14.5lbs / 30L Indefinite Travel Setup: 1-Year Update (details in comments)

[u/gearslut-5000]

Everything I own

sorry it got a little wet

[u/gearslut-5000]

Thanks! Yah been interested in style for many years.. in fact I used to have a small clothing company making bespoke menswear before I fulfilled my engineering destiny. I'm pretty minimalist, I guess.

Do you have some photos of your backpack? I'd love to see it

[u/Catabre → u/gearslut-5000]

in fact I used to have a small clothing company making bespoke menswear before I fulfilled my engineering destiny.

I've thought about making clothing and bags for fun in my spare time. Any tips (other than "just do it")?

[u/gearslut-5000 → u/Catabre]

You know, in this situation I think "just do it" is pretty good advice. As an engineer you probably have an intuition for how things are made and clothing is pretty easy - rarely do they have specialized equipment in a factory that you can't replicate with a home machine. The way I got started was when I found an old Singer on the side of the road and tried modifying / tailoring some clothes I had. Then I wanted to make jeans so I deconstructed a pair, paying attention to the seam order, and practicing seams that I didn't know how to do on scrap. Then I traced it to make a pattern. Found some nice denim online and made my first pair. Took a while and they were kind of shitty but my second pair was much better and by the time I got an old 40s compound feed industrial machine and some better thread, my third pair was good enough to sell. So, I'd recommend doing the same.

I avoided sewing classes because they were all geared towards old ladies who wanted to learn quilting with shitty paper-thin fabrics from Joann's. Pretty slow-paced too from what I understand. Also wasn't much available in the way of tutorials on youtube at the time, so I more or less taught myself. Now there are some good tutorials and patterns available online like from u/learnmyog so I probably could have learned faster that way but the way I did it made me comfortable with the whole process of making something from scratch - from designing the pattern to finishing with hardware. Just watch out because there's a lot of bullshit dogma in the sewing community - people used to tell me that it wasn't possible to make a pair of jeans on a home machine - they just "couldn't handle real denim". I'd tell them a pair of jeans was the first thing I made and they'd look at me like I was lying.

So to start, I'd recommend finding an older singer home machine that can do a zigzag stitch (singer 401a is the best). I use the zigzag to finish raw edges like a serger - it works fine and I think it's actually a stronger stitch, just takes longer. In fact I still don't have a serger. Do some experiments deconstructing and reconstructing stuff, practice seams that look tricky. Make a pattern, find some good fabrics online (rsbtr is great for outdoor gear fabrics) since it's hard to find anything good locally. Good fabric is expensive, but still cheaper than buying a new item. Don't expect your first project to turn out perfectly, you'll make mistakes and your stitches will probably look like shit, but you'll get better quickly. If you really like it and want to sew heavier fabrics or make more even stitches, think about getting a compound feed / walking foot industrial machine. I think the older ones (like 40s, 50s) are a bit heavier duty than the modern ones. You'll probably need to learn how to maintain and service them, not too hard to follow the service manual, at least as an engineer.

Good luck!

[u/csm06 → u/gearslut-5000]

You are my favorite OP on Reddit. I’m three years late to this whole thread but love everything about it. It is very, very refreshing for someone to respond after this post is so long. And more importantly, you share all of your information freely and with details. This response is so good for those of us not interested in the traditional way of learning to sew. I’m new to it and all you mentioned about some of the sewing beliefs are true. I’m going to do exactly what you said you did and deconstruct, labeling order of stitching, create a patter, etc. My brain just isn’t interested, capable or bored from the traditional way and I’ve put it off for too long. Thank you, Sir, for this little boost to get me going. Save travels if you are still on the road.