Eva's journal

The lack of updates is mainly because I spent Wednesday to Sunday last week in London, going ot a conference and hanging out with the wonderful clothsprogs (Teddy) and his husband Tom, as well as a drunken Satuday night with my friends Billy and Turk.


And, much to my surprise I also got to meet sarahbellem for the first time in 12 years, since she, and trystan and Kendra surpisingly (to me at least) showed up at the Association of Dress Historians' conference. The surprising part being that they had travelled all the way to Englnad, not that they were at a dress conference of course. I was standing there after gettign soem tea in the first break and thinking: "That looks a lot like Sarah", and then she came up to me and it was Sarah! You can imagine the enthusiasm.
Unfortunately she and Kendra both got sick, so I didn't get to chat with them much, I did get to hang a bit more with Trystan though.

There usually isn't much overlap in the attendants between British conferences and other international conferences on dress unfortunately, so I didn't meet that many old friends, but I got to meet Jola Pellumbi, one of the organizers of the "Dressing the Early Modern" network, a few Swedish PhD students that I don't meet often, and Lena, another Swede, who I do meet frequently, and who is great fun to be with. And a lot of other people of course. The Art Worker's Guild where the conference is held is a very handsome house, and it's nice to be there.

The conference was Friday and Saturday, but I arrived already on Wednesday to get some extra time in London. At the airport I met fellow historian Henric Bagerius, who had come on the same plane. We has scheduled a meeting on Thursday to film a discussion about late 19th and early 20th century fashion for his blog about the reform dress movement in Sweden, but it was nice to meet already on Wednesday, and have some company on the tube from Heathrow.

I got off at Hammersmith and took the tube to Goldhawk road for some fabric shopping at, and around Shepherds Bush market.

I got these, both for regency outfits, from Classic Textiles, £3/metre for the white, which there unfortunately was only 2 metres left of, and £2 for the green fabric, which has a narrow silver thread in it too. I got 8 metres of that and gave half of it to my friend Alfhild as a present.







The weather was really nice, especially compared to Sweden, so I spent quite a lot of time lying in the grass on Shepherds Bush green, reading the abstracts for the conference. This time I had been smart enough to wear a jacket slightly too cold for Sweden, so that I wouldn't over heat. Though on Wednesday it was really shirt weather.






I also bought trim for £ 1/metre, and a nightie, since I love traditional nighties and those are very hard to find in Sweden.






The last photo is taken at Teddy's and Tom's place in Wimbledon, where I went later in the afternoon. I got to sit in their sofa, watch telly, drink tea, play with dolls, pet the cats and do some knitting and embroidery; it was wonderful.

Here's Malfie, one of the cats:




Thursday I got up early-ish and met up with Henric for our filming. There were some trouble shooting at the V&A, despite his having been told it would be possible, so we ended up filming at his hotel. or, as it were: not filming, since his phone for no apparent reasons turned off after half the interview. We will have to re-do it back here in Gothenburg.


Wimbledon in the morning:


After that I went back to the V&A and looked at historical clothing for a couple of hours, before heading to one of the circles of hell: Primark on Oxford street.

The secret to survival is to go into a state of meditation: not think about how long the queues are, or how much people there is there, just accept it, and let it pass. I got some wardrobe staples, such as basic cotton/elasthane tops in a variety of colours, knickers, leggings for working out in, and mittens. I also got a Hufflepuff sweatshirt for Maja, and what I thought was a Ravenclaw sweatshirt for me. Unfortunately somebody had hung a Mickey mouse sweatshirts in the middle of the Ravenclaw sweatshirts, which I didn't notice until I got home to Teddys' place. This meant going back to Primark on Friday evening, after the conference and try to exchange it. The actual exchange process was no trouble, but when I got there, there were no Ravenclaw sweatshirt to be found, they were all sold out. After desperately looking one final time I found one, in a kids' size, but luckily big enough for the new me (though I would have preferred one size larger).

I've been wearing it to work this week.


Saturday meant more conference, and I had my presentation, which went really well, and so did Lovisa's on cross dressing in 18th century Sweden and Anna's on Norwich wool fabrics in 18th century Sweden. There were lots of interesting presentations, but I was rather tired by the end of the day, so when we had finished I was happy to get to Russell square and get on the (really full) tube to King's Cross to change for the blissfully less full Circle Line to Ladbroke Grove to meet Billy and Turk, since I was spending my last evening with them, at Billy's place.


Lots of beer was drunk, and good music listened to, and everything from music to politics, to the Arthurian legends were discussed.




Sunday I was slightly hung over, so we just took a stroll down Portobello market, read some, and then I got on the tube to Heathrow and home again.
I was of course very happy to meet my family again, Rickard and I did some rather enthusiastic kissing at the bus stop where he met me, but I really want to be back in London again.


