Raison d'être

My late mother dressed me beautifully in comfortable clothes.

In some sense, the above sentence is really the entire explanation for why I've had this idiotic idea for at least fourteen years of starting my own clothing line. But it may not be enough information for random internet strangers to comprehend this bizarre obsession. 

My mother sewed, knitted and crocheted. My parents briefly owned a small business selling sewing machines, sewing patterns, thread and other sewing notions.

This was pre internet, so figuring it out themselves was tough and they succeed. When it shut down, leftover patterns, lace, buttons, etc. got stuffed into a chest of drawers.

Decades later, they were still being used to sew clothes for the grandchildren cheaply. A yard of material bought off the clearance rack plus thread, lace etc already on hand plus mom's incredible knack for making children's clothes that weren't easily outgrown meant my niece had like two dozen fancy gowns as a preschooler.

I ended up reading a lot about clothes and I was able to help my socially awkward ex dress well enough for acquaintances to shower him with praise about what a stylish good looking man he was and how they could see why I married him. We would both laugh and he would say "You have that backwards. I'm a stylish good looking man because I married her."

He looked like something out of Revenge of the Nerds when I met him.

In recent years, my substantial knowledge of clothes has helped me dress comfortably for cheap in a socially acceptable fashion. This has been a valuable skill while dirt poor and ill and has facilitated getting healthier when that's not supposed to be possible, but it's been years and years since I wore anything pretty.

I'm not petite. Men have big and tall shops. Women in America have short or fat shops.

In addition to being too tall and not adequately plump for most women's clothes in the US, I'm fairly certain most designers are bonafide sadists who are thrilled with the idea that women get to either be ugly or utterly miserable in pursuit of beauty. 

In other words: Miserable no matter what they do. Pick your poison.

It's extremely extremely ridiculously hard to find women's clothes that is BOTH comfortable AND beautiful. At ANY price.

I've mostly lived in men's t-shirts and sweat pants or similar for years. It's comfortable and practical but not conducive to meeting with clients and trying to establish a white-collar freelance income or other business. This fact helps make my poverty intractable. 

My late mother had a mastectomy and I have a medical condition that makes me prone to edema. I can gain or lose a size overnight.

Most women's clothing doesn't accommodate anything like the scar tissues and lymphedema common for various female health issues and we also really seriously do NOT do anything remotely sane as maternity wear for professional women. 

I miss the amazingly positive experience with clothes from my childhood that I didn't understand at the time was 99 percent "My mom is awesome." 

I would like a real career and a professional wardrobe to go with it. I cannot for the life of me find ANYTHING in stores that meets the standards my mother set for me growing up. 

I believe if I can figure out how to make clothes my mother would approve, other women would probably want them too.