Happy Holidays

Hope ya'll are having awesome times with your family and friends. I was sick for a majority of Christmas with a nasty virus. To the point where I was barely eating Christmas dinner. And I am kind of a non-stop food bag.
But aside from that, it was magical. My parents got me lots of warm winter clothes along with a rice cooker (HELL YES) and Trevor got me an Ashley Wood Designer Toy Robot, a silver bracelet and some lovely perfume I wanted. I also got Christmas money so I was able to buy myself some new boots so I can stop wearing my crusty buckle boots.

Anyway, tonight is New Years! Not sure what the plan is yet, but something fun will happen for sure. I always really like New Years because it feels like a 100% new start so I always make a ridiculously long list of resolutions. Here are just a few:
- Read a new book every month at least
- Learn to cook like a ninja
- Start prepping and sending out fashion illustration portfolio
- Visit Europe
- Try to buy things from local businesses if financially possible
- Try to buy as much organic food as possible
- Start an initiative to help those in need (eg. Pakistani flood victims, animal abuse, etc.)
There are more, but I'm not about to upload a book onto blogger. Anyways - Embroidery is going well, almost finished. Moving onto costumes soon and simultaneously peeing my pants. I swear, I always get sick at the worst possible time. And aside from that, I just finished up a BravoFACT production 2 weeks ago, have some contract work lined up for the next few weeks and shall be quite busy.
OH YEAH, and to all Toronto people, please stop by the Steamwhistle Gallery January 5th in the distillery district to see our 'Time and Space' show!

Steamwhistle Show

Opening on the 5th of January and running through the end of the month, Space and Time is a group show of illustrators and textile artists.
Lose yourself in time at the opening with drinks, food, conversation AND live music by

BEST MAN ( http://www.myspace.com/bestmanbestman )
THE ETHERS ( http://www.myspace.com/theethers )

Featuring:
Abe Nelson
Erin Ornstein
Gillian Blekkenhorst
Jenn Woodall
JJ Tebrake
Kaity Hill
Katherine Verhoeven
Laura Harte
Mary Verhoeven
Molly McCracken
Trevor Henderson

Big thanks to Kat Verhoeven for all her hard work in keeping this organized.
Also, probably no updates for the remainder of the month. Gotta get Steamwhistle work finished, some sketches for film projects, contract work for company, repair work for solo performer and somehow fitting in a seasonal Christmas job in order to afford gifts. Sigh.

Sneak peak

Hey ya'll,
So I just finished my first piece for the Steamwhistle show in January. Well, 80% finished. I just gotta bust out some real fancy stitches for the border. Anyway, here is a sneak peak of piece #1 for my 'Fabric of Time' exhibit!


Just finished my gig at Stage West. It was excellent. Going to see the show tomorrow with the boyfriend. He'll get to see all those Egyptian collars we slaved over for weeks! It'll be great. Plus, free food. The thing I cannot resist.
Anyway, lots of stuff coming up. Designing a collection I hope to be shown at Alternative Fashion Week come spring. Doing some indie film projects.
ALSO - ANOTHER JENN WOODALL?! It's true! I recently discovered another Jenn Woodall (although she is Jen whereas I am Jenn) here in Toronto who does some work on film! Will the madness never end?! I linked her on my sidebar, because how can you not keep tabs on your bizarro twin living in the same city?
On a final note, I am planning to go travelling next September. I would love to visit Madrid (for the Gaudi architecture), Paris (because it's Paris), and Italy (to see Rome and Venice. Venice being a place I have wanted to visit since being a youngin.) We'll see how this pans out. I'll probably just end up sitting at home in a beret watching Amelie and weeping.
Oh yes, and Jenny Hart is part of an art show going on in Toronto starting November 18th at the Drake Hotel. If you love embroidered art, go and check out her work. It's amazing beyond belief.

