#textile as a medium

[swashbucklery]

I have been thinking about the costuming in Willow a lot, and yes this is for fanfiction reasons but it's also just for fun. As background, my non-fandom hobbies are mostly textile based: I sew garments and teach sewing classes, I'm an experienced knitter and handspinner and I've started to dabble in wool processing from fleece and four-shaft weaving.

So once I get into a Textile Puzzle Hole I can go pretty deep, and this is a fun and important part of understanding the worldbuilding for me.

Because they're doing a thing with Willow that - I actually really enjoy. It's not "classic fantasy" in the sense that it's not period-appropriate or of a specific era that we'd recognize. They're also clearly trying to call back to the 80s roots of the original film with some of the design choices; mostly the elements of armor and clothing that they're pulling from traditional martial arts clothing and the existence of Fun Fantasy Denim.

A lot of my thoughts aren't necessarily about critique, but more about trying to put together a cohesive rubric for myself as to what the costuming aesthetic is. Because it's not "anything goes," it's got a specific vibe and a clear voice and I want to "get it" more for my own writing and for my own understanding.

I think the two rules that I've drilled down so far are:

Textiles As Artisan Material (all-handmade, no fantasy spandex)

Function Over Form

1. Textiles As Artisan Material So to get into this a little, I want to get into the idea of how textiles are made because for me I'm In Deep and know a lot about the raw material to cloth to garment process but the average person does not. (I will say, I'm excepting the Cuirass from all of this - we know metatextually that it's a 3d printed stretch fabric bodysuit; it's also magic so it doesn't count.)

So, the average person is used to textile production that is predicated on post-industrial-revolution technology. Meaning:

power-driven machines for weaving and spinning

computer technology available in spinning and weaving machinery to allow for easy production of highly complex cloth structures and patterning

overabundance and artificially low costs of raw materials

When you are thinking of fabric (and I'd include cloth and leather here but not metal armor) as a skilled artisan material, understanding the reasoning for, for instance, Jade having one shirt for the entire series involves understanding what steps are involved. Then, we can understand how many human beings are involved in fabric and therefore garment production and also how many people need to get paid along the way. A piece of cloth entirely handmade for a garment would involve:

a producer to grow the textile fiber (cotton, flax, wool, hide for leather)

skilled artisans to process the fiber (washing, preparing for spinning which could include combing/carding wool, retting flax, etc, leather tanning)

skilled artisans to add dye. This can be done at the stage of prepared fiber, finished thread/yarn, or finished cloth. In a real-world/modern context, this would have significant impact on the cost of cloth. Certain colours (reds, purples) are much harder to dye true than others or require more expensive dyestuff.

skilled spinners to turn the fiber into fine threads for weaving - depending on the fineness needed for the specific weave of the cloth this could be weeks to months of work. Thinner threads will take more time but have more drape and be less stiff as a cloth, so you'd need thin threads for next-to-skin garments like undershirts, and for fine fabrics in things like dresses or fancy formalware

weavers to weave the threads into cloth. Again, the timing here would depend on the type of thread being used but it would also depend on whether or not there are any woven-in embellishments as components of the cloth. Basic cloth in plain weave would take time but not a lot of extra skill; twills or patterning require more time and weaving skill.

embroiderers to add any embellishments either to the base cloth or to the finished garment

tailors and seamstresses to make garments to measure, which would involve cutting any pieces out of the finished cloth and turning it into a garment the correct size for the wearer. If we are assuming that the mechanical sewing machine has not been invented, then garments would be sewn by hand.

handsewing a correctly finished garment involves more than just tacking the pieces together; seam finishes so that the cloth doesn't unravel often require going over the same seam line one or more times. The labour hours in this step cannot be overstated.

metalworkers or other craftspeople to make fastenings and finishings: buttons, toggles, grommets on lacing that weren't handsewn, etc.

leather garments would be made by a separate type of textile worker, since leatherwork requires different tools and a different skillset to successfully construct garments.

So for a basic garment we're looking at needing to pay six separate types of skilled artisans for their work, up to six or seven if it's a garment with elaborate fittings and/or finishing such as buttons or metal fasteners.

The textile economy is relevant here because it is going to translate directly into style. Cutting fabric into patterned shapes leaves waste; this is fine if you're using mass-produced fabric that you can easily afford to replace but if cloth is the 10/10 most precious thing in your garment, you're going to try to cut it into as low-waste a design as possible. It might also lead to less fussy fitting, so that garments are adjustable and can be used by a person for much longer.

It also translates into textile types. Prior to the advent of mechanical knitting machines, any knit (stretch) fabrics would be hand knit. If you have ever tried knitting yourself, you understand that knitting with thin thread takes more time, and therefore more labour hours.

