8.03.2011

hipper than hip


i am feeling like the most perfect birthday brat there ever was.

last night ruggy surprised me with tickets to death cab for cutie.  we found out about the concert after all the scalpers had bought up blocks of tickets, but ruggy waited patiently and on the day of, he pounced.  face value, peeps!  take that scalpers!

i wore my "new" flouncy pleated skirt.  this was a RTW dress, a dress sized for a pixie, and the zipper never even came close to fulfilling its life work.  i hacked off the bodice and voila!  new skirt.  by the by, my most recent oona does it! features a maxi denim version of this trickery.

  
the top is burdastyle's cap sleeve dress, bodice only.  well, let's face it, the bodice is all you get in this pattern.  if you've made this jammy (and a lot of peeps did, for sew weekly's kiss the cook challenge), you know there are hella fit issues.  i lowered the waistline, raised the neckline, and gathered the sleeves at the shoulder seams, which keeps them where they should be, rather than down around my elbows.  how unseemly.

and because it's made with le stretch jersey, no zipper.


do you listen to death cab?  when we arrived at the waterfront concert in brooklyn, there was a line of people snaked around ten blocks baking in the sun.  practically all of these people were under 18.  we often find ourselves in this time warp of age.  at the last peter gabriel concert we went to in jersey, everyone was of the over 60 set.  

ruggy spied a happy gentleman in a brooklyn brewery t shirt and asked him for the skinny.  what's on tap tonight?   we're thirsty.  brooklyn man grinned  (they all do; brooklyn brewery must be a very happy place to be) ipa, summer ale... lemme get you guys a wristband.  i'll just check her ID.


who, ME????  pshaw.

this little refashion comes complete with lining and taffeta flounce,  which indeed was its saving grace.  someone put a lot of work into this.  i couldn't abandon it on account of a tinkerbell sized bodice.

it's nice to be the big people at a concert like that.  the first thing we did was grab some alcohol and sit by the water, fuzzy bees getting drunk in the grass at our feet as we looked out at the manhattan skyline and shared a pork sausage sandwich.  we could hear the kiddies clamoring behind us to get close to the stage.  remember when we'd push to the front?  i chuckled. this is so much nicer.  

sixty seconds into ben gibbard's vocals, i grabbed ruggy's hand and pushed through the crowd like the teenaged fan i am.  admittedly, the proximity of hipsters did wear thin, and a few songs later we returned to a calmer spot, bouncing and smiling and occasionally turning to watch the sun set behind us.  

they were amazing.  ben gibbard didn't stop moving for two and a half hours, running back and forth to drums, keyboard and guitar, at one point banging away with the drummer, facing each other on two kits and looking like a couple of muppets.  every ten minutes, ben told the audience to turn around and look at your city NOW! like a giddy tourist.  they closed with this song, which goes from a couple of soft notes on a piano to a walloping chest thumping skyscraper of sound that makes you want to scream in joy.


the waistband of this skirt wasn't sturdy enough, having been dissected from its bodice appendage, so i threw some twill tape in there, sandwiching in some red circle-y dollar a yard trim, and then topstitched some triangles for good measure. 

egads, triangles.  do hipsters get a dress code mailed to them or something?  i lost count of the number of cut out dresses.  specifically ones with an isosceles triangle sliced out of the back of the dress, from waistband to bra closure.  these sharper edged cut out dresses make me think someone forgot a pattern piece.  they also make me think buffalo bill is lurking around waiting to make him a woman dress.

hey, what a great creepy segueway to say i'm THRILLED y'all are coming to my party!  i hope you're getting your dresses ready! 

20 comments:

  1. We just went to an outdoor Furthur concert and I had the same time warp-y experience. I was expecting everyone to be middle-aged hippies but it was mostly a younger crowd. We seemed to be right in the middle. But I didn't get i.d.-ed!
    Happy birthday week, miss thing!

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  2. Love the dress, you're the master of the print.
    This time of year there are concerts every night somewhere in the Black Hills because next week is Stugis bike rally, but it's mostly 50+ people at those concerts.

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  3. I thought this was a dress! I love it even better now that I know it's a top and a bottom. (I love mixin' stuff up.)

    I am trying to get in to Death Cab because I've heard I'd like them. I know how you feel about eighteen year olds at shows though. I love MCR and ALL the people at those shows make me (at 25) feel like a grandma.

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  4. You lucky, lucky girl! I LOVE Death Cab. I'm so jealous over here.

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  5. I'm so impressed with the way you mix prints together, it's a great outfit. In fact, I just love the photos on your blog, there's always so much going on :)

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  6. Lurvy lurve this dress! I am making mah party dress as we speak!

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  7. You are so funny! You know, I've never actually been to a rock concert in my life - ha! Sure I've been to concerts, symphonies, operas and all forms of classical music but never a "rock" concert! This sounds like so much fun! Love your darling skirt and the top is so much fun paired with it! Darling! So darling! xoxo, Sunni

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  8. OMG LOVE! I love that you made the bodice in jersey because it looks fantastic! I'm going to need to do a neckline and waist adjustment next time because I think you have hit on a solidly gorgeous formula. That skirt is brilliant. I adore the triangles but do not like hipster triangles.