Moved out and moved in

I am officially a resident of Toronto once again! Oh, Toronto. How I missed your 24 hour action. How I missed your crazy people vandalizing TTC property. How I missed reading the angry political discourse in NOW magazine.
So what have I been up to? Just finished work on a short film about a week ago. Just started my new gig at Stage West in the costume department. Working on a sewing contract for Black Diamond. OH YEAH, I had an art show about 2-3 weeks ago. I should have posted about it but I am forgetful. It was at Function 13, it was cool, it's finished now, tada! I got some lovely feedback despite having a mental breakdown during the show. Oh, constant self-criticism. My worst enemy.


OH, so last Wednesday, the Design Exchange had an AMAZING panel on costume design. The guest speakers were Marjory Fielding, wardrobe supervisor at the National Ballet of Canada, Monique Prudhomme, costume designer for films such as 'The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus' and 'Juno', and Dawna Pym, a teacher at Seneca who runs some costume programs at the ROM that I have to check out now. Did I mention it was amazing? Ms. Fielding discussed the history of dance and ballet, as well as the history of the Tutu. (!) Ms. Prudhomme discussed working as a costume designer for film and some stories from productions she's done. Ms. Pym told us about the ROMs costume collection, as well as Senecas, and it was really interesting. And they even brought in garments from previous ballet productions and the costume collection at Seneca! It was so great to see a tutu up close. We had to wear special gloves to touch them. It's amazing the amount of work that goes into tutus. It makes me really want to try and make one myself.. Maybe when I'm less frantically busy.


And afterwards, they had a short Q&A. They actually stayed even later to talk to people one and one! I can't tell you how giddy I was to speak to Monique Prudhomme, whom I just think is an amazing designer. I also introduced myself to Marjory Fielding, as we only knew eachother via e-mail. I left the event feeling giddy and walking on clouds. It was such an amazing night. Then I went out with Trevor and Mary to grab dinner and had ultra delicious guacamole. Speaking of which, I should make some for my housewarming party.
Oh yeah, the design exchange is pretty much the coolest thing ever. I did a guest-speaking gig there back in June. Link is on the side. For any designer or artist, they are always doing great things that you should definetely check out!
What else, what else.. The steamwhistle show is approaching for January. Starting it now, really really excited for the show. I think it'll be great. I have to apply for Toronto Alternative Fashion Week 2011 very soon. OH, I have a really great gig coming up.. But it's top secret! And super nerdy and amazing! I'll definetely post pictures and info later on when the jig is up.
Oh yeah, and our new apartment? So awesome.

Vote for me!

I have a profile on Talenthouse.com. Recently, they announced a competition to design a stage outfit for Florence Wench, of 'Florence and the Machine.' (Listen to 'Cosmic Love' if you haven't, it's excellent.) I entered the contest myself so I can trying to rally support! If you have a minute, please go and vote for my entry! If you don't wanna vote for me, feel free to go through all the other submissions!

>> VOTE FOR JENN! <<

Other than that - Incredibly busy!! Working on film sets, sewing bags for my online store, working part-time. OH, one thing I no longer have to do is house hunt! We found the perfect apartment and we'll be moving in November 1st. Maybe a few days before if possible so we can have a radical house-warming/costume party. But we'll see!
Anyway, I'll update again soon when I don't have a pile of sewing to tackle.

UNION! UNION!

