Finding My Style

In the past few months, I have been having a wardrobe dilemma. I used to have a clearly defined sense of style, which meant that both getting dressed in a morning and shopping for clothes were simple. However, since becoming more interested in making my own clothes, and seeing the possibilities that come from that, my style seems disjointed and all over the place. I find myself only wearing a small part of my wardrobe - not wearing things I've made, as well as things I've bought. However, I recently discovered the problem with my buying and making habits, which has enabled me to make a change.

It was after seeing Sarai's Wardrobe Architect (an invaluable tool whether you sew or not!) that I decided to try to find out what the problem was. It wasn't just a case of changing what I was sewing - my buying habits needed to change too. So, naturally I turned to Pinterest, which always has the answers. I looked at two of my boards - my board for dressmaking inspiration, and my board for style. Technically, the two shouldn't be too different, right? Well, that's where I'm going wrong - the two boards could have been created by different people! Here's a breakdown of what I found:

Dressmaking:
When it comes to my dressmaking board, it would seem that the more extravagant, the better. As I said before, the possibilities with dressmaking are endless, but that's not necessarily a good thing. I don't seem to be understanding the fact that I actually enjoy wearing clothes that are mostly simple in design. Just because I can add extra, that doesn't mean that I should. This has spilled over into my buying habits - only buying things that have that something extra, or are different from things I have seen before. Some of the crazy, crazy things on this board include a patchwork skirt, lots of sheer inserts, utterly bonkers pocket placement, and whatever is happening here (really, Charlotte?). Hidden amongst the madness are a few gems which I would genuinely wear, but they are few and far between. Scrolling through this board made me realise that I was looking for clothes that were simply too, too much.

Style:
I don't really make a conscious effort to pin to this board, and now and again just pin images to it which I instinctively like. Therefore, I wasn't expecting this to be a very cohesive board, stylewise. So, it was a pleasant surprise to find that I actually did know the way in which I liked to dress, and the colours and fabrics that I most enjoy wearing. This is the kind of outfit that I'd love to wear on a daily basis in summer, and this outfit is basically my all year round uniform. Looking back over this board was a revelation for me - it enabled me to see what it was I really should be buying and making. Namely stripes, denim, florals, and chunky knitwear. I don't really think of myself as liking clothes just because of their colour, but obviously my sub-conscious does - the colours I should be looking out for are blush pinks, soft greys, bottle greens, and all shades of blue. It's also interesting to note the fit and shape of the outfits I've pinned here - slouchy t-shirts and jumpers, skinny, tapered trousers, a-line shift dresses, and pinafore dresses are my staple shapes.

The Next Steps:
I've already sorted out my fabric stash, and felt liberated at the amount I got rid of. Now I know what fabrics I'm more likely to wear, it seemed pointless keeping things that didn't fit the criteria. I also got rid of a lot of teeny-tiny remnants that I was keeping simply because I loved the fabric, even though there was no way at all that I'd be able to do anything with them. It's refreshing to look through the fabric that I have and know that it will all be used in some way, not to mention that it's a lot easier to now see all of my fabric!

The next big thing to do is to purge my wardrobe of all the things which I am not going to wear. It's going to be time consuming, and hard to sort out the things which I will wear from the things which I won't wear. Ultimately though, it will be worth it in order to get my wardrobe back in shape, and I'm excited to have a wardrobe only containing things which I will wear.