Towards a completely me-made wardrobe

In some unexpected stroke of luck, I am up to date with my blogging reading. Confession: I marked many old to-read blog posts as read and started with a clean slate. But I think that’s OK because it had to happen. And I’m actually keeping on top of it! Even managing to comment on posts which aren’t months old. How? By reading a couple of blog posts in a morning at my desk whilst I eat my cereal (Rice Krispies this morning, in case you’re interested) as well as a couple of posts before bed. Bare with me, I am going somewhere with this post…

It was this very morning that I came across Haley’s post on Coletterie about what the Colette and Seamwork teams learned from Me-Made May. There have been a few of these posts across the blogosphere which I’ve read with great interest, and identified with many of the sentiments. The lessons I’d learnt during MMMay16 were bundled into my final post for days 26-31.

Haley’s post pulled together many of these sentiments and ideas I’ve been reading since the end of MMMay16 and actually, even before that. Ideas around targeted sewing, filling wardrobe gaps (it seems everyone is missing separates!) and creating a capsule wardrobe. But what really resonated with me in the post — and not an idea that is new to me, or many of you, but a concept which MMMay16 has really crystalised for me — is the goal of working towards an entire me-made wardrobe.

After MMMay16 ended, I didn’t want to go back to ready-to-wear (RTW). Or, at least, I wanted to wear at least one me-made item each day. And I’ve stuck to that in the 8 days since it finished. There wasn’t really anything from my wardrobe that I had been desperately missing, apart from jeans which are firmly on my to-sew list. I’d been slowly moving towards this anyway I think, as I rarely buy RTW clothes anymore, mainly because I know I can make it myself. Instead, I visit clothes shops for inspiration, and only succumb to purchasing something if I know I wouldn’t be able to get my hands on the fabric they’ve used.

So, like Anna in Haley’s post, this has all cemented my quest to have an entirely me-made wardrobe. I remember seeing other sewing bloggers or Instagrammers talking about the idea of this, or using the hashtag #memadeeveryday, and thought it was too wildly ambitious for me. But it’s not! Sure, I’d probably miss my leather jacket, and come the colder weather, my big winter duffle coat. But MMMay16 highlighted just how achievable a completely me-made wardrobe is! Something that’s easy to forget — because I don’t blog all (or many) of my makes or hang them on a constantly visible, retail-esque clothing rail — is just how many me-made’s I already have. I mean, look at them! And that’s not even all of them. Arrogance or smugness is not my attention here, more a reminder that I can, you can, do anything! Oh, and I am pretty proud of how far I’ve come in the ~2.5 years since I first started sewing.

So, what about you? Are you are looking for a completely me-made wardrobe? Do you think it’s achievable? Or would you rather have days without makes? Do you rely on/relish RTW? I hear a lot of people say they rarely wear their makes, which I do think is a shame. But their goal may not be the same as mine: to wear what I make. I’m so intrigued by what other people’s quest is when it comes to dressmaking. So hit me with it!

Correction: the article originally referred to the Coletterie post having been written by Sarai rather than the post’s actual author, Haley.