FASHION WITH TESSA--GUEST AUTHOR AND FASHION EXPERT DIANE VALLERE

We’re always happy to welcome back Diane Vallere to Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers. After close to two decades working for a top luxury retailer, Diane Vallere traded fashion accessories for accessories to murder. In addition to the Style & Error mysteries, she writes the LEFTY-nominated Material Witness and Mad for Mod Series. Diane launched her own detective agency at age ten and has maintained a passion for shoes, clues, and clothes ever since. Learn more about Diane and her books at her website. 

Samantha Kidd’s Fashion Personality Profile Tester

While between jobs, former fashion buyer Samantha Kidd has hung out a shingle as a stylist. In order to help her understand her client’s needs, she gives them a quiz to determine their fashion personality. Take it and see what your choices say about your style:

1.  Choose a pattern:

2.  You’re indulging in a favorite treat. You choose:

   A.  Steak, baked potato, and iceberg salad

   B.  Takeout

   C.  Cheese, grapes, bread, and bottle of wine

   D.  Sustainable Krill and Plankton compote, mangosteen mochi for dessert

3.  Your favorite style of pants are:

   A.  Hi-wasted pleated trousers like Katherine Hepburn would have worn

   B.  Jeans

   C.  Hemp drawstring waist

   D.  Whatever Nicki Minaj wore in her latest video

  

4.  You win tickets to the Academy Awards, all expenses paid, including a shopping spree for your outfit. You wear:

   A.  Something Grace Kelly might have worn

   B.  A long gown to hide your flip flops underneath

   C.  Vintage caftan, arm filled with bangle bracelets, shoulder duster earrings

   D.  A black tuxedo and a mountain of pearls

5.  Your favorite Johnny Depp:

   A.  Cry Baby: put a man in a black leather jacket and a white T-shirt and he’s good to go.

   B.  What’s Eating Gilbert Grape: Who needs all the crazy costumes?

   C.  Pirates of the Caribbean: Long hair, head wrap, and a vest. He’s like Rhoda in drag.

   D.  Edward Scissorhands: Very Jean Paul Gaultier!

Results:

Mostly A: Classic. You have classic style. Forget trying to keep up with the latest trends. You look (and feel) your best when wearing styles that transcend trends. Stock up on twinsets, pencil skirts, jeans, and trousers, and accessorize with scarves and pearls. Effortless!

Mostly B: Casual. Who has time for fashion? You want to look good and feel good. Play with proportion: oversized sweaters with leggings or sporty zip-front jackets with skirts. Add in sneakers or rubber soled shoes and a messenger bag in your signature color and you’re good to go!

Mostly C: Bohemian. You’re a free spirit and your style shows it. Go for loose tunics in colorful, abstract prints and loose weaves, and pair them with frayed hem jeans. Forget earth shoes…go barefoot! All the better to show off your paisley-painted pedicure.

Mostly D: Fashion Forward. You can list designers like others list the state capitals and wouldn’t be caught dead in last year’s trend. Check out RentTheRunway.com—it’s like Netflix for fashion—and spend your money on subscriptions to Italian Vogue. Who cares if you can read it? Fashion is the real international language.

Some Like it Haute

Fashion expert Samantha Kidd is in the hot seat. After agreeing to help her ex-boyfriend’s former girlfriend with a runway show, she’s attacked in the parking lot outside, landing in the hospital. And when a garment goes up in flames on the catwalk the day after the attack, the situation turns explosive. She recruits a smokin’ hot photographer to turn up the heat on the investigation, but even the third degree won’t expose an angry arsonist. With a crash course in sizzle, Samantha’s curiosity leads her into another inferno, and this time she either faces the fire or gets burned.

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CRAFTS WITH ANASTASIA--GUEST AUTHOR DIANE VALLERE

Diane Vallere writes cozy mysteries with a stylish twist. She authors the Style & Error Series, currently optioned for TV, the Mad for Mod mysteries, and the fabric shop-themed Material Witness mystery series. She launched her own detective agency at ten years old and has maintained a passion for shoes, clues, and clothes ever since. Learn more about Diane and her books at her website.

Five things to do with one yard of fabric

(and a few items you probably have lying around the house)

Fabric has always held a bit of magic to me. I used to tag along with my mom on trips to the fabric store, where I’d wander the aisles and look at bolts of cotton, silk, taffeta, and wool, and wonder how exactly it was that someone knew what to do with it. My personal favorites were the colorful cottons, lined up in small clusters of coordinating colors: white with black polka dots, black with white polka dots, white with black lines, black with white lines, white and black check, etc. I could entertain myself for hours trying to pick my favorite combinations. My love of fabric stayed with me, even when a love of sewing faded into the background. Which is why I have a stash of fabric with no particular projects I mind. Someday, I think, I’ll have the perfect project for some/all of it. But in the meantime, I still find ways to enjoy it.

