The End - Handmade Wardrobe

Allright, virtual parties or not, there's some more to review about the past year. My goal was to create a wardrobe, of which at least 75% would be handmade. Let's take a look at what I made, with this (quite crucial) question in mind: do I wear it?

Purple shrug

XL to S

Imagine This

Dyed Shirts

• The Purple Shrug: Well knitted, but I almost never wear it. Certainly not recently. Purple just isn't really my colour. Plus it's a bit twee.
• The XL to S shirt: Well you know what happened to it. Only wore it a few times before it's second makeover.
• The Imagine This shirt: I got quite some wear out of that one, even wore it to job interviews. It made me feel confident, out of the ordinary but professional. Sadly I've outgrown it through my improving sewing skills. It no longer meets my standards. I chose the wrong fabric for one thing. I do still like the design though, maybe I'll make another, better one.
• The dyed shirts: Yeah. Should not have dyed them, really. Never wore them.

Hmm, below average scores. I guess my makes of the first half year were not very succesfull. I have to keep in mind that my fashion sense was also non-existent at the time, and my sewing skills were minimal. Next round please!

Knitted Shrug

Yellow Hoodie

Basic Floral Top

Polka Dot Top

• Knitted Shrug: Nope, don't wear it. The design is just not right.
• Yellow hoodie: Ofcourse I wear it, it's awesome ;) The first big succes, in the sense that I wear it a lot and I got a lot of response to it. About 20 people requested the measurements! This was also the start of my mustard addiction.
• Basic Floral Shirt: I did get a lot of wear out of it, but I've noticed I favour other shirts over this one lately. I had a temporary floral phase, and it seems to be over now. 
• The Polka Dot Top: Don't wear it a lot, but the weather hasn't been great. I wear it on nights out, and I do still like it.

Well, that's better! Can you see the learning curve? Better designs, better sewing. At this time I also started to draft my own patterns. And I joined BurdaStyle.com, a great place to learn from other sewists. 

Summer Green

Pink Balloon Skirt

Boyfriend T-shirt

Kimono Sweater

• Summer Green: I like the fabric, but I don't wear it for three reasons: don't like the length, don't like the pleats and I have nothing to wear it with. The first two reasons were dealt with recently, I'll tell you more about it later. 
• Pink Balloon Skirt: The fabric is lovely, and I have started to wear it more often. It's just that the lace makes it hard to combine for some reason. I'm thinking of re-doing the whole skirt, the seams are starting to fall apart because it's quite heavy. 
• Boyfriend T-shirt: I wear this quite often. It's casual and it pairs well with the Dance Pants.
• Kimono Sweater: Have worn it, but it's a bit too warm right now. Am still happy with it. 

With these makes, I tried lots of new techniques. Drafting a waistband, installing invisible zippers, making a balloon skirt, gathering, using bias tape. The overall quality of sewing is higher and better thought through.  

Remake with Bow

Striped Basic

Dance Pants

S to Awesome

• Men's Shirt Remake: One of my favourite work shirts. I wear it a lot, wíth bow! 
• Striped Basic: Also wear this often. It goes well with the Dance Pants. The fabric is not the best quality though, and it shows. 
• Dance Pants: I wear them when the weather permits it. These are one of my favourite makes, because they pair well with other handmade garments.
• S to Awesome: Another favourite work shirt, for warmer day's. 

Two remakes in this row, I love to do those! And they turned out te be my favourite shirts. I have some tweaking to do on the dancepants, I'm thinking of adjusting the waistband and the pipe hems. I sewed them a bit hasty, never a good thing. On to the last row!

Mustard Mini

Summer Dress

Flower Harem Pants

Party Frock

• Mustard Mini: Unbelievable how much response I got on this. Almost just as much as my Yellow Hoodie! It is one of my favourites, too. I wear it quit often. Am working on the tutorial, too!
• Summer Dress: Happy with this one. I concentrated on neat finishing which payed off.
• Flower Harem Pants: AKA Awesome Pants :) Lovely and comfortable.
• Party Frock: Well just made this yesterday, but I'm wearing it again today! 

All four of these are favourites, but I only just made them. It might be that they fall out of grace a few makes down the line, when the bar is placed yet higher. But I don't really think that will happen, these really display my personal style.

When overlooking all these makes, you see the coherence? Me neither. That's the main problem of my handmade wardrobe at the moment: it consists of separate garments that cannot be easily combined with eachother. I have set no perimeters for colours or style. To really create a coherent wardrobe, I'll have to choose some colour groups and stick to that. I already have some ideas, and I'll share them with you next week.

About that 75% rule: 20 new garments + 4 I haven't shown you yet + 1 I made before I started this blog, means 7 RTW garments... Hm I'm afraid that won't be possible, seeing that I already don't wear 5 of the makes above. When I add all the other things I made, the plaid, bags, sleeves and wallet, it comes to a total of 35, which makes for 11 RTW garments. That should be doable! I'll get back to you about that later.

Tomorrow I'll tell you about the UFO's and misfits I haven't shown you!