When Making Doesn’t Match the Picture in My Head
In my head, sewing was going to be easy. Clothes with a certain look, a perfectly sized tote bag, home furnishings that felt considered and long-lasting. Making seemed like a direct route to self-reliance — a way of aligning ideas, materials, and intention into something coherent and useful.
Five years later, and with plenty of sewing disasters behind me, I’ve accepted that it isn’t easy at all. Designers make it look effortless, but there’s a kind of quiet magic required before ideas, materials, and technique agree with one another. More often than not, they don’t. Things come out technically fine but somehow wrong — not quite what I imagined, not quite something I want to live with.
What I’ve learned is that perfection isn’t the point. Functionality doesn’t depend on flawlessness, and usefulness isn’t cancelled out by imperfection. The real draw has been the process itself — the making, the using, the slow accumulation of understanding. That, on its own, has been enough to keep me returning.
I’ve also come to see how easily influence can override taste. Early on, I made things that didn’t really belong to my life — fabrics, colours, and forms that looked good elsewhere but never quite felt like me. Over time, those misalignments became instructive. They helped me recognise what I’m actually drawn to: pieces that are casual, practical, and grounded; materials and colours that feel natural rather than loud.
These so-called disasters weren’t detours after all. They were part of learning how to pay attention — to notice what fits, what doesn’t, and why. Making hasn’t given me mastery or certainty, but it has taught me something quieter and more durable: how to recognise alignment when it appears, and how to live with the rest while I’m finding my way there.