New item is putting a bustle in my step

I love working on new things, and when I came across these I just had to make one... or a dozen.

These simple bustles are so much fun to make, and I can't wait to wear them!

Besides these fun Star Wars and Doctor Who themes, I'm working on some holidays and more formal looking bustles.

Follow what's new on my Facebook page, or on Etsy or the Online Market.

Something you may not know about me

I have quite a few social phobias. Anything that involves talking on the phone to a stranger takes me up to a week to get the nerve up to do. I don't like going out unless I know at least one person that I can use as an anchor all night. I'm also rather shy, and big groups take a lot out of me.

This shocks quite a few people who have seen me "work a crowd". The truth is, I don't work the crowd, The Sewing Wench does. It doesn't take much to get me into that persona, but every event that I work where I'm selling my stuff, it's The Sewing Wench you interact with.

It really isn't that shocking when you consider that I'm the first internet generation. We learned that we could be social with out having to show our true selves. We didn't need to face the rejection because while we did have winners, we also had participation ribbons. If you participated, you weren't a looser. You weren't a winner, but you're not a looser either.

The truth is, becoming The Sewing Wench is kind of like staying behind that computer screen. They don't have to see ME, and it's her they reject, not me. This is why I always support cos-play. My generation and the ones after me haven't grown up in the social worlds as the ones before. Hell even dating is digital and you no longer have to face the person who might reject you, you just send an email and if they don't respond, you can tell yourself all kinds of things. It's kind of like that participation ribbon. If they don't tell you "no" then you participated so no losers here.

I think that's what most of my social anxiety and phobias come from. That fear of rejection. I didn't have to practice it as a youngster. I was never forced to put myself out there. It also wouldn't surprise me if that's what a lot of the kids my age say their social anxiety stems from too. No one likes to be rejected, but in generations past you had to face it, so the sting was a bit less. Kind of like building up a tolerance for something. If you experience it enough, the effect dull out.

There are occasions now where I can't hide behind my alter ego. And what I can't wiggle out of I have to face. It takes me a while to do this. I prep and practice what I need to say, and write out a script, but eventually it gets done. And I'm the better for it.

So don't scoff at that person who always wears Wonder Woman socks, or the guy who wears the Micheal Jackson jacket everywhere. You never know what villains they are fighting in their life.

Ending the year with a Bang...Literally

On Dec. 5th 2015 I was on my way home from vending at the Cin City Burlesque show when the back end of my van was smashed into by another car.

Because it was an older van, the damage was more than the value, so insurance called it a total loss. Oh yeah, the driver of the other car fled the scene because they did not have a valid license or insurance. There is still some debate on whether it was the drunk fella or the girl driving, but the girl is the one being charged. 

This accident really took a lot out of me. I realized just how fragile my confidence can be. This hasn't been an easy case to handle, it's been a fight at every turn.  For the first two weeks I posted a daily update on my gofundme page (gofundme.com/NewCart). Not only was this a way for me to ask (plead) for help, but it was also a bit therapeutic. It gave me a chance to voice to the world every step forward and every hurdle that I had to leap as it came. 

But the other thing that this experience taught me is that I am my biggest obstacle. I would get so into my own head, so into everything that was going wrong, that I couldn't work myself up and stopped doing the things that made me happy. 

I could have been working on more costumes, after the injuries were pretty much on the mend. I could have put a lot more effort into getting things on ebay and such. But I didn't. I stood in my own way a good portion of the time. 

I have let myself get in my own way a few times. I've been scared that something was too big for me, so I didn't go after it. But realizing that you're hurting yourself, is a great start. Now it's time to do something about it. 

No excuses. No "poor me" attitude. I have stuff that needs to be done so by golly it will get done. No one is going to drop a corset company in my lap. I have to make it happen. 

Last year was a great start to making this come true. The year ended very rough, but I survived, and now that I am in January (and have my school reimbursement check because I still don't have the insurance money) I can but my effort into striving, not just surviving. 

I may have lost my way in December. I may have let doubt cloud my path. But today is a new day, new month, new year and a new chance to make things happen. 

Pricing shit is hard...

For those of you who would rather watch a video than read, here's a video.

This post, and the video, comes about because of a few different conversations that I have had with people over the past few months. One is, "why is your stuff so much more expensive" or more accurately "you charge how much?!?" and two, "what do you think I should sell (insert product) for?"

We can answer both conversations with the same blog (or video if you have now stopped reading and gone off to youtube). There is a method to how I price my items. It's something that has taken me a few years to hone in on, but this is what works for me.