What this means for clothing in-universe on Willow is:

almost entirely woven fabrics, with the exception of handknitting (see: Elora’s scarf-shawl)

this likely does translate into undergarments; I've been looking at regency and late-Victorian era examples to get my head around. The modern bra and panty set is heavily heavily dependent on not just machine knit fabric but also a TON of petroleum-based synthetic textiles that cannot be produced without modern post-industrial means.

fastened using items that can be handmade! Buttons, toggles, clasps, ties or belts for the most part, with the occasional Fantasy Rivet or Fantasy Grommet.

precious! so precious! Expensive to produce and also worth caring for; we see some examples of visible mending in-show and that would have been the standard for everyone with the exception of Kit and Airk.

2. Function Over Form So this is maybe something that I only think about because I sew, but the modern eye is really used to equating and understanding "woven" fabrics and "stretch woven" fabrics as equivalent. Jeans are the easiest example to think about: they're made with denim, but in things like skinny jeans that denim is usually blended with some kind of spandex. Typical woven fabric doesn't stretch in either direction in a meaningful way; stretch-woven fabrics do so because of the synthetic textile content.

So a lot of the design choices that we see in the show really have to take into account that those textiles won't stretch with movement, and that the wearers need to be able to swordfight:

larger, baggier shirts with cuffs or vests rather than more fitted shirts, to allow for full movement at the elbow and shoulder

trousers that have a bit of extra wearing ease at the hip and thigh, so that when the wearer sits or squats there is room for the change in their body shape with these positions

there are a couple of GREAT leather jackets (Kit's in the early season especially), but if you look closely there's actually a grommet-and-lacing system to attach the sleeve head to the body, so that the shoulder still moves. So clever!

Anyway I have been having a lot of fun thinking about this and deconstructing the garments further. Thinking more about the costuming helps me find the worldbuilding details that make it easy for me to write, and I’d love to chat about this lots and lots! I do have some screenshot receipts for this; I didn’t include them because I mostly just wanted to write and not do ~graphic design today.

[shutterfox5555]

Bronica ETRS with Zenzanon 50mm f2.8 lens, shot on Kentmere 100 and developed with Ilford Ilfosol 3

[faededaway]

Crocheting, knitting, textile art is so time consuming. But!!! BUT!!! It tells me that things I care about will take time and effort. Things I want, things I love, need dedicated. They need me to care enough about them to set aside some time for them.

I cannot want them to become faster. I am not losing time. Yes the bag I crocheted took a week but it is beautiful and it is well made. I can put things in it. It is sturdy and I made it. I even used two colors AND made it slightly fancy by adding two granny squares in it for pattern.

I had to figure out a lot of stuff on my own!! I had to frog a bunch of it too!!

But!!! I made it.

ALSO I'M SUPER ELATED WILL HOW IT TURNED OUT AND I FEEL LIKE I LEVELED UP IN MY CRAFT

So yeah

[viviennehollisart]

"These flowers smell so good! It must be the pretty raindrops Feeding them magick and wonder. I want to stay in this place For a very long time."

~ Says Bonnie, the pink flower bug.

[musical-chick-13]

The thing is, we need to be aware of the intended function of things, re: art. Some genre conventions exist solely to express or exaggerate an idea or feeling. Some ways of writing or performing exist primarily for emotional catharsis. Dark or absurdist humor is a way to deal with serious topics without having to put yourself directly in the middle of them. The songs in musicals are meant to be a communication of ideas that are too complicated and emotionally intense to remain contained in spoken word. Things like twelve-tone music/experimental opera are meant to reconceptualize how we think about the structure of Classical music and the aesthetic things we've come to expect from it. Gritty or serious deconstructions are usually meant to make us re-examine literary conventions, either as a thought exercise or to make some sort of statement about the world. It's okay if something doesn't work for you, but JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, you all have got to stop acting like something not working for you makes it inherently meaningless or artistically bankrupt or "immature" or "stupid" or "needlessly edgy" or whatever the fuck else people keep trying to claim.

[jumpscaregoose]

I finished my yuri skirt

it is of course my Girls. made it out of an old skirt I've had since actual middle school and never wore because it was a midi skirt and I don't wear midi skirts. she was just going to be cabbage but I randomly got inspired at like 10:30pm last night and now we have this

this is how much I severed that's going back in the cabbage drawer

[lambify]

@byanyan requested a starter:

" i think this box has the best colours. " he pushes the box of oil pastilles towards byan , a make shift peace offering despite the two having never interacted before. its full of pinks, purples and the odd blue - worlds away from the stack of broken neutral sticks in boxes around the table where byan seems to be sat alone. he chooses to ignore the name that byan had made for themselves, a troublemaker, amongst other names uttered by students; " if you want it? they fit your vibe. "

[regallibellbright]

This may officially be the most self-indulgent fic I’ve written in... *checks notes* a while, by virtue of containing both shameless hypermobility projection and Knitting Versus Crochet Discussions.