Here’s how:

1. Impromptu Table Cloth for a party spread: Find a small table that’s taking up space in your attic. Add a piece of wood on top and drape fabric over it. Match the fabric to the theme of the party. Voila! Instant ambiance and more space for hors d’oeuvres.

 

2. Art: Wrap the fabric over an inexpensive wooden frame and tuck in around the frame. (You can also glue it. School glue will wash out, leaving fabric undamaged. Glue gun glue will peel off when dry, also not damaging the fabric.) Voila! A pretty wall hanging. Perhaps an inexpensive way to freshen up a guest room or a hallway?

 

3. Curtain: Drape your fabric over a dowel rod and rest the ends in existing curtain rod hooks. OR buy a set of small rings with clips attached. Iron the raw edge of the fabric to the back and attach the clips along the length of the fabric. Feed clips over curtain rod. Voila! New curtains. (Neaten up by using an iron to fold raw edges under.)

4. Apron: Cut a length of ribbon long enough to tie around your waist. Double your yard of fabric over the ribbon and tie in the back. Voila! Instant apron. Coordinate fabric to your home interior or party theme for extra fun.

 

5. Vase: Fold fabric down so it is the width of an inexpensive vase. Lay vase on fabric and gently roll until the vase is covered. Secure in back with pins or tie with pretty ribbon (or both.) Voila! Instant room accent. 

What creative ways can you think of to use a yard of fabric?

Suede to Rest

With her career as a dress designer in shreds, Polyester Monroe is looking forward to a fresh start. But as it all unfolds, the pattern to a new beginning looks a lot like murder.

When Poly Monroe was little, she loved playing in her family's textile store. But after a fatal family tragedy, Land of A Thousand Fabrics was boarded up and Poly never expected to see the inside again. Now, as inheritor of the long-shuttered shop, she's ready to restore the family business. However her two new kittens, Pins and Needles, aren't the ones causing a snag in her plans...

Not everyone wants Poly back in San Ladrón, especially a powerful local developer pressuring her to sell--and leave town fast. But even when the threats turn deadly, she's not ready to bolt. Because Poly is beginning to suspect that the murder behind the shop is tied to a mystery in her family's unsettled past that she's determined to solve...before her own life is left hanging by a thread.

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FASHION WITH TESSA--GUEST FASHIONISTA/SLEUTH SAMANTHA KIDD

Diane Vallere is a textbook Capricorn who writes cozy mysteries with a stylish twist. She authors the Style & Error Series, currently optioned for TV, the Mad for Mod mysteries, and upcoming fabric shop-themed Material Witness mystery series. She launched her own detective agency at ten years old and has maintained a passion for shoes, clues, and clothes ever since. Learn more about Diane and her books at her website. Today one of Diane’s fashionista sleuths joins us to give us some tips on reorganizing our closets. 

Ten Ways Ten ways to reorganize your closet

By Samantha Kidd

1.    Color: Lots of industry pros will tell you this is the way to go, but I’ve found it can be distracting. What if you only have one item in orange? Do you give it away or move on? No. I say move on.

2.    Decade: When you have a lot of clothes and want to honor their stylistic integrity, this is the best option. Items that would normally not make the haven’t-worn-it-in-a-year cut can become entire sections. The key here is to be aware of the difference between fashion and costume. Not that there’s anything wrong with either!

3.    Fabric: If you live in an area of the country that has varying temperatures (or you have an on-again/off-again allergy to cashmere,) this might work for you. Be warned, though, that this involves a lot of tag checking, which can sometimes lead to hours lost on the Internet trying to decipher those little cleaning icons.

4.    Size: I eat a lot of pizza and pretzels. Don’t get me started.

5.    Price/Value: There are times in a woman’s life when we need to spend a little extra on an outfit. A fun experiment is to sort your closet according to what you spend on each item. Poor choices will become evident quickly! As will poor shopping companions.

