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September 16...ooops that 17th, 2022
Ah- the tech monster attacks again - tried to send this out last night, but the dates got a little confused, so here we are a day late, but still with great feeling!
WRINKLE PHOBIA
Sometimes when we're sewing, the wrinkles can overtake us to the point that it becomes a maze of never-ending problems. We expect our clothing to perform and act way beyond anything that RTW offers, and even beyond what is possible for clothing to do.
Clothing that never wrinkles is not only impossible but impractical to wear. We see movies or people in costumes that really belie the true function of clothing.
 
Both of these are ridiculous examples of what clothing should be. The one on the right is a cartoon for goodness sakes, and the one on the right is a costume created for a certain look at a certain point in the movie. We forget that this character may have had 14 or more costumes made for the movie because 1. she kept splitting out of it, 2. she had to look pristine for every scene and 3. the costume kept failing and had to be replaced cause it was drooping or otherwise showing
"wrinkles" that weren't in the cartoon.
This isn't clothing - this is make-believe type stuff that is not even part of the real world.
The fact that we have wrinkles shouldn't make us think something's wrong with our clothing because there are wrinkles in it. When in fact, the wrinkles are meant to be and and have to be there for the garment to move.
No one would think that these clothes are irregular or that they don't look right because they have wrinkles.
 
In fact most people would think something was wrong if these clothes didn't wrinkle as Princess Anne is walking and as Niki Haley is waving. These clothes have to wrinkle to allow the movement of their bodies.
Our clothes are not to be confining. They are basically there to protect us from the elements. And when they do that, they can be an expression of who we are. In the case of Princess Anne, a symbol of stability, honor and good judgement, in the case of Niki Haley, welcoming, approachable, professional and competent. Both garments represent their owners' desire and projection.
So where do we draw the line between bad wrinkles and good wrinkles?
We start with our fitting stance - and this is very important. We may not like the way we look at our natural stance position, but it is how we should stand when we are doing fittings.
What we need to be thinking about here starts with the shoulders, and how they fit, then how the garment hangs from the shoulders.
After we correct the hang/drape of the garment, then we can look at the bow or splay of the garment (does it tilt in or out) and then correcting this, we stabilize or make sure that the garment is stable so that when we move around, it returns and rests on that same spot every time.
Throughout this process it is inevitable to  run across errant and irregular wrinkles. But standing with your weight on one hip and seeing a wrinkle in your pant leg or your skirt is not a good way to stand while fitting. It causes unnecessary wrinkles and once corrected,
when you go back to your natural stance, you have a whole new set of wrinkles that you don't really need to re-fit to make your clothing look better.
There is only one time I have veered from this rule, and it's because this rider was not only graded on her performance but on her clothes. The jacket could not wrinkle in the waist and around the torso - I suppose it was a sign of poor posture. So I had her on a fake sawhorse, to imitate her stance while riding her horse.
Obviously gaps, gobs of fabric (particularly under the arm), and wrinkles representing poor draping, bowing or splaying, are wrong. But don't get too hung up on this.
No one would accuse these wrinkles to be bad...
 
In fact most people would agree that these wrinkles are natural and totally warranted in these stances.
So yes, fit your wrinkles so that they smooth out, but remember that a "no-wrinkle" look, is fake, like the actress who has to change 40 times in a movie to make the costume look natural, and the cartoon character can't help who she is, she's just drawn that way! 😜
This is a beginning guide on what to do with your core pattern after you have fitted and worked on it.
All the work that you have done in your core pattern contains all the information to make a garment that you will totally love. This means you really don't have to buy another pattern for making skirts, pants or leggings. Variations on your core pattern makes it possible for you to have the styles you see in a photo or on Pinterest without having to look for the pattern that looks like it might work. You can now simply trace it onto your core pattern and
you're done.
This resource also contains some other important resources at huge discount because they are so important to this creative process of varying your core pattern. It also contains some downloads that aren't available in the Resource Library at all, but are vital toward making good design.
In this world of crazy, illogical fashion, we sewists are having to turn into designers. That sounds really hard and foreboding, but it's not. Unlike designers, we simply haven't had all the experience they have, most of that experience they got when they went to design school. More than anything I wanted to make this process encouraging, empowering and enlightening without having to worry about whether or not you could vary your core pattern.
You can! It isn't that hard. It is knowing some guidelines and charging out into the unknown. That's what we sewists do and we do it very well most of the time.
This is the beginning of the series into variations on core patterns. I wanted to start with something basic, so that you wouldn't feel so intimidated. It takes a while to write these up, cause I'm an idea factory, and coordinating and organizing these ideas can be monumental with the sewing muse yacking in my ear 24/7.
The resource is available now at a discount so that you can enjoy it before spring starts in full force. Right now, I'm thinking happy, colorful and pretty. Those are all fresh looks for future clothes. When things seem upside down, it's great to have something to make us happy and often bright, springtime and summertime fabrics are just as much as drab, dark and somber fabrics. I'm ready to be beautiful, comfortable and look flattering in my clothes and
I'm dying to share that with you.
Skirts, Core Pattern Variations, Part 1 (but there's more than skirts in here)
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