Retro Rack

Hello my fashionable darlings, been a while since I did an outfit post.

Here is what I wore to a speaking gig recently. This was a writer's conference in San Francisco. So It's local to me and I could wear stuff that I don't normally pack. Either because it takes up too much space, doesn't pack well, or isn't versatile. The skirt is eShakti and the top is vintage.


This is what I chose. It was also relatively cold that day and I took into consideration that fact that I would be there a full day. Walking around a lot and also sitting on panels in chairs and stools.

The Outfit!

Top Down

• Hat: 1950s red felt beret style fold felt number, vintage store
• Earrings & Broach: 1980s costume jewelry augmented by me. The broach the earrings originally came with died as did the tassel dangling from the broach I'm wearings so I cannibalized the two broaches, which is why the metal doesn't match. I have considered hanging a Bumbersnoot from it instead. But I love those earrings and wear them all the time so having a matched broach is a GOOD thing. Thoughts? 
• Necklace: Obligatory pen necklace, sadly no longer available. I don't know what I will do if mine die. 
• Top: 1940s velvet. This is the top part of a vintage suit the bottom of which is a simple velvet pencil skirt. The skirt no longer fits but I can still fit the top (yeah boob surgery). I have had this piece since high school, for years it was what I wore to funerals. It has the best fold over and big button details but because it is velvet and velvet eats light it doesn't photograph very well.  I got it on Haight Street in the 90s.
• Belt: Slim red one, modern, from Target years ago (similar $7) (although if I were going to buy it over I'd actually buy this one $10, because it has no metal components and is therefore more versatile).
• Gloves: Classic not lined black leather 3/4 vintage, thirfted (similar $40). 
• Skirt: eShakti, yes it has pockets, I usually use this as an underskirt but I bought specifically because it also works as a day skirt. 
• Shoes: Modern, very low kitten heel patent almond-toe Mary Janes. Remarkably comfortable AND waterproof (similar $32)

Glove Lengths

1. Short: Ends at Base of Thumb (AKA drivers)
2. Wrist: About 2 inches from base of thumb
3. Classic: 4 to 6 inches, ending below the elbow (technically the ones I am wearing above as classics)
4. Elbow: Traditionally 8 inches from the base of the thumb. Recently, up to 12 will be defined as this length. 
5. Opera:16 -23 inches from the base of the thumb to the upper arm, for a glove to be called "opera" it MUST GO OVER THE ELBOW

Unfortunately if you are shopping for gloves NO ONE obeys these codified descriptions. Sigh.

There you have it. Me in mostly black, not something I do often, but this outfit suited this event and people seemed to like it.

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can shop my recommendations via the following lists:
Steampunk, Retro Jewelry, Makeup, Retro Clothes, Lifestyle

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I get a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

On my various fashion online places (like Instagram and Facebook), this dress was unanimously voted the best of the convention. (Although it may have to do with how good the photo is (taken by my lovely friend Bob).

Outfit Breakdown

• Hair: black cotton turban - $11 (this is my favorite turban style)
• Earrings: typewriter key craft earrings from a con (similar on etsy)
• Pen necklace: silver no longer around - similar $28
• Belt: black stretch bow belt -  $7
• Dress: eShakti (yes it has pockets), $80 (no longer available but you could turn this one maxi and it's a similar cut) I added sleeves, changed neckline, and customized the measurements. Learn how to shop from them in this blog post.
• Bag: black teakettle purse - $64 (10% off at time of this post)

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can shop my recommendations via the following lists:
Steampunk, Retro Jewelry, Makeup, Retro Clothes, Lifestyle

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I get a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

This was my first outfit in Phoenix recently, Fashionable Reader!




This is an old favorite dress because it's polyester and packs easy (no wrinkles) and is relatively cool. Because there were lines in the sun to get into the event, I paired it with a check umbrella as a parasol, and walking sandals (no heels for me this day).

Outfit Details

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can shop my recommendations via the following lists:
Steampunk, Retro Jewelry, Makeup, Retro Clothes, Lifestyle

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I get a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

Hello my dear Fashionable Reader,

Here I am at my recent RWA chapter presentation dressed in a black cotton day dress with brown accessories.

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can shop my recommendations via the following lists:
Steampunk, Retro Jewelry, Makeup, Retro Clothes, Lifestyle

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I get a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

I went through this massive purge recently, frankly I've changed shape quite a bit since my surgery and not everything fits well anymore. Plus I really just want to slim down my wardrobe, I have too much clothing. Some of these I haven't worn in several years.

