30th Day of Spring 515 AV
Naiya faced a new challenge today, a man had wandered in asking if Naiya could make a hairpiece for his daughter. He wanted bows, and lace, and flowers on a band that she could tie around her head. It was a request that Naiya had never faced before, and it would require her to put much more attention into planning the piece than she had ever before.
It was a daunting task. So she started with what she imagined would be the least difficult part, the band.
It would need to be wide enough to be noticed, but not so wide that the tie would be bulky and cumbersome. It would need a sturdy fabric, to hold up to being tied and untied numerous times, as well as to hold the bulk of flowers and bows that the man had requested.
To further the difficulty of the task, he wanted to add lace, an expensive and altogether more fragile material. It certainly could not hold the weight of ornamental flowers, it was likely that even the tying of the lace ends together would cause the delicate material to unravel.
She needed to use something other than lace for the band. Linen perhaps, would survive the tying and retying, but would likely set deeply with wrinkles. Her next thought was cotton, the material was sturdy, and did not wrinkle as deeply or as easily as the linen would.
The band needed to be a decent width, to accommodate the additions, but would also need to taper off into ends that would tie together neatly. She considered just cutting the cloth into an appropriate shape, but it would leave the band thin, and wouldn’t allow for a way to stabilize the accessoires. She would instead, she decided, cut a double width of the fabric and fold it over, creating a band twice as thick in material, and additionally creating a stabilizing under layer to attach the pieces to.
What was a double width, though? What was a reasonable width to hold back the fall of hair without creating an odd look in the style? Not to mention, how the flowers and bows would need to be arranged not only to fit, but also to be aesthetically pleasing.
She was becoming bogged down in details. First, how wide did the band need to be?
She grabbed a square of fabric, folding it until she had a band about a hand wide, hopefully a size that would accommodate the tentative design plan that was slowly forming in her mind. She hovered near the large mirror the shop owned, painstaking as it was to pack away for travel, it was often the selling point on items in the shop. Once someone saw herself in the brightly polished glass, it was often that much more difficult to leave without the item. As that was the case, Naiya found herself waiting for just such a customer, the woman, who was in a beautiful longsleeve dress, was twisting and turning before the mirror, trying to see herself from every possible angle. She seemed concerned, perhaps not feeling sure of the fit or the style.
No one was helping the woman, seeming content to wait forever for the woman to decide alone, a poor sales tactic since most women were more critical of themselves than anyone else would even dream of being.
When the concerned pondering of the woman turned to frustrated defeat, Naiya had to step in. She quickly tucked the band of cloth into her belt and came around the mirror, appearing in the woman’s line of sight for the first time.
Greetings, concern, Naiya complimented her arrival with the signs, before offering her vocal reassurance. “I was just admiring your dress when I noticed you looked upset. Is something wrong with the feel of the dress?” Naiya questioned, stepping up for whoever it was that should have been helping the woman.
Before the woman really had a chance to respond, Naiya jumped back in continuing what seemed to be questioning of the woman’s trouble with the dress. “I know that a lot of women dislike the height of the waist here,” She gestured emphasizing the spot she was referring to, “I think, though, that it suits you particularly well, the lower line really lets the skirt flow nicely around the soft curve of your hip.”
The woman seemed unconvinced, but returned her attention to the image reflected back at her. She seemed fixed on the fall of the fabric at her hip, fiddling and pressing at the fabric where the gathering of the skirt raised the skirt’s height.
“It’s just this, here.” The woman informed her discontent shaping her hands, “I think it makes my hips look wider.” Naiya nodded, agreement on her hands, and for a moment the woman seemed shocked.
“Imagine how jealous everyone will be. So many women try on similar styles and still look as thin as the grass that surrounds us. Who wants to look just the same as that? So common.” Gently, she lead the woman into a partial turn, so that she was at a slight angle to the mirror. “Instead, you’ll have curves that even men will envy.” Naiya teased gently. “Not to mention how the fit of the top slims you, even the sleeves compliment how fit you are.”
She stepped back, allowing the woman another moment to admire herself. Her posture had changed, she looked more confident, happier. Perhaps, now, she would buy the dress.
Naiya hoped she would, it would be a shame for her to leave without the dress when it complimented her so well. All the same, when she turned to put her own clothing back on, Naiya did not hover to offer to sell the dress to her. She was not Naiya’s customer, and if the woman needed her to sell the dress to her, she would seek Naiya out.
Until then, if that time was to come, Naiya had other things to take care of. Namely, the ornament for the daughter of her own customer. She pulled the cloth from her belt, reshaping the folding until it resembled a hand’s width once more. She placed the cloth across her own hair, leaving a breath of hair showing at her forehead so that she could gauge how the band would look as it slipped into place. It was quickly apparent that the band was too wide. Far too wide.
She shook out the cloth and folded it smaller, closer to a half hand instead. She held it to her hair once more. This was a more reasonable size for a band, but she wasn’t sure she could manage both flowers, and bows in that space. Not to mention that she needed to work lace into the mix somehow.
Once more she shook out the folds of cloth and folded it again, a happy medium between the two sizes. This was more like something she could work her plan into, however, when she held the band against her hair it appeared far too wide, too bulky, to work. She would have to go with the half hand size and replan her design around the size of the band, rather than sizing the band according to the design in her mind.
So with her new size in mind, she moved away to work on the design. She considered cutting the band and designing off that, but after a few ticks of thought she decided a better method would be to draw the band first, and design on paper, that way if nothing worked out just right at first, she didn’t have cloth that was cut too small, or even too large, not when she’d had to change her tentative plan once already.
