Week 1: Understanding Your Sewing Practice

Welcome to Week 1 of Making Space to Make! Before we get started organizing anything we need to take things back a bit and ask ourselves one fundamental question. How do I actually sew? By this I mean how do you actually work — where do you sew, when do you sew, and what sorts of projects?

When you’re starting out with a new organization project it’s easy to start by thinking how you want to sew, or how you think you should sew, or how you might want things to look based on what you’ve seen on social media. The problem is that when you do that instead of taking stock of the reality, you end up building systems that don’t work in reality, leaving you back where you started.

Organizing solutions that work for someone who sews two hours every Saturday morning are completely different from what works for someone who grabs 20 minutes here and there whenever they can. So this week, we're just going to notice our habits. We're going to look at your actual sewing practice so that when we start organizing, we can set up systems that work for how you really sew.

Where Do You Sew?

Let's start with the physical space. I'm not asking whether you think it's good enough, organized enough, or how you wish it looked or functioned, just what's actually happening right now.

Some of you have dedicated sewing rooms. Some of you are sewing at the dining table. Some of you have a corner of the bedroom, or a closet you've converted, or you're portable and move around the house. None of these is better or worse, they're just different and because of that they need different solutions.

When you're thinking about your space, consider these questions and make a note of your answers:

• Is this space just for sewing, or is it shared/multi-purpose?
• Do you leave your machine set up in a designated space, or do you put it away each time?
• Do you have storage in the same space where you sew, a specific spot in a closet somewhere, or is everything scattered?
• Do you ever find yourself wanting to sew but the high barrier to setting up or getting ready stops you?
• Can you leave projects out mid-process, or do you need to pack things up between sewing sessions?

Here's what this looks like for me, and please keep in mind that this is my job and the only "people" dependent on me are two beagles. At this point in my life I have a dedicated sewing space in my house. We live in a Chicago bungalow and I have the entire upstairs floor. The room featured in the video that accompanies this post is where I sew and there's another room across the staircase and landing for my office. With this setup I'm able to sew anytime I want or need to, which is important when it’s part of your job.

In the past I've had an office and workspace outside the house, I've had dedicated rooms in apartments (I once took over my entire apartment with work), and I've also had many times where I had no dedicated space and would just sew where and when I could. All of these had different pros and cons and all of them required different organizational systems to function.

Just notice where you sew and what the constraints are. We'll come back to this later when we're setting up organizational systems.

When Do You Sew?

The next question to ask yourself is when do you actually sew? I don't mean when you wish you sewed, I have very different answers for those two questions, but when does sewing actually happen for you?

Think about these patterns:

• Do you sew in long stretches (weekend marathons, full days), short bursts (30 minutes here and there), or somewhere in between?
• Is it scheduled time or spontaneous when inspiration hits?
• Are there certain times of year you sew more? Maybe you're big into fall sewing, or you avoid summer because it's too hot.
• Do you sew regularly or go in phases where you sew a lot then take a few weeks, or months, off?

This varies a lot for me based on what's happening at work. Over the past year my time has been sewing muslins for future patterns and doing a large amount of administrative and website work. This means I'm not sewing every day but when I do sew, my space needs to be ready for me and I have set tasks I need to accomplish. I also sew in shorter sessions during times like these because I like to test a technique or see how something comes together, then think about it before committing to it in my pattern development process.

Understanding your actual sewing rhythm helps you figure out what kind of setup and organization you need. If you sew in short bursts, you might find it helpful to have everything very accessible and ready to go. If you do long sessions, you might need more project organization so you can work on multiple things.

What Do You Make?

Now let's look at what types of things you actually make and see what sort of patterns emerge.

Consider these questions:

• Do you make lots of quick projects or do you prefer long-term makes?
• Do you sew from your stash or buy fabric on a per project basis?
• Do you like to batch sew your garments, or do you prefer to make one item at a time?
• Are you someone who finishes one thing before starting another, or do you like to have multiple projects going?

I personally only like to have one project going at a time, and this goes for knitting and sewing. I'm actually terrible at multi-tasking and something about having unfinished projects really gives me a mental block so I try to avoid that whenever possible. At the same time I often have to put my personal projects away before they're finished because I need to sew something for work.

I also love batch sewing for certain garments because I'm somewhat of a uniform dresser, meaning I like to wear the same style of garment almost every day. Usually a button-down shirt of some kind, so I will absolutely sew multiple of those in a row.

Knowing this about myself means I need an organization system that will allow me to tuck my personal project away temporarily while I sew for work without things getting completely chaotic.

Again, there's no right way to sew. Some people are very methodical — one project, start to finish. Other people like having options based on how they're feeling when they sit down to sew. Knowing your patterns will help you organize in a way that supports how you actually work.

What's Working & What's Not?

Now for the questions that will really help us moving forward: What's already working in your current setup, and what's causing friction?

What's Working

Let's start with the positive, because I guarantee there are things you're already doing that work really well. Maybe you have a great system for storing patterns. Maybe your machine and iron are always set up and ready to go. Maybe you have one drawer that's perfectly organized and you can always find what you need.

Notice what's working because we're not going to mess with those things. If it's working great, let’s leave it alone and use it as inspiration for future systems.

What's Not Working

Now, what's causing friction? What makes you avoid sewing or put it off?

Is it that you can't find your scissors when you need them, or you have them but they're dull? That you forget which patterns you own? That your fabric is in three different locations and you can't see (or remember) what you have? That your machine needs maintenance and you keep putting it off?

This isn't about feeling bad, we've all got parts that just don't work. It's about identifying the specific barriers so we can address them.

What was working for me: I had pretty good systems for storing patterns, fabric, thread, etc., and my equipment was set up both at work and home, always ready to sew.

What wasn't working: I was trying to sew in two different spaces, home and work. At some point I got tired of buying 2 of everything. Additionally sometimes I would work at home on the weekend which resulted in me hauling patterns, muslins, and supplies back and forth making it so I would inevitably forget something every time.

Once I identified that as the specific problem, I could actually fix it rather than just feeling generally overwhelmed.

Your Action Step This Week

Here's what I want you to do this week: Just notice. We’re not fixing anything yet. Notice where you sew, when you sew, what you make, what's working, and what's not. Maybe jot down a few notes if that helps, or just think about it while you're sewing this week. Understanding your actual sewing practice is the foundation for everything else we're going to do in this series.

Join the Conversation

What did you notice about your sewing practice? Were there any surprises when you really thought about your patterns and habits? Leave a comment below, I'd love to hear what you discovered!

Up Next: Week 2: Defining "Organized Enough" — Setting Standards That Work for You

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