70's Vintage Florals

As I sit curled up in blankets on my couch, staring out at the snow falling out the window, it's funny to think of anything floral related. However, if a little vintage flare is added to the mix, florals for a fall collection totally works.

Dresses by Mata Traders. Textile Design by Shifra Whiteman. 

Last spring, when the design team at Mata Traders came together for our seasonal brainstorm session, I kept feeling drawn to images of antique and vintage flowers. My favorite was a piece of 70's wallpaper bursting with mustard, pea green and brown flowers. My first reaction was "Gross!  The colors are horrible!", but the shape of the flowers caught my eye and I started to sketch them over and over again. I finally created a repeat that everyone on the design team loved, and then we started to play, what I like to cal "the color game". We tried using darker muted colors, bright colors, pastels…I'm pretty sure we tried every combination of colors under the sun. In the end, we chose a few purples, a cream and a punch of orange. 

Left: Hello Dolly Dress. Right: Oberlin Dress. Dresses by Mata Traders. Textile Design by Shifra Whiteman.

After receiving a sample pieces back, we knew we had made the right color choice. The colors are a nice change from the monochromatic winter wardrobe. The print came back so well that two dresses were created from the fabric. The Hello Dolly Dress is so cute and pairs nicely with chunky sweaters for fall, and elegant Oberlin Dress. 

Cross Stitch Roses

Another season has finally come in and Fall 2014 is upon us. The new collection has arrived, it looks fabulous and boy do we have some fabulous prints to share with you! 

Last summer we at Mata Traders took a good look at the Fall 14 forecast and fell in love with this idea of crafts. We already have embroidery in every season and sometimes we add a bit of ikat into the mix, but for this season, we decided to focus on a pattern fully dedicated to cross stitch. As you know, I have personally become fascinated with cross stitching (thanks to my good friend Haley), but here was a chance to play with the image of the craft rather than actually cross stitching a dress. Now that we had our concept, we needed a subject. The forecast was full of vintage florals. We decided to merge the two ideas; vintage florals and an illusion of cross stitch. 

Cross Stitch Roses. Textile Design by Shifra Whiteman. Garments by Mata Traders.

Creating this particular pattern was really fascinating to create. From the beginning, we wanted colorful flowers with a dark background so that the colors, no matter what we chose, pop! We started with a grid made up of the letter "x" and used illustrations of 3 different flowers. Then, we used 3 different shades of the same color to show the shading between each petal and 2 shades of green for the leaves. After playing with 3 different types of flowers, we decided to use only roses. The next step was playing with scale. We had one word on our minds…BIG! We wanted everyone to see each "x" printed on the fabric.

Left: Oberlin Dress    Middle: Hello Dolly   Right: Loyal Love Dress

We held our breadths waiting for a sample to come back and see if this pattern would even look good.  Thankfully it did! The whole design team fell in love with it and the vintage look with a modern twist looks awesome. We love it so much that Mata Traders decided to make 3 dresses with the fabric! Check out the Oberlin Dress, a wonderful cut perfect for any lady (especially ladies with curves), or the Hello Dolly Dress which could be paired perfectly with a cozy sweater! But my favorite dress is the Loyal Love Dress. It is such an elegant garment that could be dressed down for work just as easily as it could be dressed up for a wedding.