Naiya faced a new challenge today, a man had wandered in asking if Naiya could make a hairpiece for his daughter. He wanted bows, and lace, and flowers on a band that she could tie around her head. It was a request that Naiya had never faced before, and it would require her to put much more attention into planning the piece than she had ever before.
It was a daunting task. So she started with what she imagined would be the least difficult part, the band.
It would need to be wide enough to be noticed, but not so wide that the tie would be bulky and cumbersome. It would need a sturdy fabric, to hold up to being tied and untied numerous times, as well as to hold the bulk of flowers and bows that the man had requested.
To further the difficulty of the task, he wanted to add lace, an expensive and altogether more fragile material. It certainly could not hold the weight of ornamental flowers, it was likely that even the tying of the lace ends together would cause the delicate material to unravel.
She needed to use something other than lace for the band. Linen perhaps, would survive the tying and retying, but would likely set deeply with wrinkles. Her next thought was cotton, the material was sturdy, and did not wrinkle as deeply or as easily as the linen would.
The band needed to be a decent width, to accommodate the additions, but would also need to taper off into ends that would tie together neatly. She considered just cutting the cloth into an appropriate shape, but it would leave the band thin, and wouldn’t allow for a way to stabilize the accessoires. She would instead, she decided, cut a double width of the fabric and fold it over, creating a band twice as thick in material, and additionally creating a stabilizing under layer to attach the pieces to.
What was a double width, though? What was a reasonable width to hold back the fall of hair without creating an odd look in the style? Not to mention, how the flowers and bows would need to be arranged not only to fit, but also to be aesthetically pleasing.
She was becoming bogged down in details. First, how wide did the band need to be?
She grabbed a square of fabric, folding it until she had a band about a hand wide, hopefully a size that would accommodate the tentative design plan that was slowly forming in her mind. She hovered near the large mirror the shop owned, painstaking as it was to pack away for travel, it was often the selling point on items in the shop. Once someone saw herself in the brightly polished glass, it was often that much more difficult to leave without the item. As that was the case, Naiya found herself waiting for just such a customer, the woman, who was in a beautiful longsleeve dress, was twisting and turning before the mirror, trying to see herself from every possible angle. She seemed concerned, perhaps not feeling sure of the fit or the style.
No one was helping the woman, seeming content to wait forever for the woman to decide alone, a poor sales tactic since most women were more critical of themselves than anyone else would even dream of being.
When the concerned pondering of the woman turned to frustrated defeat, Naiya had to step in. She quickly tucked the band of cloth into her belt and came around the mirror, appearing in the woman’s line of sight for the first time.
Greetings, concern, Naiya complimented her arrival with the signs, before offering her vocal reassurance. “I was just admiring your dress when I noticed you looked upset. Is something wrong with the feel of the dress?” Naiya questioned, stepping up for whoever it was that should have been helping the woman.
Before the woman really had a chance to respond, Naiya jumped back in continuing what seemed to be questioning of the woman’s trouble with the dress. “I know that a lot of women dislike the height of the waist here,” She gestured emphasizing the spot she was referring to, “I think, though, that it suits you particularly well, the lower line really lets the skirt flow nicely around the soft curve of your hip.”
The woman seemed unconvinced, but returned her attention to the image reflected back at her. She seemed fixed on the fall of the fabric at her hip, fiddling and pressing at the fabric where the gathering of the skirt raised the skirt’s height.
“It’s just this, here.” The woman informed her discontent shaping her hands, “I think it makes my hips look wider.” Naiya nodded, agreement on her hands, and for a moment the woman seemed shocked.
“Imagine how jealous everyone will be. So many women try on similar styles and still look as thin as the grass that surrounds us. Who wants to look just the same as that? So common.” Gently, she lead the woman into a partial turn, so that she was at a slight angle to the mirror. “Instead, you’ll have curves that even men will envy.” Naiya teased gently. “Not to mention how the fit of the top slims you, even the sleeves compliment how fit you are.”
She stepped back, allowing the woman another moment to admire herself. Her posture had changed, she looked more confident, happier. Perhaps, now, she would buy the dress.
Naiya hoped she would, it would be a shame for her to leave without the dress when it complimented her so well. All the same, when she turned to put her own clothing back on, Naiya did not hover to offer to sell the dress to her. She was not Naiya’s customer, and if the woman needed her to sell the dress to her, she would seek Naiya out.
Until then, if that time was to come, Naiya had other things to take care of. Namely, the ornament for the daughter of her own customer. She pulled the cloth from her belt, reshaping the folding until it resembled a hand’s width once more. She placed the cloth across her own hair, leaving a breath of hair showing at her forehead so that she could gauge how the band would look as it slipped into place. It was quickly apparent that the band was too wide. Far too wide.
She shook out the cloth and folded it smaller, closer to a half hand instead. She held it to her hair once more. This was a more reasonable size for a band, but she wasn’t sure she could manage both flowers, and bows in that space. Not to mention that she needed to work lace into the mix somehow.
Once more she shook out the folds of cloth and folded it again, a happy medium between the two sizes. This was more like something she could work her plan into, however, when she held the band against her hair it appeared far too wide, too bulky, to work. She would have to go with the half hand size and replan her design around the size of the band, rather than sizing the band according to the design in her mind.
So with her new size in mind, she moved away to work on the design. She considered cutting the band and designing off that, but after a few ticks of thought she decided a better method would be to draw the band first, and design on paper, that way if nothing worked out just right at first, she didn’t have cloth that was cut too small, or even too large, not when she’d had to change her tentative plan once already.