ELEGANTEES FOR BREAKFAST

When I was living back at home in Iowa, I had a very large space to do design work in. Compared now to Manhattan, space is now much smaller and rent is higher....but, it's so worth it to us! We love living in New York City. My husband is a native of Queens, and is a singer, working on developing his voice and a CD this year. As for me, well, it's obvious I'm a fashion designer, and while it's not always efficient to work in a small space, it’s a dream come true to be in New York!

When my husband and I were looking at apartments right before our wedding in June, we knew we could make our place work because our first date was at IKEA, and we got very inspired. (Haha, just kidding, but our first date really was at IKEA.) For those of you who don't know, IKEA is a small space savvy furniture store that is especially popular in cities where apartment space is limited.

One morning, I was borrowing the fridge handle to hang samples I was working on. When Israel woke up, he comes out in his PJs. As he opened the door to the fridge he asks, "Elegantees for breakfast?"

My husband is amazing, btw! I am very impressed with how he is not only so supportive of my passion, vision, and heart for Elegantees, but he sacrifices his personal livingroom/kitchen space just for me. However, I know he is praying we can upgrade to a bigger apartment when our lease is up. I really cannot blame him though; and once you see the next set of photos, you'll agree ;-)

I do so many things in our kitchen. I do the pattern-making,  sewing the samples, trying on the samples and making adjustments to the fit and style all in our Manhattan junior 1-bedroom pad! Our kitchen table has multiple uses as well! Sometimes we’ll have dinner with the sewing machines 4 inches from the salad bowl. Enjoy these pictures I took recently while I was cooking up some Elegantees for breakfast.

 

Temporary storage while I use another part of the apartment.

Pattern adjusting

 

My handwriting is terribly sloppy! But when I'm writing down fit corrections, I note things quicker than a doctor.

 

The design board on the wall

  

Elegantees for dinner (sewing machines to my right). Oh in case you're wondering, Israel cooked.

 

Mr. & Mrs. Martinez (we do get out of our kitchen/livingroom/workstation/storage)