A few days ago was the end of the latest edition of Me-Made May, this annual challenge to wear at least one handmade garment every day of the month. After having a blast for my first participation last year, I enrolled again for 2016. Here is the recap, with pie charts and an animated gif of course!
Just like last year, I flooded my Instagram account with endless clones/selfies, with leads us to this wonderful gif:
A few thoughts come to mind:
• Clearly, I have enough me-made garments to last one, if not two months, wearing one everyday without repeats. According to Stylebook (in which I try to log all my clothes) the last count is 58 pieces that come from my sewing machine or knitting needles, and I haven’t even finished indexing everything. I am very impressed by people like Eléonore who manage to regularly purge their closet of all their non-worn garments. I have so much trouble letting go of clothes I have made, even when I haven’t taken them off their hanger in years…
• I had to wear several pieces twice because I went on vacation for two weeks with just a carry-on. I wanted to avoid repeating complete outfits so I tried to pack garments that I could wear several ways. I also went crazy with a nautical theme and I can’t resist showing you my matching packing-list (with outfits on the right, again thanks to Stylebook – I am obsessed with this app…):
• As for versatility, I had great hopes that my Lupin jacket would work with everything but I was a bit disappointed, as I seem to only wear it with jeans. On the other hand, Mélilot is clearly a winner: it is the most comfortable shirt I own, and I like it as much worn over jeans than tucked into a skirt. The outsider making a comeback is my Mabel skirt, which I considered an utter failure. It turns out it works with a lot of shirts and sweaters I own, and the silhouette is a welcome change. I still have an issue with the bulky waistband, so I’m hoping I can replace it with a navy Brume skirt soon.
Let’s now turn to the pie charts, in light of last year’s ones.
Here are the types of garments I have worn during the month:
• 11 dresses: gingham shirtdress, Centaurée, Anna, floral and blue Moneta (worn twice), Dolce Vita, Zéphyr (worn twice), gingham dress, navy chiffon dress and Liberty fabric dress
• 7 skirts: Chardon, Brume, Mabel (portée 2 fois), jupe moutarde, jupe en vichy, Fumeterre and Zéphyr (not blogged yet)
• 6 tops: Ondée (worn twice, not blogged yet), teal (worn twice) and purple Plantain tees, Mélilot (worn twice), Datura and King Kong t-shirt
• 1 jacket (Lupin), worn 3 times
Compared to last year, there is a larger proportion of separates compared to dresses. This is symptomatic of how I have felt for a while, which is that I tend to want to sew fewer dresses and more tops and skirts so that I have a more versatile wardrobe. Now for the pattern brands…
What a surprise, even more Deer&Doe than last year! I used to sew Deer&Doe patterns a lot, and now, well, I work there, so… Once more I am puzzled by the absence of Big 4 patterns given that I own so much of those. I guess I buy a lot of these patterns (who can resist Jo-Ann pattern sales?) but then I get caught in the latest indie patterns craze..? I need to go back to my pattern library, because I am sure I have a few treasures hidden there…
How about you, any interesting insights for Me-Made May this year?
No MMM insights, but it’s a relief to hear that I’m not the only one who falls prey to JoAnn’s pattern sales. Any chance you’ll post more about the Stylebook app? I’ve never heard of it, but it sounds useful. Your three part-series on Trello convinced me to get my sewing queue out of my head and into a visual format, and while I’m not using it to its fullest potential yet, it definitely helps. 🙂
I’m glad to hear that about Trello! Not so sure I’ll post about the Stylebook app, my friend Eléonore did a great post on it recently so I felt that I didn’t have much to add… That said I just realized her post is only in French so it’s not much help to you!! I’m sure you would love this app though, I’ve been really enjoying reading your wardrobe architect posts and it fits right in this approach.
You totally win the internets with that FANTASTIC GIF. I love that your expression remains the same, while your hair does all kinds of different stuff! I could watch that for a while. Super awesome. You make gorgeous clothes and I love your sense of style.
Hahaha I WON YAY! I was having a lot of fun everyday taking that selfie just thinking about how cool the gif would look in the end ^^ Thanks a lot for your comments they made my day!
Can I just say that I am 100% in love with this post. The pie charts, the gif. There’s nothing that can’t be worked out with a good pie chart (or gif for that matter).
I took part again in MMM this year and sadly, not sure much has changed from last year – I still feel like I would benefit from more me-mades. But I did find some stretchy Mabel-like skirts in my closet that I really loved wearing. Such a unexpectedly great make aren’t they?
Aw thank you so much! And I’m with you on the Mabel-like skirts… I’m wearing mine again today!
That gif! Amazing! Thanks for a brilliant post – very interesting, I’ve checked out the app online and if it’s android friendly I’m so getting it – thanks for a great tip!
I don’t participate in MMM our of sheer laziness – my horrible little phone and I and selfies = big hassle. But I’ve been practically completely me made for a few years now. Summer is all about dresses for me (easy in the big heat) but I am trying to introduce more separates just for variety – the return of the not too short crop top combined with high waisted bottoms means one layer less (the tucked in layer) and is fun. I’ve never done a pi chart but I think my proportions are pretty similar. Must look at my big four patterns!
I’ve been planning to make my first Lupin slightly shorter and was so chuffed to see Emilie’s (papillon) wonderful version confirm that it would look cute with dresses….
Dang, they don’t do android:(. and my phone and tablet are both android… would you oerchznce know of anything similar for android?
Ah yes unfortunately it doesn’t exist for Android, so I have to use it on my iPad at home (I have an Android phone as well) :/
Apparently there is one called Stylicious that looks pretty similar, but I haven’t tested it.