The Self-Made Wardrobe

The Self-Made Wardrobe is a project where I only wear garments I’ve made, for one year.
You can read more about the project here.

 Week five is finished!

It was a mostly straight forward week, some sewing and some knitting, when I wasn’t melting. It would seem that August decided to throw us a swelter-y farewell party, which made for some really gross knitting weather.

I did get the ball of black yarn I needed to finish my Versio sweater, so that when the weather does get better I can finish it up.

And wrote some reminders to myself about what I like wearing and what I don’t.

But in much more exciting news, I spent yesterday conducting my first experiment at sewing jeans.

I took a rub off of a pair of jeans I have that fit pretty well (not perfect) but well enough, worked up a basic pattern, and sewed up a pair of long shorts.

I don’t have photos, I was too much in the head-space of figuring things out to remember to grab the camera. Next time I’ll try to remember the camera.

They didn’t have pockets, or belt loops, or bottom hems, or even a button when it came down to it.

Mostly I just wanted to check the fit and see if I could figure out the steps for putting them together.

I think I figured out a sewing order that I like:
Back legs to yokes. Front legs to back along the side seam. Back legs together. Fly. Front crotch. Inseam. Waistband.
Next time I’m going to try sewing the front of the crotch seam together, then inserting the fly, then top-stitching the front crotch seam.

The fit is sort of ok. I can get them on, walk around, and sit down in them, but really, no one needs to see that much panty-line detail.

Plus the fly is a little bit funky. Totally functional. But funky.

I think though, if I add a bit of ease, back pockets, and switch up the order I sew the fly/front crotch in, the next pair will be wearable.

Overall it could have gone worse. (A lot worse.)

I need to make a trip to the garment district to pick up metal zippers, some more pattern paper, some hardware, and top stitching thread.

But I’m a little bit thrilled about the prospect of wearing jeans again!

PS. I’m working on a post looking back on the first month of the self-made wardrobe, so if you want to know as soon as it comes out – sign up for the newsletter and select “blog posts.”