I need a plan...

I am Lucia, I am a fabricholic. I buy and I buy and I never make anything. Here is to changing that. 

Warning! Navelgazing ahead.

Being a fabricholic I tend to let my fabric choice drive my sewing. What I mean is that I purchase a beautiful fabric and then try to figure out what to do with it. Well, it should have been obvious but only recently I've realized that this is not very conducive to a great wardrobe. Why? Well, in the best case I end up with a nice garment but I rarely have whatever else I need to wear with it, so it goes straight into the closet. And in the worst cases I end up with an unwearable garment because I had my heart set on a given pattern but it turned out to be totally wrong for the fabric that I also had my heart set on. In both cases I end up discouraged and sometimes downright demoralized and I simply stop sewing for a while until I recover. 

Lately I seem to have grasped this difficulty at a subconscious level and attempted a solution of sorts: I've been sewing many similar dresses in similar fabrics because I know that sort of fabric worked with that sort of pattern (worst case avoided, yay!) and because I can wear dresses with just the tights/boots/belts that I already have (best case of best case, yay!). This worked okay for a while, but I'm a bit bored of dresses now and my sewing mojo has promptly vanished...

So what is the REAL solution?

At the moment I don't have the time nor the discipline to join a sew-along or a contest, but I think that sewing "with a plan" is what I need to break this vicious cycle. Looking around in the sewing blogosphere it seems that most swaps have ~10 garments, but that feels a bit too ambitious for me right now. Let me be realistic and aim for a 5 piece wardrobe. 

It should center around 3 colors: 2 neutrals and one accent color. So here comes the first pragmatic decision: a year or so ago I was in a houndstooth mood and I bought a number of matching fabrics with the intention of making a spring wardrobe in B&W. So, instead of going out to buy more fabric for this swap, I'll choose black and white as my two basic colors to make sure I use some (or all!) of these fabrics. This also has the advantage that the accent color can be almost anything!  

So here is a plan that would work for me and gets me excited to be sewing again:

6 items (mmmh, how did that one extra get in there?!):

A: 1 dress (one-piece): plaid mini houndstooth WL05 1.75m
B: 1 dress (two-piece, how vintage!): plain mini houndstooth WL08 3.8m

C: 2 tops (t-shirts, shirts, blouses): 

          Ca: plain mint silk v-neck top (resized from mom)

          Cb: bright flower print silk georgette S14 2yd

D: 1 skirt: black stretch cotton
E: 1 jacket: black stretch cotton

Vogue 8648 view C

The one-piece dress A will be Vogue 8648 view C in a mini houndstooth fabric with a 6x6cm plaid pattern overlaid. I just hope the bias sides look ok on my pear body (no, don't hope, make a muslin!). I would make view E but I don't have enough fabric for the circular skirt, rats!

The two-piece dress B will be Paco Peralta's draped top plus Burda's 01-2009-112 skirt to make my poorman's version of this Alexander McQueen from F/W 2009 (swoon!):

Alexander McQueen F/W 2009

The Ca top is my second pragmatic choice. I need it to go with my zigzag fur jacket and greyple pants, and I've already begun taking it apart in preparation for reducing it two sizes following Sherry's downsizing tutorial.

The Cb top will be Burda 10-2010-118 in a bright flower print silk georgette S14. The idea is to wear it tucked in like this with the two pencil skirts from B and D:

high-waisted pencil skirt with billowy top, notice the fluttery sleeves

The jacket E will be Burda 08-2006-108 which I had already started cutting in black stretch cotton twill to go with my color blocking dress. Thus this is my third pragmatic choice.

The skirt D will be in the same stretch black cotton as the jacket. After the jacket I have 1.80m left, so it is really enough for a dress... nope, I should NOT let my fabric determine what I sew! I *want* a skirt, so I should *make* a skirt. The leftover black fabric can be used as contrast to the leftover houndstooth fabric for another V8648 dress (Sorry, but I HAD to say that to calm down my inner psycho!). Now where were we? Ah yes, the skirt D will be Burda 01-2007-111. I also considered Burda 08-2007-113 but I don't think the fabric choice would be quite right.

Time limit? yes, I know, it helps to focus the efforts, plus I work better under deadline pressure. But I'm starting a new job and I also have to be realistic, so I'll give myself a really wide margin: so long as I can still wear these pieces this Spring I will call it a success. So my deadline is anytime in June. Yeah, I know it sounds like a unconstraining constraint, but...

Well, that wasn't so hard, now, was it? So, let's get started!