Since then I've been busy with work and visits to the hospital, for scheduled tests, and accompanying one of my daughers when she got an IUD.


Today I have to work on turning my presentation from the conference into an article for the Journal of Dress History, since the deadline is on Sunday.

So. Friday 13.15 I landed at Heathrow. After collecting my, then much lighter, suitcase I took the tube to Hammersmith and soon found my way to armillary (Björn) and Sarah's place. Sarah had a cold and was home from work, which meant that I could get rid of my suitcase before heading out for shopping. We had tea and Sarah accompanied me by foot to Goldhawk Road and Shepherd's Bush market. I bought this printed cotton, pattern designed by William Morris and a shot cotton/viscose blend (I think) in strong turquoise. 

Then I left Sarah and took the tube to Oxford Circus and then went down to Margaret street (off Regent street, on the same side as the Topshop flag store) and Bravissimo, where I got this and this; both in black. By then I had realized that a) Ieft my A-Z at Björn's place and b)really wasn't sure about the exact location of Carnaby street; since I hadn't been there since the 80s, when it was one of the places you could find shiny leggings in leopard print. With the help of the map at the tube station I was, however soon there and promptly went to Irregular Choice and bought these:

After that I went back to Hammersmith and went to the local Primark and bought knickers, panties, whatever you like to call them adn to the pub next to where Björn and Sarah lives for a quick pint of bitter. I met some really nice blokes there too, wargamers.

Then I had dinner with Björn and Sarah, really good food made by Sarah and we talked and they sewed and we had some Canadian Icewine and then some of my home made apple wine that I had given to Björn years ago before I went to bed.

Next morning I was awake at seven and up at half past seven since I was going to the new research day organized by the Association of Dress historians. Everybody was really, really nice and I got to meet such celebrities as Jenny Tiramani, author of  "Seventeenth-Century Women's Dress Patterns", who seems very nice. The presentations were all very good and interesting and I look forward to having more contact with these lovely ladies (well, there were a few men too). My presentation also went well and I didn't stumble much on the long English words such as "Hierarchy" and "Aristotelian".

Still, a conference from 10-17.30 is rather taxing so when I got to billyoblivionx place it was with great pleasure I received a beer as soon as I entered and then had a bath and home cooked curry and even more beer. Quite a lot of that actually, so I spent most of the Sunday being rather hung over. Though we also took a walk and listened to music.

I was home again at half past ten in the evening and it seems almost unreal that I've been to London an back just over the weekend.

This is the conference I'm going to in London on the 5th of November. I'll probably stay witharmillary and S on Friday and then the conference on Saturday followed by beer with billyoblivionx. I hope I can stay at his place then, since the drinking may take a while. And then home on Sunday.

This means that I won't be able to go see clothsprogs and T this time, but I hope to rectify that on my way home from Brighton (for this conference) in December.

Friday we went to Camden for the market. Yes, it is a tourist trap, but no only and it's for tourists like me and Valeria, unlike Oxford Street where you can find things you like, but really isn't for old punks and hippies like myself. Valeria adores Camden and finds it very strange that none of here friends, who go to london more frequently than we do, has hird of it.
A sign that Valeria is getting older is that we didn't buy any pretty Gothic Lolita dresses that she doesn't wear outside the house, but instead clothing that she actually uses. In this case a checked shirt/tunic in two tones of grey, a pretty wool mix dress in grey with black dots and a pair of blue, high heeled Oxfords. I don't think that I bought anything, except a hoodie for Vendela and a wallet with flowers on. And food of course, this year we had chinese: vegetarian chow mein for me and giant dumplings for Valeria.
Since we had walked along the canal last time we were there we decided to do something else in the afternoon and got on a bus to Russell Square, intending to go to the British Museum. When we got there, however, Valeria was tired and didn't feel like it so we had tea and muffins (or at least she had muffin) at Starbucks and just sat down, talked and relaxed. I don't think that the British Museum is going anywhere.
My real reason for going there was besides to go to Atlantis bookstore on Museum Street, which we did and had a nice chat with the owner and i bought a book by Ronald Hutton, namely: Witches, Druids and King Arthur.
The last thing we did in town was to return to Forbidden Planet on Valeria's request, so that she could buy even more Manga.

