So I have a sewing closet. Now, to be honest, I thought I'd have more room in there than I do. I'm pretty good with spacial relationships and figuring out what can go where, but I was really off with this closet. Probably due to the fact that I have a lot more sewing stuff than I thought I did. I'm at the point that if I get any more fabric for my stash that the rest of the household will disown me. I have a meme on one of my Pintrest boards that says it all.Or then there is this one.
I discovered recently how much hassle it's going to be to cut out large things in my closet. I sing in a local community choir and needed to make myself a new black skirt for performances. (The one I originally had disappered so I needed to make something quick.) And typical me, I waited until the afternoon of the concert to actually make this skirt. The only black fabric I had was a queen size flat sheet made out of a slippery fabric so getting it lay flat in a very confined space on a plastic tabletop was a disaster waiting to happen. I managed to do it (I'm not really sure how) and I now have a black concert skirt. And oddly enough, I managed to make it too big. A rare occurrence, to be sure. And I did it totally without a pattern. The hows and whys of that are for another blog.
So my sewing closet needs more room. I really wish I could use either one of the bedrooms or even the living room for my sewing room, but that's not going to happen. I'd love that, but only we were to move out of Fairport. And I love living in Fairport!! Electrical rates are Cheap!!!! Our electric bill for the whole month of November is a whopping $30.76. And that's with an electric stove. But I digress. What was I saying?
Oh yes, my sewing closet. It's small, cozy in a jail cell kind of way. It's a whole whopping 21 square feet. Maybe if I finish the projects I've started I might just see some progress and find another square inch of space. Yeah, a whole bunch of small projects for my Etsy store. I can do that! Though right that is all on hold. The light bulb blew the other night and now I can't sew unless I move my lamp in the living room. And that's not going to happen because the cord would have to be draped across a pathway from the front door into the living room proper and cause a safety hazard. We will just have to call maintenance and have one of the guys replace the closet light bulb, as well as all the other light bulbs that have blown out since we moved in. Including my closet light, we have 6 light bulbs that need replacing. As soon as the bulb is replaced I'm going to take some pictures of my sewing closet so you all can see my creative space, such as it is.
Every once in a while I go surfing for ideas for my sewing room and I look at some of the pictures others have put up of their sewing rooms, especially ones that their owners consider "tiny", and I'd wish I had that much space. These "tiny" rooms look so huge!
I've sewn in various spaces in my life. My mom had her old Kenmore console sewing machine in the living room and used the dining table to cut out the patterns. It was there she taught me some of the basics of sewing. In junior high, what is now called Middle School, and in high school I took Home Economics and I had the luxury of using good sized cutting tables and good Singer console sewing machines. I learned a lot then including how to start adjust patterns to my size because there was no such thing as "Plus Size" patterns in the late 60s. We were lucky to find patterns that went to size 22. After high school I did occasional sewing whenever I needed something special, but often something didn't turn out right and I'd have to go to a back up outfit.
After a while I got interested in Costuming. I love costumes and once had a Costume Party for my birthday. I've gone to college several times in my life, and it wasn't until I got to the college I from which eventually graduated that I finally decided to do costuming seriously. I started designing some things despite my inability to draw human figures. Also about this time I got a book that helped people design their own clothes based on specific measurements. There are several systems now like that one I use to have: The Lutterloh System and SURE-FIT DESIGNS™ are the only systems like that now, and of the two the Lutterloh comes closest to what I had way back when. There were several basic pattern shapes with lines radiating from a central point on a shape. One would pick the basic they wanted for shirts, pants, dresses, skirts, etc. The one would take a special ruler that come with the book and the shapes, and line up with one of the several lines. Each line has a number next to it and you make a dot next to the same number on the ruler.
When I went to college I started to get interested in costuming and in my senior year designed and built the costumes for a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. We had 21 in the cast and a total of 25 costumes. And all the patterns for the costumes were made with the pattern system I mentioned before. I learned a lot about patternmaking and knew I needed to learn more. Most of the costumes were built at the college so I had tables to cut out fabric and a decent sewing machine.
When I was sewing at home at that time I was still young and limber enough to sit cross-legged on the floor with a cardboard cutting board and spread out fabric, pin patterns, and cut out the pattern pieces. I then pulled my sewing machine along side me an stitched them together. Since I was sitting on the floor I used my knee instead of my foot on the foot pedal. That was how I sewed my maid-of-honor dress and the bride's maid dresses for two girlfriends when another girlfriend got married. I also sewed a flower girl dress for another friend's daughter for another wedding. Oh, those days. Now I cannot and dare not get down on the floor for fear I'd never get up on my feet again. Between of my excess weight and my arthritic knees floor sitting is a thing of the past for me.