Wow, no updates for a month? I AM TERRIBLE. But I'm updating now, so it's okay. I just got home from the IATSE set etiquette course over the weekend. I am now a permit with IATSE Local 873! IATSE is the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, which means I can now (hopefully) start getting work on union film gigs doing work in wardrobe. Then eventually I can apply for membership. SO EXCITING. It makes me feel like I'm some sort of half-adult with some figments of responsibility.
Things have been pretty busy! I'm done with the Feature in Collingwood. This month I also helped Nina with some contract work for the Toronto International Film Festival. She really is the nicest lady and so incredibly helpful. It's great to meet people who are so passionate about helping out little underlings like myself. Then last week, I was on a shoot with a costume designer by the name of Nicole Nader, another awesome lady, for a Canadian band 'The Trews'. Right now I'm waiting for my part-time job to get back to me, because I got an offer for work on a feature in Hamilton, and I need to book that time off in order to go on location. With Megan, a fellow Ryerson grad! Who is great!
Me and Trevor are vigorourly continuing the apartment hunt.. And by me and Trevor, I mean me. Mainly because he works full-time, I'm more of a freelancer so I have a bit more spare time. Also, I'm incredibly thorough so I am good at this searching, detail-oriented stuff. We saw a beautiful apartment earlier this week so we're waiting on a call for that place. FINGERS CROSSED


In OTHER news, I want this so desperately. It's a new figure by Ashley Wood, sold at the Magic Pony in Toronto. (Go to the Magic Pony - Go amazing.) I keep wanting to go drop some of my dollars on it but I'm SO FRUGAL it hurts. But robots are so awesome. CONFLICT!
Anyway - I can't think of much to say. Probably because I'm exhausted? I've only gotten a few hours of sleep every night this week so.. That is bad.

Collingwood has werewolves

HERE IS MY EXCITING UPDATE: I am on a film set in Collingwood. PRETTY EXCITING, I know. I can't say much, except it's an indie low-budget feature horror flick in the same vein of movies as 'The Monster Squad.' It is pretty fun, and pretty exhausting. I'm working under a costume designer, Olivia Sementsova and her assistant, Megan. They are both super awesome ladies! And Megan is a fellow Ryerson graduate, so she can feel my pain. Olivia is a really nice lady and is very patient with my extremely constant stream of questions about costume. Her costumes for the film are also AMAZING. I'm learning a lot and hopefully someday I'll be half as competant as Olivia or Megan.


ALSO EXCITING, I am going to be working for 'So you think you can dance Canada' come September! I recently worked with a costume designer called Nina Okens and I mentioned I was trying to find work with SYTYCDC. She knew a costume designer working in the department and put in a good word for me. Jolene Antle is a costume designer working on the production, and she is also incredibly nice. I'm really excited to start this position.
Man, usually I have a ton more to write, but my brain is kind of dead. Most likely from the constant sewing, production antics and general lack of sleep.
I AM GOING TO DRIVE INTO THE SUNSET NOW AND PICK UP PAPERWORK FROM STAPLES.
Also, are you pumped for Scott Pilgrim.. I AM. GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

Design Exchange Guest Speaker

A short and sweet update. I know I mentioned in my previous post that I'll be a guest speaker at the Design Exchange, so now here are the details. I'll be a guest speaker at the Design Exchange's 'Drama + Design' workshop from July 19th to July 23rd. There are some other really great Toronto designers that'll also be speaking all throughout July and August. Click the link below for lots more details:
Design Exchange Design Camp
Also, new updates on the website.. New content in the costume / illustration sections. I got an e-mail today from the owner of the Sleeping Giant gallery in Toronto where a bunch of my illustrator friends have had work on display and I've been accepted into an art show for October 1st. Should be fun!

Starting my new job this week.. I'm excited!
P.S. Check out the side bar for my link on IMDB.. I have credits on IMDB! HOW RAD IS THAT. SUPER RAD.

Finally!

A couple of months ago, my friend Joshua Von Garber agreed to shoot the costumes from my thesis collection. This has been ongoing for quite a while - Trying to schedule time between our conflicting commitments and ALSO trying to sort things out with the 2 models. In the end, we only ended up using one model, Noemi. But she was absolutely perfect and looked beautiful in all the outfits and photographs. Josh also did a really amazing job with the location selection, lighting, posing, EVERYTHING. So now I can finally post them all up on my blog. Whoooo!





