Author Topic: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes  (Read 126837 times)

Sweetloveginger

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #100 on: March 08, 2016, 07:49:51 AM »
This is awesome!

I have been sewing for years, but never had to confidence to do anything more than skirts. I don't think I have the patience to do a really nice job like OP. Maybe I should just start.

loftygoal

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #101 on: March 08, 2016, 01:56:27 PM »
Omg this is amazing! I've sewed a few of my own tops and dresses, but realized I was starting to dread working on my projects. I do not have the patience for sewing whatsoever, so I donated my sewing patterns and one of my sewing machines. I'm so impressed with people that have the patience and perseverance for sewing their own clothes.

AdiposeFinn

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #102 on: March 08, 2016, 06:53:15 PM »
This is so awesome! Someone probably mentioned this already but the tailored clothes make you look like a model.

This is a skill I need to learn. I have some nice Pendleton wool shirts but they are cut very loose. It would be great to be able to cut them apart and re-sew them for a tailored look. The fabric is of course top-of-line and will last forever but I haven't worn them in a while partially because they are so baggy. If they were tailored I would definitely wear them more... no... all the time.

stashgrower

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #103 on: October 26, 2016, 08:46:17 PM »
Very impressed!! Your custom clothes look really good on you (and your gf). I am inspired :) I was daunted by shirts but you helped me see that it is achievable.

stripey

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #104 on: November 09, 2016, 03:14:10 AM »
Another "new technology" thing I'm happy to have sprung for is a rotary cutter (and self-healing mat) to cut out fabric pieces. It must have been way more annoying (and less-accurate) in the old days to cut things out with scissors.

I am horrendous with wheely cutters. I tried cutting my curtains (straight lines! Using a straight edge!) with one, and I'd just veer off at random. I haven't been brave enough to try one on clothing, where I actually need to be precise and can't go "know what? I'll just make the curtains an inch narrower. Nobody'll notice."

I trace my pattern pieces onto the fabric with chalk, then I cut them out using my hefty Gingher sewing shears.

I purchased the Craftsy class on making dress shirts last year, but I haven't had the guts (or bandwidth!) to do it yet. I did learn that my hate for sewing machines would probably be significantly reduced if I had more presser feet for my machine. I'm not precise enough for edge stitching / top stitching with a machine, so all my "it has to look good" sewing is done by hand. I'm attaching a photo of me in my wedding dress. The sleeves are hand sewn because I didn't want visible serger stitching and similar showing through them with them being sheer. The rest is done on the machine except that I did the chest by hand because getting a concave and a convex curve to match up on a sewing machine while sewing silk charmeuse? No. Utter failure.

That's really lovely work. Funny, I love rotary cutters, particularly for knits where they sometimes have a mind of their own but I agree that sometimes a decent set of scissors wins out.

You'll hear naysayers, but I'm a big fan of French seams for sheer and semi-sheer fabrics, and I'll quite happily do them on a gathered sleeve head too. It'll show through but will still look okay... well at least to my eyes.

I LOVE my stitch-in-the-ditch foot.

MrsDinero

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #105 on: November 09, 2016, 03:48:49 AM »
So glad I found this thread.  Your shirts and clothes are awesome!  Very inspiring

Slinky

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #106 on: November 09, 2016, 03:58:45 PM »
So fabulous! I mostly buy my jeans, t-shirts, underwear, and some of my socks, but make most of everything else I wear. I share OP's goal to have my clothing handmade, but not look homemade, which is mostly in the attention to details and redoing things that don't meet standards. And ironing properly! Custom fit dress shirts for my husband are one of those items perpetually getting pushed down my todo list though. I usually manage to hem his work pants for him, but I'm always busy working on some new project. My latest obsession is full length skirts made from my handwoven fabric. It's so neat to not only make your own clothing, but also the fabric!

LadyStache in Baja

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #107 on: November 09, 2016, 04:08:28 PM »
Posting for inspiration

deborah

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #108 on: November 19, 2016, 06:33:26 PM »
The problem with rotary cutters is that they can trim off the edge of a pattern, so if you are using it a lot, it can change significantly in size. But BIG scissors are awesome!

Dicey

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #109 on: November 20, 2016, 09:56:04 AM »
Would be nice if OP would return for an update.

skyrefuge

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #110 on: November 21, 2016, 05:14:36 PM »
ha, thanks to everyone who keeps resurfacing this thread, I had no idea it would survive this long! Unfortunately, it gets more activity than my sewing machine does these days. :-(

Shortly after my last update (2 years ago!) I did finally make my second shirt out of Pendleton wool I'd had sitting around forever. I love it just as much as the first one, they're the two favorite shirts I've ever owned. Might be picking up more wool in Portland this Christmas to see if I can make one for the lady.



Beyond that, I've done a bunch of random repairs, some hemming, and made another set of matching raincovers for the lady's front panniers that she got for her second bike tour that we did through Canada and the Northeast US in late summer.



And then just a few weeks ago, I did a fairly slapdash-but-successful effort at my Halloween costume (just mine, her's was storebought, and at least the 3rd time she'd worn it, but this was the first time she had a Roger for her Jessica!)



arebelspy

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #111 on: November 21, 2016, 05:47:23 PM »
Good to hear from you, skyrefuge.

People have missed you!

That is a good looking shirt.  Cute Halloween costume, too.  :)
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stashgrower

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #112 on: November 22, 2016, 11:48:19 PM »
Nice shirt, and great costumes!

