Metamorphosis
So the reason mass customization of knits appeals to me is that I feel like it's potentially a means to make clothes that look good on the women who BUY them, rather than on the models who SELL them.
I really got a lot out of David Kibbe's book Metamorphosis. I'm not the only one. The book is out of print but there are subs on Reddit devoted to each of the styles he defined.
It doesn't work for everyone and some people have trouble "typing" themselves -- i.e. figuring out which of the styles applies to them -- and there are other typing systems out there. There are also lots of systems for determining your best colors and if you are a person of color, some of the default ones are likely to fail you because the default systems seem to assume you are Caucasian.
I am Caucasian but my maiden name is Irish. I remember some (probably Irish) actor quipping something about Superman having black hair with blue eyes and being an alien a la "Oh, being Irish makes you an alien." That's an uncommon color combo but is found in ethnically Irish people.
It's NOT my color combo but suffice it to say I have unusual coloring, so I defy every color typing system I have ever run across. Rest assured if some particular typing system doesn't work for you, I am sympathetic.
My main takeaway from David Kibbe's work is he talked in the foreword of his book about the fashion industry making women miserable. We spend billions of dollars on trends and we mostly pressure women to try to fit the latest popular thing and we mostly aren't trying to help them make their lives work better or make them feel better about themselves and how they look.
One of the curvier models in his book looks like she lost twenty pounds in the before and after pics. All photos were shot the same day.
Anyone really knowledgeable about clothes knows that this is a thing. I have read that Bette Middler "loses" weight in every movie she makes.
No, she doesn't actually lose weight. It's a plot point. They actually just dress her different at the start of the film and the end of the film. She simply has a curvy figure and can look heavier or slimmer depending on how she is dressed.
The current industry standard is that runway models are 5'9" or taller and very thin (and flat chested). In contrast, your average woman is 5'5" tall and not rail thin (and a C cup).
Back in the day, a cover shoot could be one photo out of 300 photos shot by a professional photographer of a gal with the back of her jacket full of safety pins and such to make it fall a certain way and there was a staff including a makeup artist, hair stylist and fashion stylist involved in getting her to look that way. So these photos are art and not something a real woman can really look like.
These days, the photo is likely to also be edited. They will likely remove skin blemishes, brighten the whites of her eyes and lengthen her already freakishly long legs.
So the models themselves don't even look that way. NO ONE can realistically achieve that look.
It sells magazines. It sells clothes. It's got nothing to do with reality.
I've spent a LOT of years wondering what can be done in place of our current system because every visual "artsy" field from architecture to decor to clothes that relies heavily on images in media is subject to the same pressures. They all trend towards selling upscale garbage that looks good in photos while doing a poor job of serving real people well.
Years ago, someone on a small email list described being part of a photo shoot for a room in someone's expensive mansion for publication in a national magazine. That ONE room had upscale artistic pieces in it and the rest of the house did not look like that, which the article in the magazine was not going to mention, no.
And the only thing I remember her talking about is the huge dust balls or cat hair balls rolling into the room from other rooms like tumbleweeds that they had to work at keeping out of the photos. You know THAT wasn't talked about in this magazine taking photos of "THIS is decor YOU should envy and aspire to!"
So I'm thinking that instead of having photos of models in the knitwear pieces, I will have an instruction manual on how to properly measure yourself to put in YOUR measurments for the piece in question and get a good FIT, plus photos or drawings of CLOTHES, not models in clothes.
Lots of tall women have trouble finding pants and skirts long enough. TELL ME what length you want and, voila!, you will have pants that don't look like high waters.
If you are short, you can look like a grown up instead of like a child playing dress up in mom's clothes. Petite women also have trouble finding clothes that really work for them.
I'm thinking I want a line of basics you can count on with a few colors you can count on and then the patterns get updated every year.
Need a replacement for your favorite skinny black knit skirt? We can provide that!
And will for years to come.
Bored with your favorites and looking for a pretty sweater to update your wardrobe? Flip on over to THIS year's paisley/stripes/polka dots/whatever and go nuts.
And my thinking is women who are spitting nails about their frustrations with clothes that don't FIT will order a few basics and like the comfort and fit better than anything they have ever had and get more willing to take a chance on this year's crazy color palette paisley with a solid color skirt or dress in one or more of the colors involved in the patterned piece.
