BY Annie Millican | February 23, 2010

 Distinctive clothes from Tara St. James

My parent’s collection of vintage Mainbocher and Dior was my gateway into fashion.  Delicately impressed into the hemline of each billowing chiffon gown and brocade cocktail suit was the indelible mark of a couturier.  These discreet etchings communicated the tactile history of the clothing.  And as a kid, they gave credence to a fanciful world where elegant women danced and dined in gilded parlors.  The “invisible stitch” expressed old world fetes, cocktail hours, patrons and proprietors of beauty, and the adroit fingers that brought these opulent imaginings to fruition - through simple but deft application of needle and thread.  In this way, the handiwork provided a trans-historical link, it piqued voyeuristic intrigue, and I was forever hooked.
 
Nowadays, the global supply chain obscures the relationship between designer and customer, and machinery has replaced fingerprints.  When I examine the hem of a favorite shirt, what I see is a serged edge that has no particular allegiance; a potential for fantasy convoluted by the precision of comparative advantage; a very large carbon footprint.  Disheartening to say the least.  But there is a silver lining!  I have met kindred spirits who revive bespoke traditions with a distinctly contemporary flair.  Like my friend Tara St. James, who handcrafted this skirt out of organic twill tape and documented the entire process on her blog (start:http://4equalsides.com/2009/08/25/a-tangled-web/   finish: http://4equalsides.com/2009/09/03/the-skirt/).  Tara’s innovative use of social media lends a refreshing dose of transparency to the fashion production process, and connects us directly to her bustling Brooklyn studio.  Even if Tara must work within the confines of highly systematized industry, she restores our faith in the nuance of design and the subtleties of interpretation through her digital candor.  Most poignant for me, her work and her virtual signature conjure the romantic and illusory qualities of an art which I became so enamored of as a girl.
 
Her skirt is sold here: http://shop.notjustalabel.com/womenswear/1608