Full-slips, size 34

I'm still working on the new website, but it'll take a while yet, and I know from past experience that there's no guarantee all the links will work when it goes live. Last time, I uploaded the whole thing, then found the links didn't work and had to redo each one individually (there are about 30 on each page). Luckily I didn't have many pages then - now there are over 200, so fingers crossed it all goes well the first time around.

I really must find out more about cascading style sheets though. I remember discussing them with someone who knows a bit about web design when I got the first [hand-built] version of my bear site up and running. "You need style sheets," he said, "it'll make things a lot easier in the long run." Naturally, I ignored that bit of advice, and now I'm struggling. I have made things a little easier than it was the first time round by creating a template for every folder, with the menus and links all in place, but even then, I have to add pictures, add text, and then do all the twiddly bits - change the font; make this bit of text grey; make this bit of text pink. Later, I will have to go back and add Paypal buttons to each of the product pages.

Tis all a pain in the backside. I have spent all today and yesterday doing the full-slip product pages (sans Paypal buttons) - and I've got another five categories to go (whinge, whinge, whinge).

In the meantime, I have added some more slips to the old site - size 34s this time.

The styles are not as varied as the tiny sizes which I blogged about here, but there is lots and lots of lace, like the slip in the third picture. The second picture is actually a camisole and half-slip set - which seems to be quite unusual - partly because its a set, but also because of the flared skirt of the half-slip.

The first picture is the most wonderful A-line slip/nightdress. It is hand-made in satin, with a gathered chiffon trim to the hem. The design seams to be really simple, so I'm thinking of having a go at tracing the pattern. I hasten to add, it would be the first time I've ever traced a pattern, but learning dress-making (or lingerie-making) is a big ambition of mine.

The problem with trying to recreate this slip is that I'm not sure it would look particularly good in cotton or nylon or whatever. Part of its charm is that heavy, vintage-y satin - hardly the cheapest fabric, and hardly the best thing to use when you're first starting out. I have a similar problem with putting together new bear designs out of mohair.

Anyway, please excuse my silence for a little while whilst I concentrate on getting the new website finished.

And some more...

I have updated the lingerie website again - this time with some of the most beautiful 1930s and 1940s underwear.

Brief moan about the website: it always takes ages to update it! I built it with my own fair hands, after reading a book entitled something like 'An Idiot's Guide to Building Web Pages'. If the cap fits... I managed it but there's a lot of stuff which would probably be automated on a professionally-built website, which I have to do manually. Photographing the lingerie and writing descriptions takes long enough, but I spent all this morning, from about 9:30am until 2pm actually putting the new stuff on the website. And I'll need to do it all again in another couple of days!

Anyway, our spare room was looking rather a mess. In addition to the three six-foot clothes rails, there was a wardrobe full of unlisted lingerie, lingerie hanging on the back of the door, from the picture rail, on the back of the chair, laid out on the bed... I've never really got organised since closing the Ebay shop.

I went through stuff until I couldn't possibly jam anything else onto the clothes rails, and then gave up. I did find ten amazing pieces of vintage nightwear though, so it wasn't a wasted expedition. Part of the stuff I found was bought from a UK auction house about a year ago. It was a wonderful lot - far better quality than anything I've ever found on Ebay, but with a price tag to match. As a result, I have had to put it on the website at quite a high price. It is slightly daunting - listing a negligee set at over £200 - but you can pay that much in a posh designer store (in fact, in many cases, you'd be lucky to pay only that much), and I'd put the pieces from this lot up against modern designer lingerie any day. They are incredibly lovely.

Anyway, here are some pictures of the four pieces from THAT lot that I listed today (if you click on the pictures, you should be able to see them better):

The first and the third items pictured are actually sets - they come with robes; the other two are individual nightdresses. They all have wide sweeping skirts and beautiful details. In the fourth picture, the lines you can see on the bodice are actually strips of silk sewn on the inside of the bodice - so they show up as being more opaque from the outside. Each strip is then framed, on the outside, with lots of tiny satin-stitched leaves.

It is one of my big ambitions to learn dress-making and start making vintage-style lingerie myself: the details are inspiring in a way that modern nightwear rarely is.