Dearest Needlework friends and lovers of gorgeous clothing,
This is a small detail that I cut carefully from a favourite material scrap (below), and added to my favourite red dress (made out of an old sheet) - so to cover a particularly fixed stain. I did a whole lot more re-shaping and perfecting of this dress, this month, but the figs are the most exciting part!
The stain was super-glue - yuck! How did it get there?! Hmmmm. Anyways, I thought a while about how to cover it with a wee red scrap, to make a non-visible repair, but finally settled on this idea of putting two figs on it!
Figs have been an important theme in my painting, health and pleasure life, and having lived in Cyprus and Italy, I am very drawn to the connectedness of symbology for the sacred feminine. In the small town in Italy that I live in, the word for fig is used with double meaning, as well as the fruit, it refers to a woman's yoni. I like the basic idea of this, though it is not usually used in a respectful way when talking about women. Despite that local distorted-thinking - perhaps because of it - I love the carrying-around of this image on my thigh, which reminds me to focus on abundance and not on lack: even the abundance of energy which comes from my core, freely and effortlessly, because of my juicy feminine vitality! So the fig images are like a punctuation throughout the day, to come back to core, and to focus on what IS (not on what ISN'T).
The colour of a cut-open fig is exceptionally beautiful (in real life), and this fabric that I took the figs from had a very nice depiction of them - sufficiently realistic, even though it is a bit cartoony on a relatively cheap dress; just a lovely red contrast, on a white background: open figs in all their glory. (I originally bought the fruit-emblazoned dress for myself for my birthday, about 8 years ago: it was a whopping 15 Euros, but I have an annual tradition of buying myself an unusual and special garment for birth-day celebration...)
I felt into the positioning and the quantity and type of fruit, and these two figs were just perfect: especially, how they sit on my thigh - and act as a conversation starter!
The repair actually took a couple of hours, as the edging needed a very precise and small stitch right where the border of the fruit turned into the white of the background: tiny red cotton stitches attaching it firmly to the skirt, over the hardened marks of glue. My intentions also took time and slowness to filter into the figs - to bring their full meaning into the print, and the form and roundness that it took on the skirt. The figs puff out ever-so-slightly, giving the symbol even more affirmation and presence.
When I walk up through the town, or down through the medieval quarter, I love the contrast of this bright red and the eye-catching detail, against the natural stone and marble steps. The red dress pairs nicely with a long, white underskirt that I made, with a silk red bottom border (which highlights the lace edge), and this seems to also harmonise with the fig details.
It is joy-full to have this symbol carried around with me; I feel protected by the image alone, and eve more so by the figs as totem and magical symbols, they bring me back to juicy clear vibrant focus: I AM, I am a vitally energetic and aligned Womb One, and I have every Right Living In Me, to walk freely, confidently, relaxed and in my pleasure, wherever I am drawn to, and to gather what I need to bring back to my home. I Am my Authority.
The use of a symbol like this in an unusual position, is something I will do more in my Making Clothing Magical Again work: rather than a logo shouting from our heart area, or a brand name on our back and sleeve - branding being intimately related to farming animals - this use of a natural symbol in a more chosen and specific place, can have a radiating energy and effect that empowers the individual, rather than taming them/ making them one of the herd.
Do you have any special symbols, totems or magical images on your clothing? Or have you got any beautiful ideas about making a change/ repair to a garment, by adding some particular new metaphor/ drawing/ detail? I'd love to hear about it!
LovE!
www.claregaiasophia.com
