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The Interview:
I met my daughter at Alexis Nihon shopping mall and we waited for her there. She was twenty minutes late and launched into frazzled diatribe about all sorts of things within moments of us meeting. That, I am used to. What irked me was that, given the nature of some of topics, I had to ask my daughter to put her ear pĥones in. Should I have brought my thirteen-year-old to an interview? Yes. She is contemplating a career in fashion but, more to the point, it's my interview and I can, within reason, do what I want. I'm thinking I should bring Ava more often, actually. She's got a wicked deadpan stare and what people think they can say around a thirteen-year-old probably says a lot about them.
She brought samples. I liked them. I saw pictures of her work. I liked them. An acquaintance recommended her but, that should not have been a factor, given said person's personality and the fact that her "She knows her shit" was useless because this person can probably not even thread a machine.
I have a few minor misgivings but I ignore them and hire her. I want to shoot before the leaves change colour and I'm excited about my new project!
Over the next few weeks, I assign three pieces to her: A pair of shots, a romper and a pair of pants. I ask her to make a pattern and a muslin of each. After some time, I schedule a fitting on a Monday and arrange to meet her on Friday, after work, so I have the week-end to go over what she's done and correct any mistakes.
The Second Meeting:
I ask her to meet me at the Second Cup at the train station. She was twenty minutes late. She sat down and dropped one small roll of paper on the table in between us. Within moments, I found out that this was the pattern for the shorts and that she had brought nothing else with her. she apparently spilled coffee all of the pants muslin right as she was leaving. I ask her where the pants pattern is and she gets really flustered and starts rambling again, this time about how she is almost forty and living in a room. She does, though, tell me that she had time to make herself a pair of shorts using my pattern. when I ask her where the romper is she says, "Oh, I haven't even looked at that". I pay her anyway because I want to be sure to have what I need on Monday.
The Third Meeting:
I cancel with my model because I don't trust my pattern maker. One of my best friends, Amanda, is over and, in addition to having measurements that are similar to that of the model's, we studied fashion together and she's been working in the industry since so she can help with this next meeting because I'm getting exasperated. Monday rolls around and Amanda I wait. And wait. Finally, Amanda has people she must meet so she leaves. The pattern maker is two hours late. She texts me saying she's late because her bike tire was almost flat. She shows up with nothing but the pants pattern and looks offended when I say I'm not paying her any more and that, had I been waiting around with a paid model, I would have deducted part of the model's fee from her pay. She vows to come back the next day with everything. As she leaves, she tells me she probably shouldn't have stopped at her friend's place on the way. I'm all out of "wtf"s at this point.
The Fourth Meeting:
She's over an hour late but I'm at home with Amanda so I don't care as much. She shows up and has two of the muslin with her. Her muslin is more like burlap but what bothers me the most is that she's off by a lot on the shorts. Like, over an inch on the waist. I pay her and tell her I want the corrections in two weeks. the only reason she didn't babble senselessly about how her life is a mess, this time, is that, when she's not trying on clothing, Amanda is pacing in the kitchen, behind me, and deadpanning the woman.
The Fifth Meeting:
Three weeks later, she drops the corrections off at my work and I ask her to make the romper in the upcoming week.
Online:
In the meantime, my friend (and the ex she bitched about at her interview) posts a Breaking Bad spoiler on his facebook. I call him on it, nicely but firmly. She jumps in out of nowhere and is incredibly rude. She says, "1) It's Wednesday, 2)It's the Internet and 3) The boy in Boys Don't Cry is actually a girl. At this point, Before this, I had been thinking that I could maybe give her a few samples to sew, just so we could get to the shoot but, after this, the bitch was fired.
The Sixth Meeting:
She brings me the romper pattern and, despite me having asked her for them, none of the other muslins (I had told her not to make on for the romper).
After two weeks of putting it off, she sends me some wrecked muslins by asking my friend (the aforementioned ex) to drop them off at my place when he comes by to pick my up for a week-end trip we had planned. To make matters worse, he waits until we've been gone for two days before telling me, claiming that he had wanted to avoid "weirdness". Jesus.
I must admit that I let all of this get to be and I've fallen about two months behind, which is terrible, but salvageable. This week I will hire another pattern maker (she has twenty years experience and can use PAD Systems) for some of the more complicated pieces and get back on the horse.
The Third Meeting:
I cancel with my model because I don't trust my pattern maker. One of my best friends, Amanda, is over and, in addition to having measurements that are similar to that of the model's, we studied fashion together and she's been working in the industry since so she can help with this next meeting because I'm getting exasperated. Monday rolls around and Amanda I wait. And wait. Finally, Amanda has people she must meet so she leaves. The pattern maker is two hours late. She texts me saying she's late because her bike tire was almost flat. She shows up with nothing but the pants pattern and looks offended when I say I'm not paying her any more and that, had I been waiting around with a paid model, I would have deducted part of the model's fee from her pay. She vows to come back the next day with everything. As she leaves, she tells me she probably shouldn't have stopped at her friend's place on the way. I'm all out of "wtf"s at this point.
The Fourth Meeting:
She's over an hour late but I'm at home with Amanda so I don't care as much. She shows up and has two of the muslin with her. Her muslin is more like burlap but what bothers me the most is that she's off by a lot on the shorts. Like, over an inch on the waist. I pay her and tell her I want the corrections in two weeks. the only reason she didn't babble senselessly about how her life is a mess, this time, is that, when she's not trying on clothing, Amanda is pacing in the kitchen, behind me, and deadpanning the woman.
The Fifth Meeting:
Three weeks later, she drops the corrections off at my work and I ask her to make the romper in the upcoming week.
Online:
In the meantime, my friend (and the ex she bitched about at her interview) posts a Breaking Bad spoiler on his facebook. I call him on it, nicely but firmly. She jumps in out of nowhere and is incredibly rude. She says, "1) It's Wednesday, 2)It's the Internet and 3) The boy in Boys Don't Cry is actually a girl. At this point, Before this, I had been thinking that I could maybe give her a few samples to sew, just so we could get to the shoot but, after this, the bitch was fired.
The Sixth Meeting:
She brings me the romper pattern and, despite me having asked her for them, none of the other muslins (I had told her not to make on for the romper).
After two weeks of putting it off, she sends me some wrecked muslins by asking my friend (the aforementioned ex) to drop them off at my place when he comes by to pick my up for a week-end trip we had planned. To make matters worse, he waits until we've been gone for two days before telling me, claiming that he had wanted to avoid "weirdness". Jesus.
I must admit that I let all of this get to be and I've fallen about two months behind, which is terrible, but salvageable. This week I will hire another pattern maker (she has twenty years experience and can use PAD Systems) for some of the more complicated pieces and get back on the horse.
Posted in: employees,fashion design,pattern making,sewing,trial and error
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