Over the past few weeks, I’ve been trying to pick out some fabric for a dress I hope to sew:
This is what happens when you decide to go on a shopping fast for the duration of a pandemic that may never actually end. You begin to imagine yourself with the skills of a French couturier, and you think, “How hard could it possibly be?”—fully ignoring the fact that the last time you made a garment with a waist and pleats, you had big hair, braces and terrible taste. Although I guess I shouldn’t be so hard on my junior high style. Those were some dark times for fashion.
Where was I again? Ah, yes. The local store I’d like to purchase my fabric from is currently closed for in-store shopping, which I fully support, and the only way to browse their selection is online. But I don’t know how I can buy fabric without feeling its weight between my fingers and rubbing it against my skin. As with most things clothing-related, I trace this need back to my mother, who always pored over a textile’s zat dei (質地) before buying. She instilled in me the importance of considering the texture and quality of any material, whether it’s for a t-shirt or a wedding gown. Zat dei is everything.
Over the years, I’ve come up with an arbitrary list of fabric types with an acceptable zat dei. They include, but are not limited to: cotton poplin, ponte, boiled wool, cashmere, flannel, french terry, most silks, velvet and corduroy. On the flip side, the ones I tend to avoid are jersey, fleece, chiffon, velour, boucle, satin and most synthetics, especially lyocell. I don’t really understand how I decide what goes on which list. It’s instinctive. But the times I’ve gone against my gut, I have always regretted it.
So here we are, at the point in the pandemic where I make lists of fabric for no discernable reason. But hey, why not?
As Sam Anderson so accurately observes in his glorious NYT Letter of Recommendation about eating chips:
A pandemic, it turns out, produces a curious paradox: It not only creates a shrieking worldwide drama of existential dread—it also puts relentless pressure on the most mundane aspects of our everyday lives. For nearly a year now, many of us have been locked in a controlled environment, a closed lab of selfhood: the Quarantine Institute of Applied Subjectivity. Our homes have become biodomes designed to study the fragile ecosystems of Us. All our neuroses and addictions and habits are under the microscope. […] We have turned into scientists of ourselves.
I’ll let myself off the hook, then, and call it field research. And while I’m not entirely sure about the parameters of this little experiment or what I expect it to yield, I hope you don’t mind my collecting data and sharing it with you in the name of science.
:) Teresa
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