Here’s my One Week, One Pattern in collage form.
I was actually aiming for (and I consider I succeeded with) Double OWOP, in that my main pledged pattern was the Belcarra Blouse, but I stuck with my McCalls straight skirt pattern for the bottom half, in accordance with my original plan. The two patterns complement each other well. It may not be in keeping with the “style things different ways” element of OWOP, but it is nevertheless all about the “wearing your favourite patterns” element. There was a fair amount of mix’n’match, and I don’t care that I repeated the Dress Of Many Colours, because I love it and there won’t be many more opportunities to wear it this side of Christmas.
Day 1: Cadfael & Cats Belcarra + Counterintuitive Black Birds Skirt
Day 2: The Dress Of Many Colours
Day 3: Watermelon Belcarra + Black Denim Skirt
Day 4: Imperfect Polka Dots Belcarra + Counterintuitive Black Birds Skirt
Day 5: Cadfael & Cats Belcarra + Black Denim Skirt ÷ Total Selfie Fail
Day 6: The What Could Possibly Go Wrong?! Belcarra + You Mean I’m Wearing Orange Skirt
Day 7: The Dress Of Many Colours + Mahoosive Yellow Lily Hairclip
It’s been an interesting week which, much like Me Made May, has very much focussed my attention on how much I do wear my hand-made clothing. I wear me-made quite a lot, but until the Belcarra splurge I didn’t have any tops to go with my skirts. I do feel like I’ve gone some way towards redressing that balance. All four of these blouses will work with various of my skirts, (not just the straight ones!) so I’m happy that the push to make those tops has resulted in a stronger and more unified me-made wardrobe.
The Belcarra pattern has been really useful and it’s definitely become a TNT pattern for me. Although I’m slightly Belcarra’d out right now, I can still see myself making more of these, in the future. It’s a very versatile top, it works with different types of fabric, and as I’ve mentioned before, it can be a good stashbuster, which reduces my fabric storage problems, and it’s good for mixing fabrics and colours, which makes for easy wearing.
What I did notice from this week’s mixing & matching is my need for simple plains & neutrals. The Watermelon top had to go with simple skirts because it’s so gaudily patterned (I’m saying that like it’s a *good* thing, your mileage may vary). The You Mean I’m Wearing Orange?! skirt needs a very plain top, because it’s brightly decorated. Normally my plains & neutrals are provided by my shop-bought clothing, but now I’ve twigged this, I’m going to try to acquire & use more plain and neutral fabrics. I will still try to embellish those makes in some way, but more carefully, and with a consciousness of keeping the wearing options open. That limitation could be a creative spur! Self-coloured embroidery… Appliqué-ing with the same fabric as the garment… Subtlety… No, I don’t believe I can manage that last one, any more than you do!
A million thanks go out to HandmadeJane, who was hosting this challenge, and to Tilly and the Buttons, for creating it in the first place. I’m starting to sound a bit like Nicholas Parsons in Just a Minute now, so I’ll stop digging this particular hole, and just say that it’s been fun!