MABON FASHION: ROMANIA

  Once I was able to travel around Romania in fall, and it was breathtakingly beautiful! The tour took me through the capital Bucharest to the countryside, where I visited monasteries and local homes, and of course awed the gorgeous Carpathian Mountains. 
  What struck me the most was that most houses had numerous apple trees in their yards, and the size of the fruit was unbelievable. So large, great in number, and deliciously perfect-looking. They also commonly grew other foods too, like corn, and many houses had a cow and a horse. Horse carriages were a more common sight than cars in the countryside.
  And the people! So confidently stylish in their old-fashioned clothes. I watched them with admiration. The women wore floral dresses and a scarf around their hair, and the men had on straight pants, a collar shirt, and a type of hat, like a mini-stetson. It felt like I had rolled back in time about seventy years. Awesome!

  Romania left such an impression on me, that ever since I have longed for a similar dress to what the women there wore. And now the time has come. Here´s my tribute to Romania:

I made my dress way more streamlined than theirs, but we live in different cultures too. The fabric is rather busy with all the flowers around it, so I kept everything else to a minimum. No collars, buttons, or pockets. Nor big show-off pieces of jewelry.

The pattern is new, and this dress is the first one I´ve ever made with it. The style is more loose than in my earlier patterns, and that´s the reason I wanted to try this. For years now fashion has been exaggeratedly wide on tops, so I figured I´d give this a try for a change. Time will tell how it works, but so far it feels good, and is a nice change to my dresses.

Makeup is natural, only using different shades of brown. While the real Romanian belles might have chosen bright red for their lips, I opted for nude beige lipgloss. But I chose bright red for my earrings. Red roses with white pearls are such a classic over decades, that they complement this traditional look well.

  Thank you, Romania, for inspiration, showing me your beauty, and teaching me your way of life! What an awesome experience.

P.S. The pattern I used to make the dress is from here (number 14).