48: Why I Wrote My Books

Years ago, having retired from production pattern making to raise my children, I decided that the pattern making and sewing methods used in designing departments should be available for lay people to learn and use.

I thought it would be one book and take about a year to write what I knew.  It was just as well that I didn’t know what I was getting into. The book turned out to be eight books that took 30 years to write.

Contrary to popular opinion, industrial sewing can be done on very basic machinery, it can even be done on a treadle.  It was the invention of the treadle sewing machine that made it possible to move clothing manufacturing into the factories.

One can date when the treadle sewing machine was invented as it was then that anti-bellum gowns became fashionable, gowns that involved yards and yards of sewn fabric, advertising the husband’s affluence.

When I entered the industry I was stunned to learn how differently the industry sewed

The methods used in industry were so much easier and much more reliable. As I learned pattern making and grading, needed for my job, I made sure to also learn the sample making procedures. I wanted to be able to sew professional clothing or my family and myself like that made in the designing departments. I asked the sample makers how they sewed. Although not allowed to sew on the machines while on the clock (I was management. Only union was allowed to sew on the machines), I practiced at lunch and at home.

Once retired to raise my children, I began sewing at home. I bought home-sewing patterns to speed the drafting, using the same drafting procedures I had learned in industry to set up the purchased patterns.

Before I had gone into the industry I had made clothing using home-sewing instructions. But only about one in three garments were ever really successful. No wonder. The instructions were awful! I decided to rewrite them. I figured it would take me about a year.

I never thought the one book I had decided to write would turn into books. That I would start a publishing company, would teach for years in college while developing a graduate level program, or have my own online school.

Once I moved over from the college fashion-degree program to teaching in Continuing Professional Education I was free to write and teach, using my own methods. My adult students asked for what they needed, enabling me to learn what was needed in the books, and how the books needed to be written.

Maybe it was just as well I didn’t know what I was getting into. I wrote for 30 years. One book turned into six, then seven, now eight. My son, Andrew, a graphic designer/production editor, helped me with the covers and with setting up the paragraph styles. I wrote everyday until all eight books were finished in March of 2022.
What kept me going? My students’ enthusiasm.

My goal was to produce  heavily diagrammed and illustrated picture books that would take a layperson step-by-step through the process of drafting and sewing that would enable her to correct her patterns to her personal fit,  then use the easier industrial sample making procedures to produce professional garments; clothing that would not beg the question, Did you make it?

I hoped to eliminate all writing – I wanted to have just pictures in the book. But I found I had to add writing as my students also needed written explanation. However, the emphasis continues to be on the visual, as most people who sew learn from the graphics, reading the captions and writing only if needed to clarify the diagrams.

Why learn industrial pattern making and sewing?
Because knowing how to produce professional garments is fun.