Music Magic
Dáire 'Mote
St. Michael's Loreto
Meath County Council
This outfit was inspired by a dress worn by the character Fran Fine in the sitcom ‘The Nanny”. The items used to create the outfit were all sourced from Dáire’s own home and included a white dress, a black skirt, a white table cloth and a pair of ballet flats.
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Dáire cropped the black skirt, cutting the black piano keys from the offcut.
She cut and hemmed a strip of the white table cloth and sewed knife pleats to create the white keys of the piano.
Dáire carefully measured each of the keys according to measurements she took from her piano. She then sewed the black keys on, using a zig-zag stitch before attaching it to the bottom of the skirt.
The top was made from the white dress which Dáire altered dramatically.
Overcoming many obstacles on the way, she cut the top off the dress, removed the sleeves and took in the side seams to fit her. As it wasn’t sitting right, Dáire cropped the top shorter and added a black strip leftover from the skirt alteration, creating a princess style line.
She took in the bottom of the dress at the side seams and attached it to the black strip, lining up the button placates. She then altered the neck line by cutting off the collar and reshaping the front and back.
Dáire used the remaining black fabric from the skirt to cover the toes of the shoes, continuing the black and white contrasting colour palette of the outfit.
She also embellished them with pearls at the back.
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Dáire researched the production of viscose which requires a high concentration of toxic chemicals, such as sulfur, nitrous oxides, carbon disulfide and hydrogen sulfide, causing air pollution especially around viscose manufacturing sites.