    I love me some Death Cab! I saw Paul McCartney on Monday and he was ridiculous and amazing and super hot for 69. No joke. The man could move. *sigh* I love outdoor concerts, don't you? Ben Gibbard is brilliant - loved him with the Postal Service.

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  9. You are a sewing machine this week. Must be the good birthday vibes. As for concerts, the last one I went to, I would have sworn I'd traveled through time back to the 80s. Everything was Chucks, tight jeans, crazy colors, off-the-shoulder tops, and lace gloves. It was spectacular in a very strange way.

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  10. Bee you tea full! I love the 2 fabrics together.

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  11. THAT DRESS!!!!!!!!!!! freaking lurve it girl. Ah, hipsters at shows... I'd guess there was lots of corduroy on the menfolk, amirite? Come the warmer weather, I'll let you know if the pixie dreamgirls of Melbourne's north sport dorsal cutouts...

    We're bringing the tequila and are ready to party hearty chez Oona. My dress is gonna Blow. People. Away.

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  12. Nice rethread on that skirt! And I love it with the top and that lovely circle-y trim! And I totally believe someone carded you. I thought you were maybe early 20's, tops, when we first met. I'm with you on the hipster triangles, although I do love a low v-necked back. It's all about placement, I suppose.

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  13. Ooh, the outfit is darling and it sounds like the concert was fab, too!

    ... I will confess I have a deep, buried passion for cutouts, so I shan't rag on the hipster girls.

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  14. Print combo lurve! I feel your time warp pain when it comes to shows. (Though not a Death Cab fan, I like his side projects.) It's a sign of hipness, that's what I tell myself...bridging the gap. I was ready for some between-acts-yoga on Wed. night from standing in one place on a concrete floor. Young.

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  15. Yay Deathcab! I started out liking them because I was young and depressed and so were they. Now I like them because I'm a little older and much happier and so are they - well... at least their music kicked it up a notch. They rock a lot harder in concert than you might guess! I saw them at Sasquatch with my boyfriend of the time, and that festival pretty much sealed the marriage deal for us!

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  16. ~ liza jane: i must research this Further you speak of... the name is immediately intriguing... thanks for the birthday wishes mama!!

    ~ molly: STUGIS. ruggy went to stugis years ago. i dream of going someday...

    ~ meg n: the peeps do not lie, you would love death cab. i was remarking to ruggy, he sings songs the way a girl might write them, but as a very straight and in-love guy, who thinks every minute about growing old and wants desperately to be in love. it's a very strange and wonderful mix.

    ~ kelly: i KNEW i liked you!!!!!

    ~ kestrel: thanks girl! i just kind of grab loud things in the house and throw them together. much like the inside of my brain.

    ~ sunni: now come on girl. get thee to a rock concert, my classical friend. post haste!

    ~ meg g: I BELIEVE YOU! paul mccartney has some pipes and some serious soul! i even love wings. dearly. and postal service was my route to death cab, i love them. a bunch of those songs are actually about a break up he had, and if wikipedia is correct, the ex sings on some of the songs post break-up. but they do lie over at chez wiki.

    ~ no regrets: thank you!

    ~ emilykate: as a matter of fact, i was all IT'S 102 DEGREES OUTSIDE WHY ARE YOU IN CORDUROY?! subject change; so that you know the expletive is directed towards a new thought: holy shit. i seriously cannot wait to see your dress. will simon be attending? he's dreamy.

    ~ daughterfish: a hearty HA! on both counts! i love a v neck back too. weird how a few inches changes things. that is a V8 moment for sure.

    ~ tanit-isis: i KNEW it. beangirl, GET HER!!!

    ~ threadsquare: i'm right with you; i took a ballet class the day after death cab, and all i could think about was how much my feet hurt...

    ~ claire: how very cool! i think ben gibbard would love that he sealed the love deal. the now ben, not the then; as you know. i was surprised at now much they rocked. nonstop!

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  17. SO GOOD! (and while this pop up box loaded, I scrolled down to see your tiki dress too. ARGH x a million! It looks SO good, I wonder if I'd ever be able to draft something like that. I'm terribly thrifty, otherwise I would click that link.

    GREAT JOB THOUGH! xoxoxoxo

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  18. That is the cutest dress ever and perfect on you!

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  19. Happy birthday! Love the outfit, love getting carded, love Death Cab. It sounds like the perfect night!

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  20. ~ veronica: exactly my dilemma-- and why i was lucky to be asked to review it :). but, i learned SO MUCH it would have been worth the dough!

    ~ e: why thank you lovely lady :))

    ~ mick: hey girl! i was actually playing your mix while sewing it up. seriously!

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i thankya truly for taking the time to comment, i love a good conversation-- and hope you know my thanks are always implied, if not always written!