What's in My Sketchbook?

Time for an edition of: What's in My Sketchbook!

People do a thing like, "What's in my bag?" and display all the items neatly but my bag is such a mess. It's like, wadded up receipts (at least one from Walgreens), about 3 broken pencils, Micron pens, and my sketchbook. My sketchbook is perhaps the most interesting. I'll be on the bus or train and suddenly scrawl in it and that's how the Sunrise Panel Top came to be - it was a doodle on the train one morning!

Next project: Contrast maxi skirt, potential colorways

Admittedly, I have a "schtick". Some might say a "voice".

One of those things is apparently putting these 3 colors together, but I can't decide which colorway I like best just yet, but it's definitely between the 1st 2. This was a quick Photoshop rendering tonight of my next project which I just bought the fabric for today - a stretch lycra. I might make my pattern for 2 stripes only instead of 3 stripes on each side. Who knows.

The other things in my "schtick", if you will, are included all throughout these sketches: contrast bright colors, stripes/paneling, zigzags. I love orange, have a thing for acid green, blue-greens, and 70s colors. Long story short: It's good to have a voice, good to be "known" for something. When I was in college and we would line our dressforms up for a critique I remember people being like, "Oooh, I know which one Nicole's is!" I'd be like, "You guys! I used different colors/different seaming/whatever!" but my pieces were nearly instantly recognizable.

If you're a designer, take the time to find your voice and your aesthetic. Really hone in on what makes your style unique and ultimately you. Never design for anyone else - it's your art. (Arguably, you might not make money designing solely what you want but that's not what it's about. Who really makes money as a fashion designer? Hardly anyone. Do yer thing and people will come around. Maybe.)

I guess I had in my mind that these were knitwear pieces. They could go either way.

Still might make this skirt. Orange/robin-egg blue.

Unfortunately, due to time and just overall abundance of sketches/things I want to make, these will probably never get made. But I thought these all were cool enough to send out into the universe.

I'll be heading out to New York/Connecticut in a few weeks to see mostly family so I wanted to make this maxi skirt before heading out there as a fun new thing to wear. Perhaps I'll get to take photos of me in it out in Brooklyn!

Latch Hook Rug Update

A little under a month ago I received all of my supplies to take on one of the biggest long-term projects I have ever taken on - a self-designed latch hook rug. I don't know why, but I am clearly nuts. So beginning today I am posting photos each month, (preferably on the 1st of each month) progress of this gigantic shag rug. See how I started it here (scroll down past posting of my $10 dress). This is a photo of it today: Yes, I used the candelabra for scale. Haha. This rug is really soft and is fun to run your fingers through. It doesn't look like much was accomplished, but though the number of packages we have gone through of pre-cut latch hook rug yarn already I have calculated that we've used over 2500 strands for this ie.) 8 packages. I also just ordered 10 more packages of lime green since that's what I ran out of first and 6 more packages of straw yellow. There is still quite a bit to go, but you see the blue row squares? Each of th

DIY Trapeze Dress

I'm a pretty big fan of tent dresses (or trapeze dresses - call it what you want). They're simple, easy-to-make and you can have many variations of them. These are a fun style to wear for spring and summer! See this DIY from a Good Housekeeping Crafts book from 1971 - photos at the end of my own trapeze top from a while ago! (Bear with me on the photos here - this book is quite cumbersome and hard to scan.) Applique patterns, in case you wanted the dress to look EXACTLY like the photo. (But why?) How to cut the fabric efficiently. (This is actually pretty important cost-wise for you - especially with something this big.) Using pattern instructions from my patternmaking book from college, I created this swingy trapeze top a bit ago. I used sweater fabric from a thrift store find for the collar of this top. I also opened up the back on the pattern to have a diamond shape. It can easily be belted like in this photo fo

How Print on Demand Sites Helped Me! And Pros and Cons

I don't know about you, but I don't always have a ton of time. Well, ok -- maybe that was before the pandemic hit. But one of the things I have learned over time being a designer of sorts and loving fashion design was that it seemed I never had enough time to do/make everything I wanted to have available within a product line to sell. Especially not when I was working a full-time job either! Bags! Shoes! And yeah, duh -- clothing! It seemed most of my friends who are designers made all of their own items from scratch on their machines and I just didn't want to sit at my machine after working 40+ hours a week. Maybe for myself only but not as a side hustle. But I always had requests from people - "Can you make me something? I want something designed by you!" I really appreciated the sentiment, but often times it was just as confusing/hard for me as it was for them. I would sit there and go "How should I adjust this for them? Am I even gonna find that fabri

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