Kimono de Jack Australia's first meet!

On Sunday was the Summer Japanese Festival down in Melbourne and the first KDJ Aus meet took place there!
Admittedly it was only the two of us but we handed out some flyers to people dressed in kimono and hopefully we can get some new people for the next event! Already the Facebook page has a few new likers :)

Just a small selection of photos, there's more on the KDJ Aus facebook page.

Was a good day, apart from being sunburnt to a crisp by the end of the day and nearly being blown away the rest of the time lol. Many people in yukata, some in proper kimono, some in shiny satin kimono, some in wa-loli, some in cosplay... some people were even just wearing haori over jeans or tights so it was good to see the variety :)

I think there will be another even planned soon so if you're interested please like the facebook page and keep watching!
My kitsuke wasn't great, I got changed in the toilets of a restaurant and my musubi got squished early on trying to move through the crowds... and it probably got really messy when I joined in the dance lol but it was fun!

Kitano Odori uploads and Kimono Remake #1

I've recently uploaded Kitano Odori from 1982-1989 on my Flickr.
In those Kitano are some of the maiko hikizuri that were recently up for auction on YJA a few weeks ago, just as a point of interest to anyone, I found them interesting because on the TM forums members had found those hiki being worn by Ume- maiko however in the Odori Programmes they are worn by Katsu- maiko so either they had two name lines or what, I don't know but it adds an extra dimension into the mystery.

Another project I've been looking at is turning kimono into dresses, skirts, coats etc and there's a great thread on IG forums about it Here.
As much as I love kimono sometimes its just not practicable to wear them so I really liked this idea for everyday wearing.

So here's what I came up with:

A very simple skirt, I was practising shirring so that's why the rest of it is basic. It turned out ok, but its not tight enough around my waist though, so I don't know if I need to change the thread tension or whether I should've used only three panel rather than four. Or used five panels but gather them a lot more so it flows more.
Either way, its ok but not great. I wasn't going to wear it outside the house anyway because the fabric is badly stained by grease it looks like. I tried washing the fabric before I sewed it up but I couldn't get rid of all the stains.

Here's the original kimono:

Sooo....that's what I did today.
I used one body panel, cut into four equal part, so I still have some fabric left to work with.
Thoughts?