6.    Function: Casual. Cocktail. Workout. Work. Spying. Seduction. Imagine the possibilities.

7.    Silhouette: Dresses, pants, skirts, coats, culottes, knickers, skorts, harem pants, caftans. You know the drill.

8.    Alphabetically: I dare you!

9.    Comfort Level: Fashion is not supposed to be comfortable! Throw out anything with an elastic waist!

10. Buy What You Want To Wear: This is what it’s all about, isn’t it? Fashion should be fun. If you don’t want to wear it, don’t. Hang what you want to wear in the front and bury the rest. If you share a closet, maybe put some of that other stuff on his side. He’ll never notice.

The Brim Reaper

When an over-the-top collection of vintage Hollywood costumes comes to Samantha Kidd’s hometown, it brings a hatbox full of hype. Close friend Eddie is in charge of the exhibit but when hype turns to homicide, he turns to Samantha for help. Brimming with good intentions, she loops in the cops, but after one too many cloche calls, she’s soon in over her head. If she can tear the lid off the investigation, it might mean a feather in her fedora. And if she can’t? She might get capped. 

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photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/partymonstrrrr/3466332859/">partymonstrrrr</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/">cc</a>

DECORATING WITH JEANIE--GUEST DECORATOR MADISON NIGHT

Diane Vallere lives in a world where popcorn is a breakfast food and Doris Day movies are revered for their cultural significance. After over twenty years in the fashion industry, she now writes full time from her home in Los Angeles, California. She launched her own detective agency at ten years old and has maintained a passion for shoes, clues, and clothes ever since. Learn more about her and her books at her website and blog.

My name is Madison Night. I own my own mid-century modern interior decorating business in Lakewood, Texas. I didn’t arrive at my decorating education through college, but instead from a lifelong love of watching Doris Day movies. The sets of movies like Pillow Talk, That Touch of Mink, Lover Come Back, and The Thrill of it All provide ample inspiration and act as a kind of documentary for me when it comes to designing a room from that era.

But first: Here’s how I approach a new room design, which I think is a concept that would be successful across various decorating styles. I ask the owners to show me their absolute favorite item in the room. Sometimes it’s a lamp they bought at a yard sale. Sometimes it’s a painting. Sometimes it’s a cookie jar they inherited from a favorite family member. Most of the time it’s an oddball piece that seems not to fit. My job is to design a room around that piece, to look at what is already there and determine what fits and what doesn’t. (Side note: once, when a homicide detective mocked my job, I pointed out that what I do when designing a room is very similar to what he does when assessing clues--look at what is there, figure out what fits and what doesn’t. But that’s a story for another day.)

Using pictures from a room I designed for a client who write mysteries, I’ll show how her dining room came together.

We started with a lamp that she bought for $10 at a flea market.

Next, I suggested yellow walls, a classic color from the midcentury era, and a nice complement to the turquoise and white of the lamp.

I installed floating shelves from IKEA next to the lamp and added more mid-century knickknacks from the client’s collection, along with a whimsical painting by Los Angeles artist Josh Hickman.

 Since this is a dining room, we knew the table and chairs would constitute the major focus of the room. One wall was dissected with windows, so my focus became the remaining wall. I anchored the wall with a silly framed work of yarn art found at a flea market, and mirrored the floating shelf/knickknack display on the opposite side to create balance. The client invested in a Saarinen-style tulip table and chairs (in yellow to coordinate with the walls) and the room was complete.

 Mid-century design relies on concepts of minimalism and right angles, but also embraces color and whimsy. And even though this style is my specialty, I think there are a few takeaways here for you, regardless of your style:

1.             Identify your favorite item in a room and rebuild the room around that item.

2.             Don’t be afraid of paint.

3.             Decorating doesn’t have to be expensive to be effective, but it should show personality.

4.             Don’t ignore DIY and chain stores when it comes to things like storage or shelving. Home Depot, Lowes, Target, IKEA, and The Container Store are a few of my favorites.

5.             Flea markets are your friend.

6.             Fresh flowers are just good sense!

If you love mid-century design and Doris Day like I do, you’ll enjoy these resources: Atomic Ranch Magazine [http://www.atomic-ranch.com/], retro renovation [http://retrorenovation.com/], Discovering Doris [http://www.dorisdaytribute.com/blog/].

Next time you redecorate, remember to have fun!

That Touch of Ink

When mid-century modern interior decorator Madison Night receives a five thousand dollar bill in the mail, she knows it’s a message from her past. Doris Day movies help with inspiration for her business, but her favorite actress can’t help when Madison’s lover comes back. After finding a corpse at a local numismatist, she follows a circuit of rare dollars and common sense to expose a kidnapping plot, a counterfeit operation, and the true price of her independence.

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