Modern Made Retro Dresses

I got this dress from Nordstrom Rack, it's not vintage. I like it but the slip under is too short, it doesn't fit well in the waist and it's sleeveless (I'm not into sleeveless these days). I also already have a 1930s style dress in this color that I tend to reach for if I'm wanting bright pink.



This one also came from Rack years ago, here it is in a steampunk style. The sleeves are now too tight and I find it a bit too short for my taste. I requires a slip which negates any advantage on a hot day.  And I just have to admit blush isn't a super flattering color on my skin tone.


 Cream lace dress, another Rack find. It is easy to get on, travels well, and packs beautifully, but I just don't wear it. It's slightly the wrong length for my taste and it's sleeveless. Which I'm just moving away from.


This ruched black dress. It's great, it hides a million sins, it packs. But... it's a little black dress. I have too many already. This one is not quite stretchy enough to show off my waist and (say it with me) it's sleeveless.

Vintage Dresses

1960s vintage teal velvet last worn for the Waistcoats & Weaponry book tour. I love this dress, it's flattering on but without my epic Rack it's just too big. It's so well made with lining and tucks and such that it simply can't be taken in, either. Here's hoping some lovely size 8-10 finds it and falls in love.


1950s striped seersucker makes me very happy, and I love this material. But the dress has never really fit me well and now it's just gone all pear shaped. Or perhaps that's me? I just don't love it anymore. And it doesn't have pockets.


1970s knitted set, shirt & skirt, both are a nubby cream acrylic knit. I think I like the idea of knitted sets more than the execution. I thought this set would both be so versatile and serviceable but frankly, I barely wear either the top or the skirt. Too warm, slightly scratchy. I'm also getting rid of the purple blouse shown with the skirt of this set. The third picture is of me right before I bought it (I'm wearing it over other clothes) but still, see the former rack? Whoa.


This black and white skirt. Massive sentimental value and great memories and affection ~ ask me at a signing some time and I will tell you the story, but it doesn't fit right anymore. It's time to let it go.

Goodbye Eshakti

These dresses served me well and brilliantly, and opened my eyes to the joys of eShakti. But after my surgery they are just way too big in the chest and that's just an area it's impossible to easily tailor. So I pass them on in the hopes they go on to find an equally well endowed young lady who, I hope, will be surprised and delighted to find something that actually fits.

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can shop my recommendations via the following lists:
Steampunk, Retro Jewelry, Makeup, Retro Clothes, Lifestyle

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I get a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

Hello Fashionable Reader!

Here's my most recent event outfit. I went to Borderlands for their Mass Signing 20th Birthday Celebration!

(And then stayed for the Sponsor Social.)


The funny thing about this outfit is that I was having such a hard time deciding what to wear, I had Twitter vote on it.


Here's the break down of what they chose and how I put it together.


The velvet blouse is part of a 1940s suit (the skirt is no more). Like all black velvet, it photographs poorly, but it has tons of lovely little details like buttons and cuffs. You'll just have to trust me that they are there.

The bag, gloves and shoes are all modern but I bought them 10 years ago. The bag came from a thrift store, the shoes are aerosoles, and the gloves H&M.

However, still available are...

• The leopard turban ($8)
• The red pencil trumpet skirt (c. $40)
• The obligatory necklace pen ($20)

Next to the amazing Katherine Kerr (I was a little star struck).

I'm afraid, since it was at night, the light wasn't awesome

 
Finally here I am in my special Borderlands Sponsor sweatshirt...


Take a good hard look, this is the only time you will ever see Gail Carriger IN A HOODIE.

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can shop my recommendations via the following lists:
Steampunk, Retro Jewelry, Makeup, Retro Clothes, Lifestyle

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I get a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

Today, Fashionable Reader, I'm do a retrospective on one of my all time favorite pieces, a 1970's polyester black maxi dress. I picked this up in Haight Street in San Francisco, and it's not normally the kind of thing I would go for. Except, of course, that it has a pussycat bow at the neck.


But the fit on the stress is just amazing, it makes me look tall and elegant. Which, with my curvy figure, is a really challenging. It's this crazy polyester fabric, and I imagine it will last forever. However if it does ever die, I have plans to take it to a seamstress and have it remade in other fabrics.


