Today I thought I’d begin introducing my readers (hopefully to come) to my creative process. As with anything, the creative process starts with an idea. Oh, in some cases the idea may be more about finding motivation, such as in the popular “what can I make that might make me some cash” or the frequent “what can I make that will keep me entertained” and of course the distress call of the lonely artist: “what can I make that will impress the opposite sex?” We’re going to put those ideas behind and start at the next level of coming up with an idea, which is to begin finding ideas for projects after the motivation has been established. In my case, the creative process begins with a simple notebook. This notebook, in fact:

I wish I could take credit for the wonderful cover art, but that needs to go to Masamune Shirow, one of my favorite Japanese artists! However, I can take credit for what I’ve written inside, and that are the majority of brainstorming ideas I’ve had, inspirations I’ve jotted down, and notes on what did or did not work for particular ideas. It looks a lot like this inside:

As you can see, there are various bulleted brainstorming ideas and the occasional drawing. Say hi to my in-work line of Kaiju Fruits and Vegetables aimed at the younger set! I need to capture ideas as quickly as I can, and if I can doodle out a design, that’s even better as I have horrible recall even minutes after an idea enters my head.

 Sometimes the ideas come easily. Sometimes they do not. When they don’t, I force myself to schedule 15-minute brainstorming sessions each day and just write down anything that enters my head, no matter how dumb. There are no filters at this point in the creative process, just not-yet-determined ways of implementing the ideas captured! As you can guess, it’s much easier to find ideas when you’re inspired. Sometimes I am inspired by nature, sometimes by apparel I’ll see others wearing, sometimes by what I wish I had in my own life, and a lot of times, by the coming together of a really cool visual with my desire to work against stereotypes.

An example of the latter is found in my ‘Thor, God of Sewing” project, inspired by the following fabric:

Thor’s sewing accessories, still in progress (I ran out of bias tape!)

In this case, I found this wonderful lightning bolt fabric in the store and fell in love with it immediately. I instantly knew that I wanted to use it to make all sorts of non-traditional sewing items, as well as at least one shirt for myself. Because of how little fabric I was able to obtain, I’ve started with the non-traditional sewing items because I really get tired of seeing flowers and stripes as the only choices in ironing board covers, machine covers, press hams, etc. Thus, I am creating my line of non-traditional looks for these items, hoping they’ll speak to others who are sick of the commonality of existing accessories, as well as to the male sewer who just doesn’t feel right surrounded by flowery prints!

The final element in coming up with an initial idea stems from having children and nieces. I love to see what I can come up with for them. Not only do the girls in my family run the gamut of ages and sizes, they run the gamut of fashion choices as well, so I love to work on ideas that suit each of them. Even better is when I can come up with an idea that bridges across all of them, though that’s usually reserved for fine arts and not for crafting.

In the future, I’ll talk more about the creative process post ideation, and talk about how I prepare for a project. But for today, relaying the basics of where my ideas come from was the goal and I think we’re there!