Costume sewing blog

General information:

Fabric types

Basic hand sewing stitches

Hand sewing needles

Knitting 101

Embroidery 101

Visible mending

Crafting on the cheap

How to fix sewing machine issues

Yarn types

Clothing fasteners

Circular knitting

Tutorials:

How to sew buttons

Disability aid tutorials

How to DIY custom patches

Make some pocket extenders for your pants (by Quixiify)

How to darn holes in woven fabrics (by Delicatefury)

How to mend holes in the thigh area of jeans

How to make buttonholes (machine+hand)

How to make pockets

How to use a seam ripper

Projects and patterns:

DIY cotton rounds

Easy knitted gloves

Free customisable sewing patterns

Easy rectangle skirt

DIY tote bag

DIY delicates laundry bag

DIY hot pads

Easy fleece hat

Fingerless fleece gloves

Apron pattern

Knitted weighted blanket (by Knitboyknit)

How to make a custom dress form

Hi, thanks for the question! 

Yep, you’re right - the Cdrama “The Empress of China” sometimes uses Japanese-style fabric flower hairpins (see example below) that are culturally and historically inaccurate (then again, Chinese costume dramas are notorious for being loose with sartorial historical accuracy…):

So let’s now take a look at actual Chinese fabric flower hairpins:

The umbrella term for Chinese flower hair ornaments is Zan Hua/簪花 (lit. “flower hairpins”), which includes fresh flowers as well as artificial ones made from fabric, paper (Zhi Hua/纸花), beads (Zhu Hua/珠花), etc.

Traditional Chinese fabric flower hairpins used with Hanfu include (but are not limited to!):

1) Juan Hua/绢花: “Silk flowers” - flower imitations made from silk fabrics of various colors. Dates back to more than 1,700 years ago, and was the main ornament for women during the Tang Dynasty. In 2008, Beijing Juanhua was officially designated as an intangible cultural heritage of China.

2) Chan Hua/缠花: “Wrapped flowers” - using colorful silk threads to wind flower art onto fixed frames. The technique of wrapping flowers originated during the Ming dynasty and flourished in the Qing dynasty. Notable for being small, delicate, and lifelike. Has been designated as an intangible cultural heritage of China.

3) Rong Hua/绒花: "Velvet flowers” - made from fine silk on twisted wire frames. Dates back to the Qin Dynasty, and was a marker of nobility. Eventually became popular among the common people during the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, and was mainly worn during festivals and weddings. In 2006, Nanjing Ronghua was officially designated as an intangible cultural heritage of China. 

For more resources, you can check out my Zanhua tag for my posts on Chinese floral hair ornaments, as well as my sub-tags for Chanhua and Ronghua.

Of course this doesn’t cover everything, but hope this helps! ^^

Hi, thanks for the question!

To start with, I have a hair tutorial tag for all of my hair tutorial content, so please check it out if you haven’t already!

Also, @fouryearsofshades has a hanfu hairstyle tutorial masterpost here. The links are in Chinese, though. And Newhanfu has a bunch of hanfu hairstyle tutorials (in English!) here. 

Next, there are lots of traditional Chinese hairstyle tutorials on Youtube, although they’re mostly in Chinese. Here are some of my recommendations:

1. Five Thousand Years - This channel is entirely in English, and has a primer on creating hairstyles using hairpieces (below), as well as reviews of volumizing hair inserts here & here:

2. 一千只大日日 - This channel has many detailed hairstyle tutorials. All of her looks are lovely! For example, below is a tutorial of my favorite hairstyle, with two side locks (uses 2 hair inserts & 1 hairpiece):

And here’s a video that demonstrates how to create the ethereal Fei Xian Ji/飞仙髻 (Flying Immortal Ji) (uses 4 hairpieces):

3. 胖仙女の闵闵 - This channel has lots of videos on hanfu, hairstyles, and accessories. For example, below is a hair tutorial for a simple yet elegant updo (no hair inserts/hairpieces):

4. 雁鸿Aimee- This channel focuses on how to create and wear Chinese hair ornaments, but it also has tutorials on hairstyles and makeup. Below is a tutorial for an early Tang dynasty hairstyle (no hair inserts/hairpieces):

A brief overview of some common hanfu shoes. There are some traditional shoes that have been worn continuously till today such as 北京老布鞋 etc. There also are wooden sandals worn by people from the south, but I have not seen anyone wearing it with hanfu. 

