SWAP at Artisans' Square

At Artisans' Square I learned of "SWAP". It does not mean we are now bartering. The acronym stands for "Sewing with a Plan". It is a sewing concept developed by Timmel's Fabrics in Canada. It is great for motivating the sewing of projects that work into your wardrobe. For an impulsive, creative project fashion sewer like myself that is a very novel and useful way to learn to approach fashion sewing. The result of impulsive creativity, although fun, can be a closet loaded with interesting fashionable pieces, yet each morning it is difficult to decide what to wear. I decided to give SWAP a try.

Artisans' Square is currently running an international SWAP, with the blessing of Timmel's Fabrics, that challenges all between now and April 2009, to make a coordinating wardrobe. 6 tops, 4 bottoms, 1 jacket. All tops must work with all bottoms.

There are all sorts of discussions at Artisans' Square as to how best to approach your SWAP. I decided to start with choosing a group of fabrics that are both inspiring, will work for my wardrobe plan, lifestyle and personality.
Next step was to choose the specific patterns or designs I wished to make from each of the fabrics.

I created the storyboard at the top of this blog entry in Photoshop by:

1) Creating a storyboard file.
2) Scanning into Adobe Photoshop a very high resolution image of the line drawings on the back of each pattern I chose. Converting these to line drawing transparencies by selecting the background color range, then deleting. Then copying and pasting the line drawing to a layer in my storyboard file.
3) Copying and pasting the image from FineFabrics.com of each fabric I planned to use as a layer just beneath the line drawing in the storyboard file.
4) Using the magnetic wand tool to select the outline of the line drawing, selecting its inverse, clicking on the fabric layer, then deleting.
5) Linking the 2-layers together.

I do have a few extra pieces in my storyboard, but there is every reason to leave yourself open to decision making along the way.

It is now time to get sewing......