Making Your Own Clothes: The Highest Acheivement a Software Engineer Can Aspire to

(This is based on a presentation I gave in a previous place of employ, wearing entirely everything (visible to the audience) I made myself.)

Most business and software articles are couched in analogy. Learning to use an abacus makes your microservices coherent! This one trick from Neolithic Man will enhance your team building! Why effective strategic planning is just like smashing an avocado! And sure, we learn by analogy. It helps. But I want to go with something that is not an analogy. A set of skills that will inform and help you be a better engineer, with a broader outlook. A better architect, with a broader outlook. A better manager, with a broader outlook. Everything in it from start to finish is applicable to every point of building software, teams, businesses.

That set of skills is the end-to-end of fashioning your own clothes.

But let me rewind, as these articles always need some personal backstory, right? What is a Ted Talk without some misty-eyed hook to appeal to the emotions? And yes here comes the backstory, but only because it makes me mad.

I went to an all-boys school. There was an all-girls school next door, but we didn't (officially) mingle until sixth form. And we boys did CDT (craft design technology) and the girls did Home Economics (cooking and sewing). We boys bent metal, formed wood. Those girls made cushions, darned hems. And that was the way it went. No splinters from making chairs for the girls, no pricked fingers with needles for the boys.

Fast-forward many decades and I was sitting with friends in my front room, bemoaning I dislike the materials most clothing was made from. They never quite fitted right. What was wrong with the world? Why can't the basic human want for covering be better? To which the reply way, well, why don't you make your own then? This...stopped me. In my tracks. Such an obvious solution. Said friend offered to lend me her sewing machine to see how I got on, and I took her up on the offer. Then kicked myself. I am dumb. Why had I not even thought of this solution before? (I refer you to the previous paragraph, and maybe you start to see why I was/am mad about all this.)

And from the first time I attempted to use it, I was hooked. The intricacy, the dexterity needed, the usefulness...but I get ahead of myself. I instantly saw the possibility and potential, and my journey started there.

This was the point I started to get mad. Why? That is the actual reason. Why. Why was I never shown this before? (I could darn a sock, but that is a targetted single use-case.) Why was I never shown this before in school? Why was this deemed 'womens' work' and not something the boys were introduced to? Things have changed thank goodness and my children did get some instruction in school on this, but alas had grown and flown mostly before I had my own machine. I have since made things for them, of course.

The more I used the machine, and got in to the whole cycle of how clothing is made, the more it seemed to me this is something every software engineer should do. The approach and skills needed are exactly the same, the discipline and the experience. How to think through a problem, how to find out solutions, how to. Just how to. A whole new vocabulary, hinged of 'how to'.

Let's start with the sewing machine itself. The tool. With many moving parts. You need to get to know how it works before you can do anything at all. Unfortunatley there has been a trend of programmers coming through over the years that no longer understand their tools. Even when they do, we return to 'Doing Advanced Things With X' rather than actual 'Advanced X'. Once you have the bobbin filled, the needle threaded, it is easy to take two bits of cloth and join them together. Congratulations, you have followed your first README, and done exactly what it said. Not what you wanted, but hey, it compiles and does something at least. But different materials? Different threads? Different needles? Different tension? Different pressure on the pedal? Take it easy, learn the tool. One step at a time.

But you have your own project, and beyond the simple push the fabric under the foot more needs to happen.

Everything is there: understanding the spec, taking a flat two dimensional schematic and turning it into a tactile three dimensional object. Hand, eye and foot coordination. Keeping the pipeline clean and clear. Ensuring the end result is fit for purpose, fitting the end user. Delivery and usage. Adjusting to keep in continual use. Adapting when circumstances change. Quite literally patching. Recycling and reuse once no longer fit for purpose.

Have you ever seen a pattern for a dress? The supreme use of form, the codified build instructions, the elegant technical language. Have you taken this beautifully laid out blueprint and considered how it you then apply it to fabric? How you maximise the use of the fabric? How both sides of that are different, how it joins with different types of materials? The nap and the grain. The margins for error? The extras that make it more than just a few bits of cloth stitched together? Yes, I still wrestle with zips. Yes, I bought a walking foot to help with silks and lycra. Yes, I bought an overlocker to add a better finish. Yes, none of those on their own make things better. Practise, learning, listening. Experimenting with darts. Your seam ripper is your best friend.

Have you ever draped fabric over a tailor's dummy (and look at the name: tailor, not seamstress) to pin and test? If you don't test, your seam ripper really will be your best friend all the way through creation. I mean, it is anyhow, and even knowing how to unpick the mistake, step back and redo is a valuable lesson to apply. And woe betide anyone who uses my favourite fabric scissors on paper.

I even have tried drafting my own patterns, learning about blocks and topology. There are standard texts on this, and ample room for extension and application. There is also no shortcut, time and experience and experimentation. And more time and trying.

Isn't it all obvious, or do I need to state the relationship to building software? Reading and understanding the spec. Eventually architecting the whole from scratch yourself. Implementing, testing, debugging, productionising and deploying. Fitting to the customer's needs, lumps and bumps. Patching and extending (lay off the beer, dudes, those calories lead to operational parameters shifting). Eventually stripping it down for reuse, recycling or binning. A new season or whim of a CEO brings new designs and colour. Fashion comes and goes, but style is eternal. Software fads ebb and flow, but foundational understanding is eternal.

