Lately I’ve been asking myself, is the craft culture large enough that people now feel guilty because they aren’t wearing things handmade?*

I keep wondering when the bubble bursts where the trend is going to lead next. How people that have invested loads of money into craft being the ‘new hip thing’ are going to salvage their consignment/re-use/craftycraft stores.

One possibility is that with the internet, there will always be a way for people to sell their wares with little to no overhead. Instead of the past, where things were predominantly done via mailorder, word of mouth, or bricks-and-mortar stores, it is now possible to get exposure to what you’re peddling without forking over a lot of cash.

Another possibility is that people are really fed up with consumer culture and the backlash is going to continue for awhile longer. Meaning that we have reached a point where more and more people are becoming annoyed with the fact that everyone else is wearing what they are. Back in the day, it was considered a massive faux pas if you arrived at a party and someone else was wearing the same dress, but now, thanks to the shopping mall, it’s practically considered normal and an open excuse to meet someone new:

“I see we have the same taste in clothes, although I didn’t see aubergine, it’s so much nicer than this forest one.”
“Thank you, have you been having a problem with the zipper? Mine keeps falling each time I turn to the left.”
“I’ve found I can get around this problem by going right and making a complete circle instead of going left. It’s a bit awkward, but the zipper stays up!”
“Thanks for the tip, the price we pay for fashion!”

Perhaps we have finally come to realise that in making our own things, we do not have to make fashion concessions/sacrifices. We can choose to wear things in a wider variety of colours and/or if we choose to buy things, we are armed with the knowledge of how to reconstruct it in order to end up with a design of our own making. Maybe we are on our way to becoming mistresses of our own wardrobes instead of pawns. Or maybe I’m just dreaming.

But there are myriad possibilities, aren’t there?

Just because some of us are making our own things doesn’t mean that everyone has to. Just because you don’t know how to work a serger (I don’t!) doesn’t mean that you are less creative or rad or crafty. It just means that you need to find your own creative path. It makes me sad when I see people writing about feeling guilty for not making things. Internal ‘I know I should do this but i’m lazy’ guilt is one thing, but external guilt (from all around you seeing crafty cool things and not feeling like a cool kid) is completely different.

Crafting should be fun and inspiring and no-holds-barred, not a playground-esque contest.

In a sense, it almost seems like we’re on the forefront of actually doing the ludicrous and becoming postcrafty. And that in doing so, there is a divide growing between those that create and those that only wish they could. The ridiculous thing being that all of our ancestors were crafty by necessity, so it’s in our genetic makeup. We’re just forgetting that being crafty is a legacy, not a by-product of hipsterdom.

Take for instance, the following photograph from isthisyou:

The girl in the photograph is most likely wearing handmade things, the bow wasn’t bought as a bow, per se, it was just a piece of ribbon, not something made to be a bow and therefore the cost marked-up, and the dress most likely handmade. (Although I am guessing, which is the glory of found photography, as you can create your own narrative- but this photo in particular got me thinking)

There was a time when clothing was made out of a literal necessity, not out of a overarching need for uniquity and originality. As time went on, there was a backlash in regards to the handmade and the domestic, not surprisingly, coinciding with clothing being readily available to shoppers everywhere at the local mall. (So sorry to squeeze loads of history into two sentences!)

Currently we are at a point where people are beginning to re-embrace the handmade and the domestic, case in point being the rise in faux-fur scarves on the necks of people everywhere. (Which I wrote about here recently) As most things tend to do, there is a marked blur beginning to form around the edges where it’s leeching from the so-called counterculture to the so-called mainstream. I am not railing against people seeing the value of what Debbie Stoller has renamed ‘the domestic arts,’ which you can read more about here.

I’m just wondering where the hell this is leading us. Because if it gets to a point where people feel guilty about not making their own accessories, it will all begin to fall apart, much like the first scarf you ever knitted. Because this whole craftycraft thing should be something enjoyable and pleasurable; something that allows you to tap into that incredibly long line of history of making and creating. I think the new craftiness is less about a rejection of technology and more about an awareness of culture, history, not to mention an awareness of our own inherent need to create and take time for ourselves.

This embracing of crafts should be a joy instead of a chore. Because in it, is an element of care, like the bow and the dress that the girl is wearing in the photograph- it’s about creating things for people to wear that are made with the best intentions, not about keeping up with the hip kids.

In this era where our clothes are easily purchased at a local mall, this can become not only an act of rebellion, but also an act of freedom.

This is just the tip of what’s been on my mind lately regarding this. Sorry to be so long-winded and dorked out, not to mention, disjointed.

*part of this was posted elsewhere. but, i’ve been thinking more about it, rewrote most of it and put it here, where it’s more relevant. i’ve really been thinking a lot about this recently. sorry.