Travelling Obi Round 1 Sing Up

Some of you might know that I am a co-runner of Travelling Kimono Round 1 and 2, a project that involves taking one kimono and sending it around the world to different people. Due to overwhelming popularity of the Travelling Kimono, we decided to open up Round 3, but to make things different we will have an obi travelling instead. 

We are calling it Travelling Obi Round 1, to keep things simple on us, organizers, in case we decide to do another round of travelling obi.

That said, the sing up is open now! If you haven't participated in either Travelling Kimono rounds, now is your chance to sign up, because until 8PM (US Mountain Time) today only new people will be accepted. After that the sign up will be open for everyone. 

So what are you waiting for? 

SIGN UP!

What I Wore for Travelling Kimono - London

Hello Everyone, 

While I didn't wear the Travelling Kimono this time, I was there in the role of a photographer. The weather was uncharacteristically nice (for the first half of the day) so of course I had to wear kimono.

I didn't wear my usual stripes, but instead went with one of my newest kimono, a summer weight purple hitoe kimono. I paired it up with my handmade reversible tsuke obi because the roses on the obi match kimono exactly. The blue and white obiage play off my haneri quite nicely, and the white belt as obijime seems to bring the whole look together. I actually  had a little trouble picking out the accessories, and I even posted about it the evening before, but I guess I always knew that I will go with my favorite white belt. On the morning of, the rest of the accessories sort of fell in place too.    

You can't see the shoes very well, but they have a plaid pattern too, similar to the obi. 

Hong and I went to the Westfield Stratford Centre to watch Magic Mike, and while waiting for our showing time, we also took cable cars over the river. I'm not going to post a lot of photos of her because I want to give her a chance to write up about the day, but here is a teaser photos. You can also see more photos here and here.

Overall, it was a great day. We watched the movie, we had fresh pretzels, we had lunch at Yo Sushi and took the cable cars for the first time ever. It did start raining right after our movie, and I had to get an emergency outfit to wear so I can hide my kimono in my bag, but Hong let me borrow her umbrella so I didn't get too wet during my 15min walk to my car. 

I'm hoping there will be more non-rainy days from now on, so I can wear kimono more often! 

~ Lyuba

Hello Travelling Kimono - First Stop is Cambridge!

Hello Everyone,

I'm sure most of you have heard by now about the Sisterhood of Travelling Kimono project, but if you haven't than check out the link immediately! Basically one kimono will travel to many countries and to even more people, where each person will dress up in that kimono, post photos and pass it on to the next person. For the first round we have 40 people who signed up, so I'm estimating that it will take at least 2 years for kimono to make its rounds! How cool is that?

One of my kimono got chosen as the Travelling Kimono, so I had the privilege to start the journey. Last Saturday I went to Cambridge to check out The Search for Immortality: Tomb Treasures of Han China exhibit at one of the museums there, and thought it would be a perfect opportunity to wear the kimono. Plus the day was very pretty too, so extra double reason to wear my kimono!

I was talking to Naomi about what to coordinate this kimono with, and she had an image in her mind about me going for the sailor theme, since I've done several sailor themed coordinations  before. I though it was a great idea, and went with it. I don't know about you, but I felt all kinds of pressure, being the first one, AND doing the Travelling Kimono too! I don't envy all the participants because I can imagine they all will have similar thinking, and I'm really glad that I'm all done and over with it. :P

 The crazy concoction of an obi that you see there is my "easy" obi from hell, meaning it's not easy to wear at all! Since it's the only red obi I own, I was determined to wear it, so I've pre-folded it into a semblance of tsunodashi musubi. It didn't turn out as well as I wanted too, but I can live with that. Now that I know what didn't work, I'll take it apart and re-do the whole thing.

It was extremely hot that day, even more so because this kimono is lined. Yes, I wore a lined kimono in 25C weather! But it needed to be done, so that it could go on to its next stop. Thankfully the museum had AC, so I was very comfortable there.

Walking around Cambridge, we came across this pub/restaurant and I just had to take a photo with the sign! How cool is that? Even the surrounding area helped with supporting my theme! Of course the trashcans just added to the general greatness (NOT) lol, but I'm thinking if push comes to shove, I can bribe someone to photoshop them out.

Next stop for the Travelling Kimono is London!

~ Lyuba