I am excited about hand sewing, but it's more
of like a, it's more of this feeling of necessity to me. It's more my contemplative
and meditative process that I can bring into my work. I love knowing that women
years and years and years ago my ancestors hand sewed their garments. Now
today we have machines that can sew dresses so much quicker, but I'm always
trying to find ways to bring the hand sewing element back into the work.
I personally love seeing the mark of the maker in, in work and it's something that
I try to incorporate.
I'm Maggie Evans. I'm the owner of Maggie Evans Designs. I'm a specialist in
custom bridal dress design and fine alterations.
I align with the handcraft movement in that it's very supportive of course of
things that are handmade, but also of this idea of getting something one of a
kind that no one else is gonna have. You're not gonna be able to find it
anywhere else and that's really what I'm striving for in my business and in my
shop. The mark of the maker says to the customer that this, this was made by
human. This was, there's a, there's a connection there that someone was
attentive. If, if all it is is just a hand sewn hook and I, at least someone had
and me, I had to spend time threading the needle, knotting the needle and spend
that little bit, it's so intimate. Hand sewing is intimate.
I see my design process really as one of evolution. Starting with a simple idea
or starting with the fabric and letting, letting the creative process tell me
where to go, I don't always start with a solid idea and go from point A to point B.
I see myself more as a collaborator than a designer and I get way more excited
about getting together with another person and hearing her ideas and developing
an idea and a dress design based on her ideas, her inspiration and my knowledge.
I come to the design process with more of a fine art background as opposed to a
fashion design background and because I did so much with, I have done so much with
3D mixed media, I bring that to my design process and I use the fabric as a
material to sculpt on the human body.
My ideal experience when a bride comes to see me whether we're doing alterations
or we're doing a custom gown is that she would share with me her ideas, her
inspirations, even propose things that she doesn't necessarily think are
possible and have the trust in me, in my knowledge, in my skill to make that
happen because that is my ultimate goal that I can give the bride exactly what
she wants.
I come to my work and see that my job is kind of, is twofold so I see that it's
my job to make a dress fit well if I'm doing an alteration, both if I'm doing
an alteration or designing a gown, but I also see my job as helping the bride to
feel really good in what she's wearing and part of that comes from the
attention and the conversation and the care that I provide to the bride.
Beyond my love of sewing and design and fabric and handmade things, I do this
work, I work with brides because I believe in soulmates, I believe in eternal
love and I want to help celebrate that and I think what better way to celebrate
that than to have your dress handmade.
Can we do a different question? That was good, right?
