I spent a great day up in London recently and visited Missoni Art Colour at the Fashion and Textile Museum, in Bermondsey Street. The exhibition cleverly brings together over 60 years of fashion with paintings by some of the leading 20th century European artists plus previously unseen works by Ottavio Missoni.  

Before you see the exhibition, you're invited into the screening room, where three screens give a you a great insight into exactly what it takes to make a Missoni garment - from selecting the initial colour combinations - playing with various knit structures - the yarn spinning of the yarn - the computerised knitting machines in action which produce the beautiful knitted fabrics - pattern cutting - building up the collections - then on to backstage at the shows where you see hair-do's being styled, make up artists at work, dressing the models, all of which culminate in the catwalk show.

The exhibition itself starts with a selection of paintings by 20th century artists, and it was really interesting to see how they had helped to influence the individual style of Missoni. The painting above, by Giacomo Balla, I thought was a really good example of a work of art which had very obviously influenced the Missoni style, you can easily imagine this as a knit structure, and the colours too work beautifully together.

The paintings, lead you through to the main room, where you're greeted by 42 mannequins, all of which are perfectly positioned on a pyramid of stairs, each showcasing clothes designed by the brand from 1953, when Ottavio and his wife Rosita formed Missoni, right the way through to 2014.

Grouped as they are, the mannequins really are very impactful, you need to stop and take your time to take in all of the details in each outfit.

None of the pieces look at all dated. In fact, it's hard to tell which styles are from what decade, as you can see from the mannequins shown above. Factory noises are used as a soundtrack in this room, and the lighting, turns on and off, row by row, both which add to the drama and atmosphere of the exhibition.

Upstairs, there are original sketches for fabric designs and initial colour ideas, knitted fabric swatches, together with works of art by Ottavio Missoni himself.

Definitely an exhibition worth seeing, particularly if you're a Missoni fan, or simply interested in fashion, it runs until 4th September, 2016.

We've just road tested the Colette By Walden Negroni Shirt Pattern, and even if we say so ourselves we're pretty pleased with the end result!

For our make, we chose the short sleeved version, but the pattern comes with a long sleeved version too, finished with a placket and cuff. We decided to made ours in our Organic Cotton Gingham in Navy.

This is the first Colette sewing pattern that we've used and we have to say that we were really impressed. The instructions for the pattern are in a spiral-bound booklet, making it really easy to use, and it has a pocket at the back to store the pattern pieces once you've used them.

We love that the pattern instructions include lots of ideas for customising your sewing project to make it your own. Plus they also refer you to their website for free downloadable variations, such as the pockets for this shirt.

The instructions are really comprehensive, taking you through each step in the process of making a well crafted shirt. The instructions also include handy tips, such as how to make perfectly formed patch pockets by cutting a template out of cardboard to help with pressing, simply make it the same size as your pocket piece, minus the folds and seam allowances as we've done below.

We customised our shirt by cutting the pockets on the bias, as shown below, and we used the Small Check Gingham, again in Navy, for the underside of the collar and the inner back yoke. Even small details like these can take your make to a new level; and give you the chance to get creative!

This was the first time we'd tackled a garment with an inner back yoke, however our concerns were soon put to rest, as the step by step instructions and illustrations are really clear and before we knew it the need was done!!

The other sewing process that we tried before was "felled seams" these give a long-lasting durable finish and they also give a look very professional to your garment. Again, there are really good instructions for these, seperated out in the sidebar, so that they can easily be referred to, so nothing to fear!

These seams are used for both the sleeve and side seams. Once that's done it's pretty straightforward assuming you've made buttonholes before. It's simply a question of hemming the sleeves and body of the shirt, stitching the buttonholes and attaching the buttons.

We stock quite a few different "crossweave" fabrics here at The Draper's Daughter and really like the two-tone look that using two different coloured threads creates when the fabric is woven.

Fabric is woven from two sets of thread (known as "warp" and "weft") going in different directions. Warp is the set of lengthwise threads, which run up and down the length of the fabric; in the manufacturing process they're held in tension on a frame or a loom. The thread that is then inserted over-and-under the warp threads is called the weft. In the image below shows a close up of our Yarn Dyed Essex Linen in Indigo, the warp threads are Navy and the weft are the Light Cream.

Crossweaves then, are fabrics woven with different coloured warp and weft threads which have been yarn dyed before the fabric is made. This gives a softer "chambray" look when compared to an equivalent solid coloured fabric.  

Pictured above are the two Robert Kaufman Essex Linens that we stock in Steel, both made using the same shade of grey. The yarn dyed, crossweave version at the top has been woven with a light cream coloured weft yarn, and looks significantly paler than the solid version of the same colour below which has been woven with the Steel thread for both the warp and weft.

In terms of the crossweaves that we stock, our first collection needs no introduction, pictured above are our Organic Cotton Crossweaves. These fabrics are hand woven in India on small power looms, using 100% Organic Cotton.

Then we have the Yarn Dyed Essex Linens by Robert Kaufman, as pictured above. These are a heavier weight than the Organic Crossweaves and perfect for both dressmaking and soft furnishing projects.

We hope this post has inspired you to use crossweaves in one of your future sewing projects, and we'd love to see what you make, please send us your photos via the contact page.

Even before we launched, it was an aspiration of mine to promote ethically sourced fabrics. Sourcing them though, has proved to be quite tricky, especially as a small independent business. However we have never given up on our desire to find fair trade fabrics.

So, I'm really pleased that we've just added our first ethical fabrics to the website. These Ikat fabrics were produced in a small weaving village in Thailand. The company we are working with ensure that fair wages are paid to the those producing these wonderful fabrics, directly supporting this community.

The fabrics themselves have been spun, dyed and woven entirely by hand, it takes approximately four hours to weave one metre of fabric. Despite the traditional hand-weave methods used to create these fabrics, the designs themselves are fashion-forward and modern.

Initially, we've added two designs to our collection. Choose from the Navy Zig Zag with it's subtle highlights of red, yellow, green and ochre; or the Chambray Broken Stripe with it's mix of traditional pinstripes and broken stripes in white and light blue.

Both designs are a medium-weight with a beautiful drape. The fabrics have been yarn dyed, which means that the yarns were dyed before the fabrics were woven. The yarns used are fairly thick which gives it a slight texture and you can see the woven pattern really clearly.

The weight and design of these fabrics lend themselves to both dressmaking and soft furnishings, perfect we think, for some summer sewing!

Today is the start of Fashion Revolution Week, an initiative born as a result of the collapse of the Rana Plaza complex in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on 24th April 2013 when 1,134 were killed, and more than 2,500 were injured.  

This complex housed garment factories on each floor, most of whom produced goods for European high street retailers.

The aim of this week is to use fashion to bring people from around the world together to bring about change for the people who make our clothes. Fashion Revolution are encouraging us, as consumers, to be curious about "Who Made My Clothes" - who grew the cotton, who spun the threads, who dyed the fabric and who sewed them together. #whomademyclothes

So this week, use social media to show your label and ask the brand who made your clothes - #WhoMadeMyClothes? For more information on how you can get involved visit the Fashion Revolution website.

I know from many years spent working in the fashion industry, that this is a complex issue, and one not easily solved by retailers alone, governments need to take a more pro-active role too.

That said, if a garment only costs a few pounds to buy, as a consumer you have to question how retailers are able to sell goods at such a low price. And this doesn't just apply to finished garments, but to all consumer goods, including fabric too.