First Line: Spring and Autumn and Warring States Period(770 BC-221 BC)

Line 2: Han Dynasty (202 BC ~ 220 AD)

Third row: Wei and Jin dynasties (220 – 420)

Fourth row: Sui Dynasty (581 – 618)

Line 5: Tang Dynasty (618 – 907)

Row 6: Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms (907 – 979)

There might be some confusions between hanfu ruqun and hakama. So I made a thing. 

Actually the way I tell them apart is like how I tell hanzi and kanji apart – by familiarity. I am not sure how helpful this is. Contact me if you have anything to add or I made mistakes somewhere. Thanks.

ngl I get annoyed sometimes too, “kimono” is used to describe any east-asian-looking robe thing even though it’s a pretty specific type of garment. Like I kinda hrmmm-ed at this scene in ATLA…

But people don’t usually mistake hanfu for kimono out of malice or racism, but just due to lack of exposure. So I’m gonna use your ask as an opportunity to give some quick n easy tips for how to tell kimono and hanfu apart. and hanbok while we’re at it (which is Korean for those who don’t know).

You can usually tell the difference from silhouette alone. To put it simply, kimono - rectangle, hanfu - triangle, hanbok - like a half oval-ish.

Nevertheless, there are certainly ways in which you can differentiate the three. The silhouette is one way, as demonstrated by offishwhite’s image and another comparison below (via). It’s crude, but it depicts the general differences - kimono (left) is tubular/rectangular in shape and overall more “geometric” looking with very straight lines, hanfu (center) has a more “curvy” silhouette with a more A-line shaped lower half, and hanbok (right) is bell-shaped:

There are also very subtle differences in the shapes of the cross-collars (via) - left - hanfu, center - kimono, right - hanbok:

Other visual clues to differentiate hanfu and kimono include: hanfu sash is typically tied in front while kimono obi is typically tied in back, kimono obi is much wider, thicker, and stiffer than hanfu sash, kimono sleeves are more rectangular while hanfu sleeves are more curved, kimono sleeves are open in the back while hanfu sleeves are closed in the back, hanfu sleeves have more variety in shapes and lengths, etc…….

You can also look for context clues, such as makeup, hairstyles, and accessories. If you see huadian (forehead decoration), pibo (long scarf worn about the shoulders and arms), and/or tuanshan (rigid round fan), you can make a relatively safe assumption that it’s hanfu.

Sorry for the unconventional q, but i keep seeing Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation everywhere and I kinda want to get into it but a) don’t know where to start (web series? live action adaptation?? wait how many are there!) and b) i don’t really “get” wuxia / xianxia, that sorta stuff, i find it really hard to cross that cultural barrier and chinese mentality seems very alien. (it’s not that i have no experience w different mentalities but chinese in particular is v hard to grasp w/o sources).

So if you have the time and patience, I’d love to hear a summary of it (like, a coherent summary bc all i get on the wikis is a shower of names and concepts that don’t make sense to me) and perhaps some “intro for dummies” abt the relevant parts of chinese history and mentality tied to it? not just the cultivation / buddhist part but also re: familial relationships, philosophy and all that. (v brief and low effort of course) Thank you and sorry for bothering you!

(“brief and low effort” referring to what I’m asking from you, not to what I need for me - as in i asked for it so i’m more than ready for a complicated essay, but you can write with as much detail as you like, I don’t want to ask for some sort of comprehensive tome)

Okay first, you do realize that if you want “brief and low” for anything, you’re asking the wrong person? I was a philosophy major. brief got drilled out of me a long time ago. 

Second… well, explaining what makes The Untamed / Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation (mdzs for short, from the chinese title, Mo Dao Zu Shi) such a standout story does require understanding some of the wuxia conventions it subverts – as well as some that it plays straight (so to speak) very, very well. 

I figure the best approach (again, sadly not brief) is to first get a handle on the genre of wuxia. Gonna break this post into two, so you’re not reading in a single three-hour stretch or something. I’ll do a follow-up about mdzs, to hopefully make it a bit more accessible for you. 

before I do that, let me first say: I didn’t grow up with this genre, so there’s going to be parts that I may miscast unintentionally. for an insider’s view, my go-to voices are @guzhuangheaven, @atthewaterside, @dramatic-gwynne, @the50-person and @drunkensword. if any of them are reading this and can point to more/other/better voices, please do.

I have three analogies – like cultural doorways –  and like all analogies, they break down when you get into the finer details. In the broad strokes, though, they mostly work, and if nothing else, hopefully they’ll demonstrate that wuxia may be a chinese-specific version, but part of a storytelling tradition that’s nearly universal.

The three doorways are: the american wild west, the samurai era, and the british arthurian romances. And, in a tangential way, the regency period in the romance genre.