So, one week after I had returned from Ireland I went to London with my daughter Valeria. The reason that we had to go in June was that her internet friend Mila was going to be in London the whole of June, but then it turned out that her record company made her go back to Thailand on the 20th, so we missed her. Luckily Valeria wasn't devastated by this and seemed to have a grand time in London anyway.
We arrived at clothsprogs' and Tom's place around eight in the evening and were instantly made to feel welcome by Teddy, Tom and the new cat Edward, who liked smelling our feet. We heated our dinner that we had picked up at Tesco's and had much needed and appreciated tea and chatted past Teddy's bedtime. The greatest surprise was that Teddy showed us that he was making Maja one of his very special rag dolls!! Since I had considered ordering one, but put it off since they are rather expensive (very reasonably so, considering the work put into them, but it's still about the same price as my ticket to London and back) I was astonished and very, very happy. Maja was also very very happy and wanted to sleep with her when she got her yesterday night.

Thursday was spent shopping. Well, actually all days except Sunday when we stayed at T&T's place until we left for the airport were spent shopping. But this was the day when we braved the tourist-y Oxford Street (by Valeria's request). But first we went to Forbidden Planet of course. And left it with manga, more manga and a Doctor Who tea cup and poster for Valeria and two volumes of old Legion of Super-heroes, a post card ("Live it up! You're only middle-aged once"> and a tea cosy for me - the latter with the legend "You can't beat a cuppa in a crisis".
Then we braved Oxford Street. We didn't find any korean pop in HMV and after going through a large Marks and Spencer's (yay for restrooms) where I found a lovely short sleeved blouse in black with strong pink dots that I very nearly bought but didn't, Dorothy Perkins, where I found a perfectly fitting grey jacket and lovely clumpy green high heeled sandals which I also didn't buy and some other shops we went to Bravissimo where I bought these: 1,2 and 3. The last one is my favourite style full cup bra and I already had beige one but wanted a black also. Then we got on the bus down the street to Marble Arch and the dreaded Primark. Primark on Oxford Street could also be described as shopping hell. Fortunately they had added at least one more place to pay since we were there last time, so there were shorter queues and it really went rather fast. Valeria bought a bag and some seriously cute bras, I bought a pale turquoise/mint green cardi and a teal t-shirt and we both got a couple of (identical but very different size) cute knickers. After that we headed to the Bond Street Underground Station where we happened to go in to a shop and I bought a watch hanging from a chain around my neck. I've been wanting a watch for a long time, since my grandmother's old gold watch just is too big for my wrist and can't be taken in more.

After that we headed home and rested before the big event of the day: Björn,armillary, and his girlfriend Sarah coming over for chinese take away and general social interaction. Teddy had met Björn before, but Tom hadn't and none of us had met Sarah. It turned out a very pleasant evening and everybody was sorry when Björn and Sarah had to leave (and Teddy had to go to bed since he gets up at the crack of dawn to go to work). It seems that I will get to see Björn and Sarah here in July, though unfortunately they can't stay with us because Sarah is allergic to cats.

And then everybody got the bed and I didn't stay awake long to read the Lacey Smithsonian mystery I borrowed from Teddy while staying there - not at all.

Can be found in my swedish blog.

I am very much alive her in London and, thanks to clothsprogs, I now also have access to a computer and the internet.
Yesterday was spent going through every corner of Camden market, followed by a stroll along Regent's Canal too Regent's Park and tehn through the park. By then Valeria's feet were hurting a lot so I let her travel "home" alone and set off to look up emoni at teh pub she works at. Unfortunately I was there an hour before she started and I was too tired to hang around another hour. By then I was also beginning to question the wisdom in sending a 14 year old girl alone through London, where she's only been twice before. However, my first instinct was right and she had absolutely no problems finding the right train and going home on her own.
The evening was spent knitting and watching Miss Congeniality together with Teddy, Valeria and after a while Tom. I had never seen it before and thought it was really funny. Today we aim for the central parts of town, but hope that it will stop raining first (though it doesn't look like it). I need to check our finances first, however, since we did a lot of shopping yesterday :)

The tickets are booked and on wednesday evening the 3rd of June my daughter Valeria and I will show up on clothsprogs' doorstep.

Three good things:

1. I managed to find a loose thread from the lace on my old lace collar that I wrote about the other day. It had a very strong smell of burnt hair so the lace is also silk. I don't know if that means anything when it comes to dating it, but it makes it even cooler. I need to look at lots of photos from the late 19th century to mid-20th century to see when this type of collars were popular. I would say not after 1920, but I'm not sure.

2. I have sewn on all flounces and hemmed the skirt for my 1850s dress. I'm now working on the closing of the bodice lining; hooks and worked eyelets. It took my husband 15 minutes to pin the toile close in the back when I tried it on the first time so I think it's a good idea to make a proper closure before i start fitting the top fabric.

3. I'm going to London tomorrow where I will meet guyelfkin and his Tom and later that week myladyswardrobe. Yay!