Dicey

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #113 on: November 23, 2016, 12:29:07 AM »
Nice job matching that plaid! Thanks for the update, skyrefuge.

former player

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #114 on: November 23, 2016, 02:18:08 AM »
You are looking happy as well as beautifully turned out.  Love the Roger Rabbit costume.

Congratulations.

aerofreaky`

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #115 on: November 23, 2016, 08:29:36 PM »
Nice work. I've done some major modifications to lab coats for my wife. They turned out to be a better fit than those commercially available and they didn't take long at all to complete.

Slinky

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #116 on: December 16, 2016, 11:01:47 AM »
It's gotten cold around here and we're expecting snow so I layered up warmly this morning. Out of the 8 items I am wearing today, I made 6 myself.

skyrefuge

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #117 on: October 20, 2018, 02:43:24 PM »
At long last, a new project to show off! This one is likely to be my crowning achievement: a green velvet tuxedo for my wedding.

And unlike most of my other projects, this one is actually somewhat mustachian from a cost perspective. Materials were about $250, and $200 of that was for 6 yards of the green velvet, of which I only actually used about half of it (for this project, I didn't really want to risk running short, or waste too much time figuring out how to lay the pattern pieces to optimize fabric usage). Certainly I could have rented a tux for less than that, except that we wanted me in a green velvet tux, and no rental place has such a thing. There are a few luxury fashion houses that may sell something similar, but I would have been looking at more like $2500 in that case. And it still wouldn't have been an absolute perfect fit like this one is.

There are certainly some flaws to be found (at least by me), which is slightly disappointing solely because it was my *wedding* tuxedo. But from the perspective of *me* making my own wedding tuxedo (it was my first-ever attempt at a jacket, 2nd pair of pants, and I'd never worked with velvet before), I'm super-proud of how it turned out. Just got our first pictures back, and every time I see it from an angle I can't normally see it, I'm like "damn, that's a great-looking tux!!"

(note that the boutonniere, crafted by my bride and her bridesmaids, has some Pendleton wool fabric from one of my above shirts)


former player

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #118 on: October 20, 2018, 02:50:42 PM »
That is a great way to resurrect an old thread.

Congratulations on both wedding and tux.

Mrs.Piano

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #119 on: October 20, 2018, 06:07:23 PM »
Oh, how wonderful! Congratulations!

Freckles

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #120 on: October 20, 2018, 09:23:22 PM »
Nice job! It looks great, and congratulations on the wedding.

lizh

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #121 on: October 20, 2018, 09:45:07 PM »
@skyrefuge That tux is pretty fucking fantastic! Congrats. And you look amazing!  Love this story!  I remember your first posts and love this latest update.

Dicey

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #122 on: October 20, 2018, 11:51:34 PM »
I think the juxtaposition of the burlap boutonnierre against the velvet tuxedo is hilariously charming and the tuxedo itself is smashing!  Congratulations on your handiwork and your new path in life. And more pictures would be lovely.

skyrefuge

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #123 on: October 21, 2018, 08:45:31 PM »
Thanks all for providing the compliments I was fishing for! ;-)

I think the juxtaposition of the burlap boutonnierre against the velvet tuxedo is hilariously charming
 

haha, the design theme for our wedding was "Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings Go To the Renaissance Faire". Nothing too overt, but she's more on the Harry Potter side and I'm more on the LotR side, so with my whole outfit I was going a bit for that Hobbit/tweedy/British scholar vibe.

Quote
And more pictures would be lovely.

What? Show off more of our wedding? You don't have to ask me twice, or really even once! I'll show off my bride as well this time, since her outfit was pretty swell too.




And if you now just want to keep going and see the rest of the day, you can check out our photographer's blog: https://www.jppstudios.com/blog/chicago-wedding-photographers-edgebrook-golf-course-rett-neil (he did call it the "most unique wedding of the year (and probably my career)", after all!)
« Last Edit: December 09, 2022, 10:44:45 AM by skyrefuge »

Dicey

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #124 on: October 21, 2018, 09:31:18 PM »
Wow, that was fun!

chrisgermany

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #125 on: October 21, 2018, 11:02:15 PM »
Congratulations, many happy years to you 2 and thanks for sharing.

Freckles

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #126 on: October 22, 2018, 06:57:47 PM »
Wow, that looks to have been an awesomely fun wedding. Beautiful, too! Thanks for sharing the pictures.

mm1970

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #127 on: October 23, 2018, 01:51:43 PM »
Oooh, what an awesome update.  It looks amazing!

SimpleCycle

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #128 on: October 23, 2018, 04:40:53 PM »
This thread is epic!  Congratulations!

jeninco

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #129 on: October 23, 2018, 05:19:53 PM »
Those photos are amazing! And your tux is absolutely spectacular -- congratulations!

One

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #130 on: October 24, 2018, 11:47:43 AM »
Congratulations on your wedding!.... I have the same problem with clothes as you.  Tall and thin, here's a couple of shirts I buy in medium tall, you can usually get 30 to 50 percent off because of sales.

http://www.eddiebauer.com/product/mens-chutes-microfleece-shirt/13302940?showProducts=&sizetype=&size=

http://www.eddiebauer.com/product/mens-eddies-favorite-flannel-slim-fit-shirt/13401602?showProducts=&sizetype=&size=

erutio

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #131 on: October 24, 2018, 01:04:58 PM »
You've managed to top your already-badass-OP with updates that get even more badass and awesome.

Congratulations, thanks for the update.  You two look so happy together.

RetiredAt63

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Re: My secret and successful journey to making my own clothes
« Reply #132 on: November 03, 2018, 11:57:52 AM »
She reminds me of Arwen and Galadriel in the movie, love the cloak and the Celtic knotwork.