At one point my mother set up a sewing area in her closet, also a walk-in, and I made my Bat Mitzveh dress in there.
After college I got an internship with a summer theatre company in Oklahoma and had a wonderful costume shop. I learned a lot from the other designers and realized I didn't know squat about designing costumes. I needed to learn a whole lot before I could call myself a designer again.
After that I went to another internship in Buffalo, NY and learned even more. It was a small but efficient costume shop that had professional sewing machines. It was the first time I had ever worked with them, and they included an overlock machine that scared the bejesus out of me. Press the foot pedal too far and you could easily take a finger off. The regular sewing machines weren't much better. Taught me that any sort of horsing around would not take place during work hours.
Then I took time off from sewing for a while because I wasn't able to get another theatre job. So I had to go into the real job force. Oh I did sew occasionally, it was not to the great extent I had done during and shortly after college.
After I moved to Kansas my girlfriend wanted me to sew some outfits for her, and that got me back into sewing. I made a robe for her and sewed a couple of skirts for myself, then we all got the bright idea to go to the KC Ren Fest. I was going to make costumes for me, my girlfriend, our husbands and her daughter. I ran out of time and only got her's, her daughter's and her husband's done. And even those weren't compleatly finish. Still had some last minute tweaking to do on the way to the Ren Fest. My sewing area then was the dining room of the trailer they had. The space was great and I've been wishing for something similar ever since.
But I still wasn't into full fledged sewing again. Not until I got involved with a local choir. They decided they were going to do a Cabaret style concert and we wouldn't have to wear the usual choir uniform of long black dress for the ladies and tuxes with black tie for the guys. We could be bright and colorful as we wanted. So I decided in a long sleeveless dress in purple with an ivory lace, short sleeve coat that had sparkles. Well by this time I had bought myself a four-stitch overlock machine, more commonly known as a serger, which was good because the purple was satin which ravels as soon as you cut it and I needed to finish the edges so there would be no raveling. My fiance and I had moved into a 2 bedroom apartment about the same time and so I used the second bedroom as my sewing room. A great bonus! So I was able to make a great sewing mess and then close the door when I was done for the day. The only part of the outfit that didn't get finished was the hem of the coat because I didn't have someone who could come over and help me figure out how long to make it. No one really noticed the hem, which was good.
We moved again to a 4 bedroom house and I didn't really have a sewing area. When I wanted to sew I just set up out into the main living room, which was mostly being used for storage at the time, and then had to put everything away when I was done or the cats would sprawl all over my project. The extra bedroom had been taken over by my girlfriend, but she had a problem with the sun beating in the room she moved out to the main living room and I got the bedroom. So another actual room that I could just shut the door on when I was through for the day. Yay! In that room I made a few things, including a gown from the Cavalier Period for a Basic Costuming class I was taking at the local community college. Then my girlfriend's 1st husband and their daughter moved in because of financial difficulties, and there went my sewing room. See the post from last 2012.
So then I'm regulated to a corner of the main living room where I again have to make sure I put things away when I done for the day because of cats. By this time I had decided to take some classes on Apparel Construction. I started with the first level class even though I could have started with the second level. I knew there were things I could learn that I didn't already know, and I was right. I had to make 3 garments for the class, and I learned something with each one. The last garment was a pair of slacks which I didn't finish. So I didn't get full marks on that one. But the other garments I made plus all my skill samples pushed me up to an A. I was so proud of myself!
So then I took the second level of Apparel Construction with a different teacher, Gigi. I Love that Woman!! She taught me so much! And the Sewing Lab at school was really great. I wish I had the space to make a sewing room like that. There were 4 cutting tables, 9 sewing machines, 6 sergers, 3 ironing boards each with a professional, gravity feed steam iron. There were also 2 professional sewing sewing machines, a professional blind hem machine and another professional machine we never talked about. And we had 2 embroidery machines. I really loved going to class.
I also took the Tailoring class with Gigi. I had once made a tuxedo and never really finished the jacket inside because the instructions made the whole process difficult and confusing, and I was afraid to ever try to make another tailored jacket. But after making the Tailoring class with Gigi I will never be afraid again. I am so grateful to her for teaching me her way of doing things.
So now I'm here in New York and I'm stuck in a closet. This too shall pass and I will once again have a decent sewing Room!
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