With the Emmys on yesterday, there’s lots of pictures of beautiful red carpet gowns around the place today. But Christina Hendricks’ gown was interesting in that it featured amazing hand beading. It was made here in Sydney by an Australian designer, Johanna Johnson.
I found this article about the dress this morning, in the Sydney Morning Herald. It also features an interview with the designer. I would have preferred that she talked more about the techniques that were used for the beading, but perhaps I have a more specialised interest in this than the general population!
You’ll know that I have an interest in embroidery beading, having mentioned the lovely Karen Torrisi on occasions before, and a wonderful book by Maisie Jarratt, called How to Bead – a fabulous book that you should get your hands on if you are interested in embroidery beading. I also had the pleasure of beading a dress to wear to a wedding last year, which you may remember.
White Threads is the blog of Yvette Stanton, the author, designer, publisher behind Vetty Creations' quality needlework books and embroidery products.
A friend asked yesterday what I know about Hand and Lock which reminded me to look at their website and check out the competition winners for this year and low and behold the winner of the open class was none other than Karen Torrisi!
I didn’t know that! Well done Karen!
I did a little beading on my own wedding dress, so I know how long it takes. That is a truly breathtaking dress!
I heard Johanna on the radio today and she said it was hundreds of hours worth of beading. And she just GAVE it away as a gift to Christina. While they knew she liked it, Johanna didn’t even have any guarantee that Christina was going to wear it until they actually saw it on her in the coverage of the Emmys. A calculated risk, in terms of marketing, methinks!
BTW, photos, please Rachel?! 😉
I’ll do what I can when my visitors have gone!