Even though we are weirdos and there are few or no models shown on the site, just (or mostly) "uninspiring" pics or illustrations of the actual clothing pieces.
I really got a lot out of David Kibbe's book Metamorphosis. I'm not the only one. The book is out of print but there are subs on Reddit devoted to each of the styles he defined.
It doesn't work for everyone and some people have trouble "typing" themselves -- i.e. figuring out which of the styles applies to them -- and there are other typing systems out there. There are also lots of systems for determining your best colors and if you are a person of color, some of the default ones are likely to fail you because the default systems seem to assume you are Caucasian.
I am Caucasian but my maiden name is Irish. I remember some (probably Irish) actor quipping something about Superman having black hair with blue eyes and being an alien a la "Oh, being Irish makes you an alien." That's an uncommon color combo but is found in ethnically Irish people.
It's NOT my color combo but suffice it to say I have unusual coloring, so I defy every color typing system I have ever run across. Rest assured if some particular typing system doesn't work for you, I am sympathetic.
My main takeaway from David Kibbe's work is he talked in the foreword of his book about the fashion industry making women miserable. We spend billions of dollars on trends and we mostly pressure women to try to fit the latest popular thing and we mostly aren't trying to help them make their lives work better or make them feel better about themselves and how they look.
One of the curvier models in his book looks like she lost twenty pounds in the before and after pics. All photos were shot the same day.
Anyone really knowledgeable about clothes knows that this is a thing. I have read that Bette Middler "loses" weight in every movie she makes.
No, she doesn't actually lose weight. It's a plot point. They actually just dress her different at the start of the film and the end of the film. She simply has a curvy figure and can look heavier or slimmer depending on how she is dressed.
The current industry standard is that runway models are 5'9" or taller and very thin (and flat chested). In contrast, your average woman is 5'5" tall and not rail thin (and a C cup).
Back in the day, a cover shoot could be one photo out of 300 photos shot by a professional photographer of a gal with the back of her jacket full of safety pins and such to make it fall a certain way and there was a staff including a makeup artist, hair stylist and fashion stylist involved in getting her to look that way. So these photos are art and not something a real woman can really look like.
These days, the photo is likely to also be edited. They will likely remove skin blemishes, brighten the whites of her eyes and lengthen her already freakishly long legs.
So the models themselves don't even look that way. NO ONE can realistically achieve that look.
It sells magazines. It sells clothes. It's got nothing to do with reality.
I've spent a LOT of years wondering what can be done in place of our current system because every visual "artsy" field from architecture to decor to clothes that relies heavily on images in media is subject to the same pressures. They all trend towards selling upscale garbage that looks good in photos while doing a poor job of serving real people well.
Years ago, someone on a small email list described being part of a photo shoot for a room in someone's expensive mansion for publication in a national magazine. That ONE room had upscale artistic pieces in it and the rest of the house did not look like that, which the article in the magazine was not going to mention, no.
And the only thing I remember her talking about is the huge dust balls or cat hair balls rolling into the room from other rooms like tumbleweeds that they had to work at keeping out of the photos. You know THAT wasn't talked about in this magazine taking photos of "THIS is decor YOU should envy and aspire to!"
So I'm thinking that instead of having photos of models in the knitwear pieces, I will have an instruction manual on how to properly measure yourself to put in YOUR measurments for the piece in question and get a good FIT, plus photos or drawings of CLOTHES, not models in clothes.
Lots of tall women have trouble finding pants and skirts long enough. TELL ME what length you want and, voila!, you will have pants that don't look like high waters.
If you are short, you can look like a grown up instead of like a child playing dress up in mom's clothes. Petite women also have trouble finding clothes that really work for them.
I'm thinking I want a line of basics you can count on with a few colors you can count on and then the patterns get updated every year.
Need a replacement for your favorite skinny black knit skirt? We can provide that!
And will for years to come.
Bored with your favorites and looking for a pretty sweater to update your wardrobe? Flip on over to THIS year's paisley/stripes/polka dots/whatever and go nuts.
And my thinking is women who are spitting nails about their frustrations with clothes that don't FIT will order a few basics and like the comfort and fit better than anything they have ever had and get more willing to take a chance on this year's crazy color palette paisley with a solid color skirt or dress in one or more of the colors involved in the patterned piece.
Even though we are weirdos and there are few or no models shown on the site, just (or mostly) "uninspiring" pics or illustrations of the actual clothing pieces.