I`ve got a lot of work to catch up on, phone calls to make.. I`m waiting on some news right now. Hopefully, it will be positive! Maybe I`ll have something exciting to post soon.

Frantic

The craziness of the G8/G20 is over. So that means I can share my work with the people of the interwebs. I was hired by Oxfam Canada to be the costume designer for their protest stunts to draw attention to certain issues during the summit. Pregnant stomaches and nude suits were created and used to bring attention to the maternal health of women across the Globe. Oxfam was gracious enough to send me all the media coverage they could find, which is linked below:

The Star
The Toronto Sun
The Vancouver Sun
Calgary Herald
The Edmonton Sun
Global TV
CBC

I loved working on this project for a variety of reasons. The G8/G20 summit was something I was adamently against, so to have the chance to work with Oxfam to stage a public protest stunt was the perfect way to balance my costume designer work with my own political beliefs and activism. I feel the G20 summit was a defining moment for Toronto. I do not wish to paint all protesters or police officers with the same brush - But from what I've read, what I've seen and from close friends who were actually THERE during the protests, I think a lot of people saw the police force in a way they had never seen them before. The injustice of the conduct of these individuals is unacceptable. A public inquiry into the incident is important and necessary. We must exercise our rights as citizens and demand an investigation into the events of that weekend. Linked below is Amnesty International's Appeal to the Government of Canada to have an independent inquiry into the G20.
Amnesty International - G20 Inquiry
I just finished interning with Nina Okens, a costume designer working in Toronto. She was designing costumes for a play of 'Taming by the Shrew' by Shakespeare. I learned so much from her and really enjoyed the work. She was quite the inspirational lady to spend time with. It also proved to me that not ALL industrial machines are evil. So now I am definetely going to save up for one. She is also trying to introduce me to a friend of hers who works in film and television, which would be great! We'll see if it leads to a wonderous work opportunity.
I just finished my entry for the Hand & Locke embroidery competition a week ago or so.

OH YEAH - Other exciting news. I've been asked to be a guest speaker at the Design Exchange in Toronto. Very exciting!! So today I have to take a photograph of myself NOT looking silly (very hard to do) and send off a short bio. Something like, "Jenn Woodall is a sleep-deprived and anxiety-ridden basket case." YES THAT SOUNDS ACCURATE.

I got a job interview for a costume shop on Friday.. ALSO cross your fingers for me. Me and Trevor are plotting on how we can go to Fantasia for 2 days to see the premiere of the Scott Pilgrim movie AND a play with Jeffrey Combs played EDGAR ALLEN POE. Yeah, it IS the coolest ever. Yes, I WILL be poor. Poorer.
The photoshoot for my thesis collection is also finished - and hopefully I'll have some images to upload very soon. STAY TUNED - Same bat time, same bat channel.

Job hunting

Me and most of my Toronto friends are unemployed. Hooray! It is extremely tough out there to find a job. Although I am being rather picky. The initial plan was to find any job I could in Brampton to save up for Paris. But since funding didn't come through from Ryerson, I had to abandon that plan. Now I'm focusing on finding a costume/sewing job. Which is hard! I had an interview with the Shakespeare festival in Prescott yesterday two days ago, which I think went well. The decision will be made tomorrow and hopefully it will be that I am who they want! If only! Other than that, I have sent out a variety of resumes to some theatre productions in Toronto and ALSO to Cirque Du Soleil. I would most likely die of happiness if Cirque Du Soleil offered me a job, I am not kidding.
Yesterday, I bought this book while at a Costco with my parents. (MY CRAZY SUMMER) PERHAPS it is a bit presumptuous?! However I am considering going to London next year so it would be a handy thing to have if I was able to suck up all the anxiety, apply AND get accepted. We will see.
The Hand and Lock embroidery competition deadline is June 30th so I definetely have to get on that. Money would help.. Currently I am doing contract work for Peach Berserk on Queen Street West. Tote bags! So if you want a tote bag, designed and sewn by me, go buy one. (Note: Nobody reads this blog, sob) And then there is the Grand Prix Fashion Competition in Japan, but honestly the chance of me being accepted into that is equivalent to the chances of me getting married to an alien who looks like Vincent Price.

