Reflecting back on my early childhood, one design item gave me the building blocks and creative steps necessary for a whole new world of imagination; my grandmother’s 1957 Sear’s sewing machine. She kept her sewing machine in a back part of her house in a room crammed with ribbons, fabric, needles, and thread. It easily could be said that this was a room designed for anyone with a creative imagination for fashion. Once you opened the door there was a large table and in the middle was her sewing machine. It was at least a few decades old, and by the looks of it you could sense my grandmother’s hard work making my mother’s clothes, her doll accessories, and everyone’s need for endless alterations. The machine was the beginning building blocks for necessary items in my grandmother’s life. With the machine she also made my family’s baby blankets and school costumes. I began to notice the impact the machine had on everyone in my family.
The machine always gave me a sense of creativity, knowing that there were endless possibilities one could create from such a simple yet complex object. I was always interested in arts and crafts, but her sewing machine represented a larger aspect of creativity. The art of choosing a pattern, fabric, and thread then combining them to make necessary complete items, spoke loudly to me. It wasn’t until the third grade when I inherited my grandmother’s sewing machine. It was tucked against the wall of my garage, where I spent countless hours expressing my love for sewing. Once I began using the machine, I became extremely comforted by the bobbing and weaving sound (when the needle and thread are being woven into the fabric), which I had always heard from my grandmother. It became almost a background song, which in some odd way flooded more creativity into my designs. Without this monumental object, I wouldn’t have been able to expand my creativity into the whole world of design and fashion.
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