Now there are some standard methods, like materials x 2 or materials x 3. I've also seen: materials + labor = cost x 2 = whole sale x 2= retail. Let me tell you, if I did that, my corsets would retail for $500 for the cheap ones. These methods did give me a place to start, but to get into my final groove, there is a little more math involved.

To start, I like to build a spreadsheet in Excel. You can do this by hand, or with any other program, I just find an Excel spreadsheet to be the easiest. 

Now we have to figure expenses. Materials are pretty easy to sort out. I use a column for each material and put in the cost. Example I have a column for fabric type, next would be "price per yard" followed by "yardage used" and then "total fabric cost." I break down each material this way until I have all of my materials. Then total material. 

Next section is labor. This is the amount that you will pay yourself when each item is sold. (material funds go back to restock those materials). Price your labor at a fair rate. You wouldn't work for some one else for less than min wage, don't work for yourself for less. For most art types, $11.50-$15/hour is the going rate. So in this section you will have "labor $", "labor time", and "labor total"

So now we have our material cost and our labor cost, and you can stop here, but if you want to build your business, you need to also add in profit. There are several ways to do this, but I start at 1.5 x (material cost + labor cost). From there I can decide if I need to charge more or less. 

Let's put that math to work. Let's say we've done all of the math and our item costs $5 in materials and takes us 1 hour to make. For this example we are going to use $11.50 as our labor rate. Just in materials and labor we are at $16.50. Now multiply that by 1.5 and we have $24.75. Now we will look at our item and decide if we think that is too much, or too little and adjust accordingly. When our item is sold, we use $5 to restock, $11.50 goes in our pocket, and $8.25 is used to build the business. This could me doing other art shows, paying for advertising, buying different materials, etc. 

Short hand: restock materials + pay yourself + build the business = sell price

Inside the Mind of Adult Dress-up

Sugar Plum, Ginger LeSnapps, and Sassy Frass as The Sanderson Sisters.
Costumes by Mlady's Coutorier

Yesterday I had a different friend help me at an event. This was her first time with me out in my world. A couple of hours in, she commented that I really knew how to "work the people" and get them interested. I told her, "I really don't. It's all The Sewing Wench."

You see, as my friends will tell you, I'm naturally a very shy person. Almost afraid of my own shadow shy. My mom made my doctor appointments until I was 28, shy. But The Sewing Wench, she's not the least bit shy, after all she makes all of her money on you buying her wares.

When I go to events, I always dress as The Sewing Wench, whether it is a full costume, a pair of wrap pants, or a corset with jeans, if I'm going to a place where I know there is potential for people to be interested in what I do, I will dress as The Sewing Wench dresses. And it is the simple act of dressing the part that makes me so out going and feel safe to talk to people. People make me nervous, crowds are draining, and when an event is over and I get undressed and into regular clothes, I feel as if the life force has been sucked out of me.

Sophie the Washer Wench with The Sewing Wench at Ohio  Renaissance Festival

Becoming The Sewing Wench allows me to forget my fears. I don't fear rejection, I don't fear strangers, I don't even fear people thinking I look stupid, or I'm making an ass of myself. She can do and say things that I would normally have that little voice in my head going, "what if some one laughs at you?" or "what if they say no?" The Sewing Wench doesn't even have these thoughts pop into her head. Dress as a sheep at a dog and cat rescue event and walk up to people saying "baaaa"? Doesn't even bat an eye. And you know what? I had so much fun doing it. 

This is one of the things with all of these adults you see playing dress up. A lot of them are socially awkward, have some sort of social phobia/anxiety, and/or have been social outcasts in their lives. Pretending to be some one else for a while allows them to do things that that little voice in their head would normally scare them out of doing. When people interact with their character, they get to experience the world in a way that they may not normally get to do, for one reason or another. 

It really is no different than how you feel with you go from everyday clothes to work clothes, or party clothes, or dressy clothes. What you wear can change your whole attitude for the day/evening. You may say, "oh I'm always the same person," but your language changes, your posture changes or in some cases your attitude may even change based on where you are going, what you are doing and in turn what you are wearing. 

This is also why I love getting women in to proper fitting corsets. You can see their personality change right before your eyes. The corset forces them to stand taller, it forces your back to be straighter, this in turn causes you to keep your head elevated. You look more confident, so people treat you as if you are more confident, and this in turn gives you confidence. It really is a beautiful thing. 

