Holly Chayes

Each Wednesday, I take stock of the projects I’m working on. 3 rounds. That’s how many rounds I’ve added to my giant granny square that will some day turn into a cardigan sweater project. This is really the only project I’m focusing on (other than untangling a giant pile of yarn), and I figured progress was slow due to a combination of: infinitely long rounds + wooly yarn + hot sticky August weather. It wasn’t until yesterday, when I was writing some number gazing/reflecty writing about the end of the self-made wardrobe that I thought to throw crafting burn out into the mix. This year for the self-made wardrobe I ended up making 23 pieces of wearable clothing (including 7 hand knit sweaters) + 1 winter coat + a handful of tank tops. And then on top of that a bunch of accessories + a handful of shawls. That’s a...

If you have a wardrobe of 27 pieces, how often do you wear each piece?

18 Aug 2015

The Self-Made Wardrobe, thoughts & things

The Self-Made Wardrobe is a project where I only wear garments I’ve made for a year. It was a year about making things and seeing what happens. As agonizing as it initially was, one of the best things about photographing every day of the self-made wardrobe is that, now the project is over, I can go back and look at things like how many times did I wear each piece of clothing? I ended the project with a wardrobe of 27 pieces of clothing. Plus a made-by-me winter coat, and a handful of tank tops. So how many times did I end up wearing each piece of clothing? (click to embiggen) It turns out a lot, or a little. This graph shows straight up the number of times I wore each piece of clothing, I just went through the photos I took each day and counted. I’m not all that...

and in the realm of ‘real books’ – To Read Over Coffee #8

15 Aug 2015

To Read Over Coffee

A collection of links from the past few weeks that I think are interesting/amusing/educational/insightful enough to read/watch/listen & think about over a cup of coffee. “Making it work as a designer: Releasing Free Patterns” The topic of free patterns & content is pretty damn divisive among knitwear designers (and “content creators” in general). Kat Goldin at Slugs on the Refrigerator (awesome blog name) wrote an excellent piece about how free content (when done well) can provide tremendous amounts of value to readers and (when used smartly) can in fact be beneficial for creators. Yay smart win-wins!! “Reading for pleasure builds empathy and improves wellbeing, research from The Reading Agency finds” More excuses to read? Yes please. “Why the end of trends is great for ethical fashion and terrible for fast fashion” Not the best written article, but yay for ethical fashion. On Mashable “Black Armor: some black American men are...

Welcome! I'm Holly Chayes.

Talking About Clothes with Holly Chayes

Who Wears Who?

The Self-Made Wardrobe Project

The Shawl Geometry Book Series

3 rounds of crochet and some crafty burnout

If you have a wardrobe of 27 pieces, how often do you wear each piece?

and in the realm of ‘real books’ – To Read Over Coffee #8

About – Holly Chayes

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