This winter, I produced a set of several coordinated monstrosities, made out of my aunt's terribly awesome harlequin, mother-of-the-bride suit which she wore to my unfortunate cousin's wedding in the early 1990s. The whole family (but perhaps myself most vocally...) have been making fun of her for this fashion choice for many years. Now I am not a fashionista by any stretch, but even I could see that the only people impressed with her outfit were all of the closeted harlequins hungry for the day when they could emerge from the shadows and take up their place again in modern culture. Well, my aunt's brazen fashion statement did not precipitate this cultural revolution, and her harlequin brethren remain cloistered in the shadows.
But I digress.
After suffering many years of ribbing, she decided to unburden herself of this fashion disaster one Christmas, and gifted me the fabled suit. Well, in true harlequin fashion, the joke is on her! This year, I turned the offending suit into a variety of handy reminders of the fashion slip for the whole family: a tie for my uncle, an elegant scarf for my aunt, 3 sets of bunting for her grown children, and a bonus set of coasters for good measure. This project gave me pause however-- was I unleashing a new wave of ugly on the world by perpetuating the life of this fabric? Only time will tell...
(December 2015)