(Though I’m writing it from the perspective of a knitter intimidated by crochet when I learned the other way around.)

[nishadesigns]

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[swashbucklery]

i'm rewatching Willow and i still can't comprehend what exactly Elora's weird wrap shawl thing with a hood is. or why it is. why is she wearing THE most impractical garment i've ever laid eyes upon. as the resident Willow textiles expert, what are your thoughts?

Oh I actually fully know the answer to this question!

One: if you would like to better understand the garment construction, there's a detailed knitting pattern with a schematic here. The in-show garment is definitely knitted, but if you're a crocheter this person's got you. What you need to understand is that if there is a thing that has a fandom, and in that thing there is a handknitted garment, viewers who knit have started mentally deconstructing it immediately.

BASICALLY both of these garments are a very long scarf, and then you make a big keyhole, and then more scarf, a second keyhole, then even more scarf. After you have the world's most giant scarf, you add a hood in between the keyholes. The way it's actually worn is with each hole as a sleeve; the trailing ends are then crossed in front of the body and tucked through the sleeves to secure them, which creates the crossed-bodice covering effect.

Two, in terms of practicality, I endured two years of The Improbably Clean White Mother Confesssor Traveling Dress so I know the real answer is that trailing ground-level things look really cool and High Fantasy Femme Heroine on-camera.

However, one of my favourite things to do with this show is take costume elements and read them in-character, because I think it adds another little layer of worldbuilding flavour that really pleases me. So in my heart of hearts:

Elora knit that scarf herself. Or maybe she had help with it, maybe she started knitting it and got frustrated and lost track of rows and couldn't bring herself to rip back, and someone else finished it for her. Either way that scarf was made by hand and it took a long time and so much care. I like to think about Elora packing for a long and dangerous journey and bringing something that makes her feel a little extra loved.

Assuming that scarf is made of wool (which again: idk what it's made of for costuming-sake but in-universe it would be) it is going to be warm as shit. A lovely, densely-knitted wool cape and hood, with the construction designed to allow it to wrap around the whole upper body, would actually be extremely practical for cold, damp nights and staying warm while keeping her arms free to ride or cook. The longer tails you could argue might be practical for wrapping more of the torso or using as a pillow on long nights.

You could also make the case that, while the other members of the party are outfitted with capes and other warm garments, Elora as a kitchen maid might not have had access to something like that. I've talked about this more in my fantasy textile post but basically: woven wool textiles are expensive. Something like that scarf could well be the warmest thing Elora owned, and might have been practical to bring from that perspective as well.

Anyway I love that scarf to bits, it is not something I'll ever make myself but I think it's gorgeous and incredibly distinctive, and the odd construction adds a great bit of Fantasy Je Ne Sais Quoi that is really great.

[shutterfox5555]

Bronica ETRS with Zenzanon 50mm f2.8 lens, shot on Kodak Portra 400

[k00299471]

Recently at a visit at the Barbican art gallery in London. ‘Unravel’ The Power and Politics of Textiles in Art.

I came across an artist Ghada Amer. I liked the use of thread she use as a medium to paint. I have explored painting with threads in my concept of movement and it was exciting to see an artist use it in a similar way.

Painting with pink threads and latex as a medium. I feel the liquid of the latex gives a feeling of movement , although it is dry it looks wet with bubbles in it. The movement of the threads although are static I feel they are almost moving around the latex.

[deepseacityunderground]

ive said this before but so much of what Retvrn Freaks glorify in early modern european art are just components inherent to the mediums being used at the time as opposed to like. an example of heightened skill that has been supposedly Lost in these degenerate times.... oil paint just looks like that. its very tonal and rich and even an artist with mediocre rendering skills will have their rendering skills improved by painting in oil. old oil paintings took years to complete not because the artists doing them were very skilled but because oil takes months to dry and they built up subtle washes over dried paint. tracing was also commonly utilized during that time period, and artists also often had small armies of apprentices who would do the hard work for them with no credit. these huge highly tonal oil paintings become significantly less impressive when you actually learn about their context.

[h0neyfreak]

…

[vigilantedelmaule]

Transitional Family Room - Family Room Inspiration for a mid-sized transitional loft-style medium tone wood floor family room remodel with blue walls, a standard fireplace, a concrete fireplace and a wall-mounted tv