Déboutonner la mode - My most treasured Book

This book is the catalogue from an exhibition I went to see while visiting Paris last year. It was a surprise visit. Our host offered to take us to Louvre, though not to see the main exhibition, but a small one, dedicated to fashion jewellery and buttons and their history. While the jewellery section, which turned out to be really small, did offer some interesting pieces, it was the button exhibition that was truly impressive!

The book was also a surprise, as I got it as a gift.

How to attatch a buckle with a prong to a belt

Generally, I prefer slider buckles, not because they are easier to sew, but because they do not require making all these little holes along the belt. Plus you can loosen it slightly while at a big dinner (something so typical in Spain...) in a very discreet way ;)

But today I want to show you how to deal with the other kind of buckles, those with prongs. It works both or metal and plastic prongs, as these can sometimes cannot be removed without braking them.

I know two ways of attaching a buckle to a belt. In the first one you have to consider the prong while making the belt itself.

Casein - An Early Plastic

As I was cleaning my first group of buttons, I started discovering different materials. At the beginning I expected all the buttons to be simply made of plastic. I had no idea they could be any different. Of course, I could tell some were made of metal or mother of pearl, but the rest was just plastic to me.

These buttons smelled suspicious to me...

But then, some buttons looked different. They were lighter or made a different sound when put together in a bag. Some others had uneven surface on the back. I started researching and I learnt that there are lots of other materials in the plastic family, actually, most are early kinds of plastic, which have different properties. And thanks to this information, it is also easier to date the items as made in different decades of the 20th century.

How to take good product photos

...and without photoshop!

Hi everybody!

Since I started my button adventure, my photographic skills have improved significantly. At first I had little idea of how to take attractive pictures and they would look like this:

How to take a prong off a buckle

Most belt buckles come with a metal prong. While some antique buckles may have casein prongs, which are impossible to remove without breaking the piece, the prongs on most modern buckles are easy to remove. In my shops I do it as a standard service, but if you have bought one WITH a prong and now you have changed your mind, don't worry. It is easy to fix.

These yellow buckles originally had a metal prong
but the customer requested to have them removed.

You can do it in two different ways. Sometimes one way is better than the other.

Button Button - my first book about buttons!

When I started my button adventure, I had little idea of the immense variety of buttons, designs and materials there might be. I could date my original collection very easily, as the buttons were from an old haberdashery shop, opened circa 1958 and closed sometime between 1962 and 1963. So there is little doubt left about it. However, as I got interested in the early plastics and vegetable ivory, I decided to look for more precise information. That's how I encountered "Button Button" book.

It is not a new publication, as it was issued in 1993. As you can see, the pictures look really old, and what was new then, is already vintage today. ;) For example, 1970s buttons are referred to as modern.

How to machine sew a button

Although it may not seem this way, machine-sewing buttons to your garment is not only easier, faster, but also stronger. One day I had virtually five minutes to go, and just discovered that a button was missing from a coat. I found the spare one attached to the label on the lining, but I had no time to look for the needle and sew it. I decided to use the machine. It took me less than a minute (OK, I admit that I had the right thread on the machine).

I will show you how to sew a button using your sewing machine it in a few steps.