Kimono Advent Calendar Day 3

I got this kimono last year but haven't worn it yet. It's a very nice silk tsumugi and I simply love the stripes. 

I paired it up with a vintage Nagoya obi. It's pretty short so I might convert it into a tsuke obi at some point. The obiage has both red and black stripes , but all the red stripes are hidden in the back under the obi. 

Lyuba 

Kimono Advent Calendar Day 1

Hello Everyone,

My friend Hong came up with the idea of doing Kimono Advent Calendar (except that she is SLACKING!), so here is my first entry.

The kimono is vintage komon, I haven't actually wore it out yet. I got the kitty paw obi as a gift from Hong a while back, and it remains one of my favorite obi. The haneri was made fairly recently and you can see how I did it in my most recent issue of Western Girl Kimono Style online magazine. For some reason some people can't open the file, my home computer included, so I apologize in advance for that. I don't know why some people have no problems and others can't load anything.

I am pretty happy with this coordination and I definitely will wear it out one day!

~ Lyuba

New life for an unwearable obi

Hello Everyone, 

A while back I won this gorgeous obi for very cheap, but at the time I didn't realize WHY it was so cheap. You can see below the reason why no one else bid on it. I wasn't upset though, because I saw the potential for a nice tsuke obi. 

Not only was the bottom of the obi in a completely unwearable condition, but there were tiny little holes everywhere on the front. Luckily for me, the obi has the same design on both sides, and the other side was in perfect condition! All I had to do was iron out the fold and make the drum part from the good size.

The first thing I did was cut the bottom so I could shorten the stiffener, then fold the fabric. It made the end understandably shorter and a little unbalanced in terms of the design (you can see it in the finished photo), but I'm not bothered by that.

Since it's a tsuke obi, there were lots of hidden spots where I can cut off some fabric to cover the holes in the obi.

By the way, I decided to do it all by hand because sewing by hand is very relaxing for me. It's much faster to do it with a sewing machine.

Here is the back side so you can see how I constructed the tsuke obi. It's actually really easy to do, and I really should stop procrastinating and convert some of the other obi I have.

Just Arrived #28

Hello Everyone,

After selling off MOST of my sale stuff at the Japan Fest in Atlanta, I was able to buy me some things that I would actually wear. I have a LOT to show you! I'm pretty excited about all these things, even if I'm not quite feeling up to wearing kimono as often as I used to right this moment.

First up are chuya obi I got. Chuya obi are my weakness, I absolutely love them and simply can't pass them up.

I also got more haori. This one is a gorgeous dark emerald green color, almost the same in shade as the obiage you will see in a moment. In the photo it doesn't look that great, but in person... it's OH MY! The other haori is gorgeous too, even if I can't quite figure out the seasonality.

And here is the obiage and obijime I was just talking about. It's such a deep green color!

I got more nagoya obi too, but I'm only going to keep two of them. Unfortunately they are not in a great condition, but fortunately if I make them into tsuke obi, they will be wearable again.

I'm always on lookout for a ship obi, except I don't particularly care for shusu silk and painted obi. When I saw this obi, I knew I had to have it! It's a gorgeous lavender color with a woven ship pattern! I'm not keeping the other obi.

When I first got this obi, I wasn't sure if I'm going to keep it. I'm simply not a fan of birds, plus I thought this obi is going to be very bright yellows. Well, it turned out to be a gorgeous yellow-green-olive color, plus pretty long for a vintage obi! It was love from first (in person) sight for me! So now this obi is added to my collection and it's not leaving it!

Before coming to the US I sold my favorite black and white kimono to help off set the costs of shipping my cats to the USA, so now I'm hoping to replace it with something similar. This kimono is in no way similar, but

it is black and white, and synthetic. It fits me beautifully! Sometimes I forget how it feels to have a properly fit kimono LOL!

Finally, here is another striped kimono I got! I already worn it to a photo shoot last week.

Told you I got a lot of stuff to show you! :D

~ Lyuba

SALE to fund my secret kimono projects

Some of you might have seen this already on Facebook and Tublr, but I've decided to sell off more of my collection to fund my secret kimono projects. On my immediate To Buy list is a fancy dress form that has both arms AND head. My blog will benefit too, since I'll be able to do coordination posts from now on... because I'm not doing flat (on the floor) coordinations anymore. They are a great pain in the behind to photograph at home and I can't show off my hats that well.

Anyways, here are some of the items I've added. You can click on the caption and it will take you to the item. There are more items in the SALE album, so please check out the rest too! 

Reversible cotton chuya obi

Dark blue nagoya obi

Greyish-olive-green vintage nagoya obi

Magenta hitoe komon

Vintage striped komon
This kimono may or may not appear in one of my secret projects... ;P

Beige stylized roses tsukesage

Orange komon

Beige and orange maple leaf komon

Black and red plaid kimono & haori set

Grey geometric komon

Men's juban

Pink juban

Hey Look! More Obi for Sale!

I went through my collection yet again and pulled out things that I do like, but still never get around to wearing for one reason or another. So here is your chance! These are definitely Lyuba-style, except they are unloved and I'd rather they go to someone who will love and wear them more than I do! Eventually all of this will be coming with me to the London EXPO in October, where Hong and I signed up as kimono dealers.