Here I am wearing it three ways. The first image is the most common way I wear this dress, with gold accessories. The second is a steampunk variation that I use when I'm traveling and need both a evening gown and a steampunk costume on the go. The final is the dress with a 1940s style velvet jacket over-the-top.


 Well my address is clearly from the 1970sseventies, there is no doubt about that. This style of dress was common in the 1930s. Here I have a retrospective of this dress style for your entertainment. Enjoy.

Teared Black Maxi-Dresses of the 1930s

Charles James, 1930s  The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Evening Dress  Lucien Lelong, early 1930s  The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Coco Chanel, 1933  Augusta Auctions

Evening Dress  Madeleine Vionnet, 1936  The Museum at FIT

Evening Dress  Coco Chanel  1937-1938  MET

And here is a modern variant...

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can shop my recommendations via the following lists:
Steampunk, Retro Jewelry, Makeup, Retro Clothes, Lifestyle

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I get a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

So one of my most worn wardrobe pieces is a little black dupioni suit, Fashionable Reader. Here I am wearing it over the years in various different ways. It's basically a sheath dress with a little short jacket over top.


I call this my Dior suit (and it might be, hard to tell as someone tore out all the lining at one point including labels). I'm thinking, from the cut and the length, that it's late 1950s.


Here is is not on my body...


"Dupioni (also referred to as Douppioni or Dupion) is a plain weave crisp type of silk fabric, produced by using fine thread in the warp and uneven thread reeled from two or more entangled cocoons in the weft. This creates tightly-woven yardage with a highly-lustrous surface."

~ From Wikipedia

Dupioni's biggest flaw is that it wrinkles, so this is one of those pieces I always have to plan time into my schedule to iron before wearing, and it's not for sitting still for long times.

The suit is basically a simple v-neck sheath dress...

The skirt is pencil and to below the knee. It's hard to tell with black fabric, but the seaming is to die for (so flattering, that image is BEFORE reduction) especially in the bodice. This is one of those deceptively simple dresses that I really wish eShakti would get hold of and deconstruct because I would buy it in a million different colors and patterns.

I find the arm holes a little high (or perhaps that's because of my swimmers shoulders which pull the bottom of the arm hole up).

With a short jacket...

It comes with this little short jacket, one big button and a very wide lapel and the much-coveted half length sleeve. (I adore this sleeve.) Also super versatile.

Here I am wearing the whole suit as an evening look. (I met Mercedes Lackey in this outfit!) I have a fancy hair bob in, a nice jet beaded tassel necklace ($20), peep-toe wing tip stilettos, and long red gloves ($8).

All I need to do is change the hat & gloves and this look works fine for daytime too. I love that kind of versatility.


Here it is with shorter gloves and no gloves, and more casual accessories.

If I want to turn it super daytime I put a shirt on underneath it, like so...


See? I am even wearing it with flats. (I try to avoid flats with a pencil skirt but sometime the feet just hurt too much.)

And here is one of my favorite versions...


So there you have it, so many different outfits out of one vintage suit.

Any preferences on which one you like the best?

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can shop my recommendations via the following lists:
Steampunk, Retro Jewelry, Makeup, Retro Clothes, Lifestyle

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I get a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

For the second day of the Alaska Symposium I wore my favorite waist cincher, or Swiss waist, over a black evening dress.


That's a little gold meets brown buckram facinator that travels well so I wear it a lot, discontinued. If I had to buy a replacement I'd go for this one, $9.

The dress is 1970s (1930s revival) and I ADORE it. It's one of my most flattering pieces. I brought so I could wear it as a dress for dinner one night and under this corset on another night. It has a pussycat bow at the neck.



I'm wearing it over a Max Studio silk cross over full sleeved blouse (similar $16).

The waist cincer is from Dark Garden. (Similar costume version for $30.)


Gold steampunk earrings (similar for $25) & vintage necklace (heirloom) and the obligatory pen necklace $20.

That's a little gold shrug I got on a whim from Ross for like $15. Similar $17-23. 

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

You can visit the following shopping lists: Travel Dork, My Steampunk, My Wardrobe.

Product links on this blog are usually to Amazon using my associate code. At no additional cost to you this means I gets a slight kick back if you make a purchase. Thank you! This allows me to continue to produce this blog without sponsors.

1956 Bosphore  Christian Dior  The Victoria & Albert Museum

2014 Elie Saab black petal

Vampire T-shirt

Retro Rack is also on facebook where I post additional images and fashion thoughts.

quotes Gail likes