Isn't is also obvious or do I need to state the sweatshop fast-fashion portion? Outsource to cheap labour and you get shoddy work. Not because those doing the work are sub-standard, because that is what you asked for. Churn it out without due care and attention, and you'll be back in a few months wondering why it is falling apart, why the usual day to day has caused holes and wear and tear. Why you are already thinking about replacing it when it has just started to be used. Why replace your working system with a new one when the current one is comfortable, hard wearing and unless you are shallow, fickle or FOMO, will continue to be comfortable and hard wearing for a while to come. Economical, sustainable while solving the problem.

There is of course the obvious sex gap here too: sweatshop seamstresses are not valued anywhere near as much as ninja programmers. Lower class women versus entitled middle class men: the way it goes. And this also makes me mad. Atelier versus skivvy. Ask your TD if they consider those two equals. The ones in a far away land generating the goods compared to their highly strung '10x rockstar'. I might have went with 'imagine your entire team was naked, how much work would you get from them not in their swag-grabbed teeshirts and elasticated waistbands' but decided that is definitely not where I want to take this. I apologise, imagine a field of puppies instead.

Did you really take in what I said? It is somewhat belaboured, so I do hope so. Not the re-reading and taking it in. Give making something a go. Almost any charity shop will have an old sewing machine. There are even open source patterns to get you started. There are sub-Reddits, communities, relations. People will be helpful. But it is a female dominated space, do not pile in and sewsplain. Watch, listen, learn. There is so much experience out there, how could you not do otherwise. (Hey, another lesson for you there, but again, don't make me spell it out. Please infer!)

You can even use these skills for good. Before the meeting time moved to a weekday making it impossible for me, I used to belong to a group who would take blankets and turn them in to ponchos to be distributed to refugees in Calais. Whyso ponchos? Because the French police would confiscate tents, blankets and possessions, but not clothes. So make clothes to survive the cold, and help others less fortunate than yourself. The first time I turned up with the sewing machine, the first thing said to me was 'nice of you to carry [machine and sewing boxes] all that in for your wife' (who was behind me). She chuckled and replied 'no no, it is his machine, not mine'. Cue some clucking and amazement. Because this is not usual. Yes, I can easily reverse the situation and realise how you say things with respect to entrenched stereotypes can cause hurt. It didn't hurt me, because, you know, man. But it does give a perspective. Small one, but still one.

To keep the analogy going, it is not cheaper than off-the-shelf fast fashion. It takes longer, it takes care and fabric is surprisingly expensive. But you get something that fits your use case, will last longer, has given you new skills to apply next time, gets better and quicker with more experience. Rather than trying to shoehorn some ill-fitting system into your already burgeoning (well, maybe that is just my waistline/production environment) wardrobe, take your time, consider if it is worthwhile to align to your own curves.

Sewing is all first-principles. Understanding the complexities of the world and solving for what is in front of you. You don't have to draft your own pattern, but even in the learning of that you gain more insight when you approach someone else's. You get immense satisfaciton from seeing it worn out. I am still amazed, and truly proud, that my wife wears what I have made for her to work. Imagine that! Fitted to her, for her.

So if you are a software engineer, a data scientist, a dba, CTO, doesn't matter. Pick up a needle. It doesn't even have to be a machine. Thread, needle, scissors, old jumper. Make a cushion cover. Badly. But proudly. Be amazed at what you have done. Dig deeper, understand, learn. Next cushion cover will have less frayed edges. Be prouder still. I love the cadence of a simple needle and thread. But automation definitely helps in the long run.

It doesn't even end there. It never ends. Always a new type of stitch to learn, new fabrics to be tried, different garments to be made. I've not yet made a coat, and I know exactly the type I want to make and have never seen it in a shop. But my current trusty machine won't handle the heavier materials, so need to upgrade that. How about a twin-needle one? A new button riveter? How about even shoes? My ambition is to one day get to the stage where every single thing I wear I have made myself.

And yes, I am still mad that this is looked down on. I can't imagine the toil a woman in a third world sweatshop producing your designer gear goes through, as it is draining all that concentration and skill. For them to receive pennies. But hey, you have a disposable polo shirt for the season. Or have yet another javascript framework to try out, another inane python build system, an LLM to shoehorn in for no apparent purpose. I can keep this analogy going all day long.

One day, I will attempt haute couture where you do it all by hand with just a needle and no machinery. But then I remember I no longer write anything in C (which isn't quite the right analogy here, but work with me), even though it is still the best way of doing (some) things.

Sure you need another hobby. One that can be a talking point more than your github activity. And people notice. I was asked 'did you make that fabulous waistcoat?' while at Initiative Planning last time round. Becuase it looks different. It looks better. It looks like care and attention and thought was paid to it. And if you do that throughout your software, your team, your company, it will all be fit for purpose. At which point, you can even use 'bespoke' in the correct sense.

Making your own clothing is not only the highest intellectual and physical pursuit a software engineer can aspire to, it teaches you all the lessons needed to apply to your everyday work. Wear both well, my friends, wear them well.