Hello and Welcome! A Manifesto?

I just graduated from Reed College, with a degree in theatre. I specialized in costume design. Now that I've got a fancy degree, though, I'm faced with the terrible problem of What To Do Next. I want to be a fashion designer. I've been sewing pretty much my whole life and making my own clothes since high school. I eat, sleep, and breathe clothes, and always have. I've tried to hide it at various points in my life, under the misapprehension that I should strive to be a teacher, or an academic, or a diplomat- something "more important" than a mere fashion designer. Once I started college, though, and started having to think about clothing in an academic way, I realized that being a fashion designer is, in its own way, every bit as important as any of those other things. Clothing helps shape the way we think and feel about ourselves. Clothing is vitally important. The world right now needs designers who are willing to think about clothing in new ways, designers who are willing to think about the role technology is going to play in fashion, about gender and sexuality as they relate to fashion, and the world needs designers who are willing to stop designing for supermodels and instead take into account the myriad of different body types there are in the world. I would like to be one of those designers.

So here I am. I graduated from college exactly six days ago. I'll be living in Portland, looking for a job, and trying to make it big (or at least make it) in the world of independent fashion design. I'll be writing about my experiences here. You can also expect to see outfit posts and the occasional craft or sewing tutorial. I keep a tumblr of inspirational images here.

The title, for the curious, comes from a P.G. Woodehouse story.