Wait, who is this girl in my inbox talking about mending?

And why I still haven’t given up on “fashion”

A few things this month have culminated in me wanting to do a proper introduction here, so I'm going to take a little bit of a walk down memory lane in terms of my own creative journey. There’s a lot of new people subscribed, so it seems there are definitely folks here that don’t know me in real life. In addition, my birthday is coming up, and the combination of being a year older and the new year always makes me more reflective.

So, how did we get here?

In a way; the “making things and sharing them with people” side of me is something I’ve always been drawn to. I loved art as a kid, and when I was in highschool I made my mom take a sewing class with me (we made pillows that are still on my childhood bed). I was hooked on it immediately, and decided that I should open an etsy shop to sell my infinity scarves (lol) and upcycled goods. I’ll try to dig up some pictures so you can cringe at my oh so very 2013 creations.

Now, looking back, I can’t help but be a little sad at the fact that upon learning a new creative skill, my first inclination was to turn it into a business. I’m sure those self help bros would be so proud of teenage me. An idolization of entrepreneurship really is the waters we are swimming in in America, huh?

While I’m exposing my teenage self, one more trip down the wayback machine led me to remember that in middle school I had a blogspot blog called “fashionable freckles.” I would post my outfits and iirc also a tutorial of how to make a bowl out of buttons?

ok, honestly, the button bowl kinda slaps

After high school, it seemed like a natural next step to go to college for Apparel Design, so I did just that. However, the more I learned about the fashion industry, the more disillusioned with it I became. In addition, the combination of strict professors and my own high expectations definitely complicated my own relationship to the craft of sewing and designing clothes. However, the resources and time that was automatically carved out in my life for creating was such an insane gift. That time period was also the birthplace of so many of my current interests: including natural dye practices, weaving, and quilting (It really was my fibers elective my senior year that re-ignited my love of craft.)

Two of the pieces from my senior capstone collection

Now, I would assume I’d be preaching to the choir here if I went into the horrible working conditions the fashion industry enables, or the detrimental effects it’s has on our environment, but all of this was constantly swirling around in my head as I thought about my job prospects after college. I told myself I would be committed to changing the industry from the inside, so I did internships with Miranda Bennett Studio (who writes this amazing newsletter now) and Open Arms (part of what’s now the Multicultural Refugee Coalition) while in school, two pioneers of the sustainable fashion scene in my hometown of Austin,TX.

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I graduated college in the spring of 2020, so as you could imagine there was approximately -2 jobs in the niche and now declining sustainable fashion movement. I did end up going back to Austin to work for the sewing center for a while as a production assistant, which for part of the year entailed sewing masks from my parents house as covers for the then sparse N95s that we were giving to hospitals at the beginning of the pandemic

But as covid continued, the desire for sustaining myself financially led me down a career path away from fashion and into ux design, where I still find myself. Maybe ironically, I design supply chain software that some of the world’s biggest retailers use (all retailers I would have never considered working for directly because of their lack of ethical practices.) Now, do I feel conflicted about this sometimes? Yes, I do. But I also have a very different view of work than I did when I entered college. My job isn’t necessarily my passion and it’s not the sum or even the most important contribution I make to this world. Would I rather spend my 40 hours a week mending clothes and teaching people to do the same? Ya, I probably would. But I also do like that the seat I sit in allows me to learn and understand more about how the systems at play in the retail industry work, and that I get to problem solve and gain skills in some complex areas.

I do have dreams of leaving tech, but I also I like that I have a 401k now and can afford to live in the expensive city that I’ve fallen in love with. And while you don’t need me to explain any of this to you to enjoy a mending tutorial from time to time, I hope that in writing this some of you will relate. I think in some ways, if all the things I love about creating now became my job, it might lose some of the magic it has. But on the other hand, pouring more of myself into the intersection of my interests and what I think actually benefits society sounds quite appealing as well. But alas, career paths don’t have to be linear and I don’t have to make all the decisions right now.

I’d like to leave you with a tiktok I made after the results of the election came out, because I think it’s emblematic of how I’m thinking about the work of this newsletter and how I’ve come to understand the importance of making and mending.

For me, making things has been somewhat foundational to the worldview I have developed and the politics I hold. I’m not saying that everyone who learns to sew as a teen grows up to become a leftist, but I am saying that as we grow more connected to how everything around us was created by human hands, it can be a gateway to a politics built on empathy and care. Perhaps I’ll dig into this more in the future of this newsletter, because there’s a lot of rabbit holes we could go down around the gendered component of textile work and how the tying of this particular realm of labor to gender has contributed to it being devalued, as well as how craft has been involved in many politcal movements throughout history.

I’d love for this comment section to be a place for us all to learn a little bit about each other - so feel free to introduce yourself below

Thank you for reading! You can also find me as @frontporchthreads on Instagram or TikTok. This project is free to read but you can optionally support my work here.

<3 Danielle