All of this is my experience only. I'm not even sure if there have been scientific studies on the relationship between how one dresses and how one's confidence/attitude changes. It would be an interesting study to conduct. Most of this is stuff that goes on in my own head when I get dressed up, or what I've personally witnessed. So while I can't claim scientific fact, my hunch is I'm on to something with this, and I hope it helps you to understand a bit better why I may have flirted with you at the burlesque show for 20 minutes, but I have no idea who you are when you see me at the grocery store 3 weeks later.

The difference between custom and "off the rack"

So I wanted to take a moment to explain why I don't keep a lot of different corsets in a lot of different sizes, and it hit me, I have the perfect examples to illustrate this!

On the left (or top depending on how the html decides to play on your screen) is a corset made from "off the rack" measurements. I did not adjust anything to the pattern. This is just your standard "42 inch waist" corset. On the right (or bottom)  is one that I altered to fit my measurements exactly. 

Take a good look at these two photos. While the red one is beautiful, you can see some stark differences.

1. Take a look at that waist in the red one. There is only a slight curve there.
2. Looking at the bust, from front on, I kind of flatten out a bit.
3. Again at the bust, I kind of have a bit of a muffin top rather than smooth round humps.

Now compare that to the purple:

1. We see a sharp indent at my waist, making it very well defined
2. the bust is rounded out and holding all of me
3. Rather than muffin tops, we now see lovely rounded mounds over top of the corset, along with signs of more cleavage (the chemise kind of blocks this for the most part)

And this ladies and gentlemen, is why I only keep a handful of samples and instead dedicate myself to making custom corsets. 

While I love the red one, it just isn't as comfortable as the purple. With the purple corset, I sometimes forget that I even have a corset on (until I go to reach for something!). It fits me like a second skin and becomes apart of me. In contrast, the red one feels very forced, and honestly it doesn't flatter me as well. 

There is just something about having my natural curves highlighted that makes me feel more confident and sexy. This is my shape. I haven't been tight-lacing or waist training to get this figure. My natural measurements are 54-43-53 (as of 9/5/15... I have them posted in my Corset Making 101 DVD and I believe they were a bit different then)  Compare that to the Butterick Size Chart  which only allows a 5-6 inch difference between bust and waist and has hips 2 inches larger than bust (where I'm an inch smaller). These are "off the rack" measurements. 

It is the pushing you into standard measurements that makes a corset feel uncomfortable, flatten you in places you want plump, and just generally does not give you the corset shape you want. I can do that, but I'd rather highlight your natural shape, and show you what YOU look like, not what the corset looks like. 

I hope this gives you a better understanding of why I don't carry a mass amount of different sized corsets when I'm at a show. Rather than a quick sale, I'm looking to satisfy my customer and build life long relationships. Corsets should be uplifting, not restricting. 

Spreading the word and learning a new art.

This Summer I took on a project that sounded so simple. Turn my Corset Making 101 class into a DVD. How hard can it be? Right? Right?

WOW!!! What a summer!

The first obstacle was to come up with a story board. I have a lesson plan for live classes, but having some one live asking questions, and being able to "read the room" is very different from looking into a camera. 

Looking into the camera was another difficult bit. Remembering to look up, smile, and be mindful of where my hands were while sewing to make sure the camera could see what I was doing... well, it's a lot! 

But I survived the filming. I thought that was the worst... until the editing started. 

Now I don't have a terrible self image. I'm pretty comfortable in my own skin, but watching myself on film was one of the hardest things I have ever done. Not only did I nit-pick EVERYTHING from my voice inflection to my hand gestures, to what I was wearing, but I also felt very self conscience. I just wanted everything to be perfect. 

As we've continued on, my videographer/editor has reminded me that I'm a seamstress, not an actress, and that coming across on the video is not a bad thing. I don't have to be perfect. I know what I'm doing and that shows. If I trip on my words, or roll my eyes, it just makes me more personable. It's what makes me The Sewing Wench. 

This project has taken a lot more than just my time and understanding. It takes money, and that is slowly running out. 

If you'd like to help support a one woman corset factory, there are a few ways you can help me make this project see its full potential. 

1. GoFundMe campaign here: http://www.gofundme.com/7h3m6z2k for direct donations
2. Buy the pre-sell of the DVD here: http://mkt.com/mladys-coutorier/corset-making-dvd-pre-sale
3. Purchase anything from the website or the Etsy page
4. Spread the word through Twitter, Facebook Google+, Pinterest, or any other social media or email/word of mouth

Sometimes getting the word out is just as important as direct donations. Having the right word get to the right person can have a huge impact.