Graduation, jobs and masters

Unfortunately, I had to withdraw from the Arts of Fashion Masterclass program for June 2010. I had been counting on funding from Ryerson which was unavailable at the last minute. They had a lot of requests this year! My parents are also not extremely wealthy so I couldn't really accept their help as I knew how much it would hurt them financially. As much as it makes me sad, I'm glad to be moving back to Toronto.
And Toronto is full of exciting opportunities! I met with Oxham Canada yesterday. They are organizing a publicity protest to be staged during the G8 summit in Toronto this June. I'm going to be designing and constructing costumes for them which I am extremely excited about.
I'm also doing some costumes for a client in Vancouver for a record release party.. I'm designing some futuristic alien costumes so that is really great for me, being the huge and ridiculous nerd that I am.
So right now I'm studying for my very last undegraduate exam! I got sick during the very last week of exams so I had to be rescheduled to the make-up week as to not infect the other students with the bubonic plague.
I'm also looking for a job.. I've applied with a few places although I'm being pretty picky. I am keeping focused on a sewing or design job so maybe something really excellent will happen soon.
Other than that.. Planning to go to New York City in July, planning to maybe do a weekly costume exercise on this blog? We'll see, currently I am very poor!

Mass Exodus coverage

So if anyone is interested in viewing my costume collection for my graduate year at Ryerson, all the photos are available on my grandportfolio site, the temporary site for my work while I get my website together.
--> RIGHT HERE <--

And here are a whole bunch of links to coverage of the event and my collection!
Urbane Bloc
Em Oh See Oh
She Does the City
This is Worldtown
FASH
There were also a whole bunch of important media types in attendance of the event who said some incredibly nice things on twitter!
Jeanne Beker: "Jenn Woodall's folkloric collection is bizarre fun!"
Stephanie Fereiro: "Jennifer Woodall, Little Red Riding Hood, Amazing."
Jeanne Beker is the host of Fashion Television and Stephanie Fereiro is a writer for WORN fashion journal (which I love so much.)
That's all for now.. I've gotta focus on packing my stuff, moving, getting over my sickness and getting a whole load of work finished.

First post / Renewed blog

I decided to erase my old blog which existed on a hotmail account (ugh) and open a new one from my gmail account (hoorah). I am officially done school but for one exam on the 28th. Then I will officially be a graduate! I am very excited. I've been at Ryerson for long enough, although I do sincerely love school so I'm not exactly sure what to do with myself now.
ANYWAYS - Exciting news! I will be going to Paris for the month of July. I was accepted into the Arts of Fashion Foundation's Summer Masterclass program. So I will be studying in the Louvre for the month alongside other creative fashion types, learning about creativity and art in fashion!

So that's incredibly exciting. I need to make money ASAP. Trevor will be coming with me as my travel companion and fellow sympathizer as a failure of the french language. Together we will be ignorant and confused by everything! As long as there is somebody else, it's okay!
Other than that, I've applied to a few competitions.. (Fingers crossed) and I've been doing some freelance work on the side which hopefully I'll be able to finish up soon. I'm also planning on starting an etsy store in the near future to sell some fabric art and hopefully make more money for Paris. So hopefully that will be a huge success that will make me rich!
Me and my illustrator friends are doing an art show at the Steamwhistle gallery. After a little bit of difficulty, we're slated in for January 2011. That's a ways away, however art takes a loooong time and at least this way, we can plan and plan. In my case, sew and sew and paint and paint and embroider.
That's about it for now. OH, if you are a Toronto or GTA resident (such as myself) I strongly advise you go see Gogol Bordello or Los Campesinos! tonight. Both are excellent.