The deconstruction and reconstruction of design
I don't have my own slopers, I haven't had them for years. Without slopers it's difficult to draft a pattern. You can drape from scratch, but I don't personally have the genius to pull that off. I'm a drafter. So if you're a drafter without slopers (basic clothes templates for those who didn't know) how do you draft anything? You take an existing pattern that is similar in size to what you want, with similar seam lines and few details, you make a mock up, put it on Headless Helen for a deconstruction.
Then you redraw the pattern on dot paper and do another mock-up. This is where you find out how much you suck at drafting patterns. I don't actually suck at it. To get the kind of quality people will want to pay half their children's trust funds to get require many fittings, an attention to detail that most people don't have. The slightest bowing to a seam can make a garment look like crap. This mock up here is alright. It's for a new apron style, so it would be a mistake for it to be too fitted. I need it to be wearable by a range of figures. I can tell you right now that I'm too fat to wear it.Today I need to find a live body to put it on. While working in the store. Sundays aren't usually so busy for us, but most Sundays aren't the second to last Sunday before Christmas. So it might be busier than usual. Either I need to ask a customer to let me put this on them and hope they'll understand if I accidentally touch their bosom, or I need to jet down to the bookstore where I might find someone working there that I know who would be willing, (for the sake of good design), to stand still and let me fuss with seams without worrying that I'm making a pass at them.
I love this process of deconstructing and reconstructing until something great is achieved. This is how I got to my last pattern. Which I'm tired of making. I am in need of more aprons because my aprons are selling. Which is GREAT! But it means that I need to get moving to make new ones and I thought I could whip out a new design I've had on my mind for a while. Just rip it out fast, but that's not how it works. Not if I want a result I'm going to be happy with. So now I think I need to just cut out more of the old pattern and work on the new pattern when I'm done. Time is of the essence here.
I'll have time to work on the new pattern during the next month when it will be dead in the store. When everyone coming in has an obvious hangover. The month of great ennui. It's also the month I was born in and the heart of winter. Which I love. It's also the month I was married in fourteen years ago. January is a hibernating month when new growth is gathering energy, when new ideas percolate in the heads of people cooped up and restless. The solemn bleakness of January is beautiful in it's simplicity and in it's necessity.
I annoyed a young woman who works at Harvest Fresh by bursting in the door with cheeks red with cold, bringing the gusts of wind in with me, and cheerily announcing that I LOVE the cold weather, and "Boy, wouldn't it be wonderful if it snowed again?!". She looked at me like I was black mold and let me know how much she loathes the cold, how much she hates winter and snow. Especially the snow. She's from California, as I am, but apparently she really belongs there, unlike me. She's got no spirit to her. She's like a delicate hothouse flower. She's saving money to move back to the sunshine state. I wish her well, I hope she makes it back. She can take the place of all the people immigrating to Oregon, the better state.
Seriously though, California is a wonderful place to live. I'm not insulting it. I mean, I might at any moment, but not right now. I think I can be allowed to love the state I'm living in more than the state I left. I just don't want to betray the people we love and care about who still live there. Plus, I really don't want to rub any one's nose in the superiority of Oregon who doesn't live here. Let's all remember how many fewer teeth per capita there are here. Oregon isn't a perfect state, it's just perfect for us.
Our sales yesterday were the best we've ever had since opening our shop six months ago.
What I don't understand is why so many people have checked out our website and we've had only two orders. I wish that if anyone knew what is stopping people from purchasing that they'd tell us. The prices are good, it's pretty smooth to navigate, and there's lots of great stuff there. What are we not doing? What detail is off?
Don't forget to enter to win an apron in the "Worst Gift Ever" contest! Go to www.dustpanalley.com for details!
I love this process of deconstructing and reconstructing until something great is achieved. This is how I got to my last pattern. Which I'm tired of making. I am in need of more aprons because my aprons are selling. Which is GREAT! But it means that I need to get moving to make new ones and I thought I could whip out a new design I've had on my mind for a while. Just rip it out fast, but that's not how it works. Not if I want a result I'm going to be happy with. So now I think I need to just cut out more of the old pattern and work on the new pattern when I'm done. Time is of the essence here.
I'll have time to work on the new pattern during the next month when it will be dead in the store. When everyone coming in has an obvious hangover. The month of great ennui. It's also the month I was born in and the heart of winter. Which I love. It's also the month I was married in fourteen years ago. January is a hibernating month when new growth is gathering energy, when new ideas percolate in the heads of people cooped up and restless. The solemn bleakness of January is beautiful in it's simplicity and in it's necessity.
I annoyed a young woman who works at Harvest Fresh by bursting in the door with cheeks red with cold, bringing the gusts of wind in with me, and cheerily announcing that I LOVE the cold weather, and "Boy, wouldn't it be wonderful if it snowed again?!". She looked at me like I was black mold and let me know how much she loathes the cold, how much she hates winter and snow. Especially the snow. She's from California, as I am, but apparently she really belongs there, unlike me. She's got no spirit to her. She's like a delicate hothouse flower. She's saving money to move back to the sunshine state. I wish her well, I hope she makes it back. She can take the place of all the people immigrating to Oregon, the better state.
Seriously though, California is a wonderful place to live. I'm not insulting it. I mean, I might at any moment, but not right now. I think I can be allowed to love the state I'm living in more than the state I left. I just don't want to betray the people we love and care about who still live there. Plus, I really don't want to rub any one's nose in the superiority of Oregon who doesn't live here. Let's all remember how many fewer teeth per capita there are here. Oregon isn't a perfect state, it's just perfect for us.
Our sales yesterday were the best we've ever had since opening our shop six months ago.
What I don't understand is why so many people have checked out our website and we've had only two orders. I wish that if anyone knew what is stopping people from purchasing that they'd tell us. The prices are good, it's pretty smooth to navigate, and there's lots of great stuff there. What are we not doing? What detail is off?
Don't forget to enter to win an apron in the "Worst Gift Ever" contest! Go to www.dustpanalley.com for details!