the Depart+ment Festival at Pitchfork this past July.  I actually sold some and that finally launched me into starting a site.

So that brings us to today!

Don’t forget about Fashion Focus Chicago! Starts October 1st through October 8th. My friend, Horacio Nieto is debuting his line at Macy’s on October 2nd as part of Fashion Focus!  Check out his amazing new collection!

Thanks! Til next time…