Sewing Club Offers a Supportive Learning Environment

Written by: Clara Schiedel

Since the start of the school year, there has been a small, yet dedicated community of sewers meeting every Monday at lunch in room 322! Sewing Club is a comfortable, supportive environment for sewers of all levels and experience to improve their skills or learn some important new ones. 

This club runs for the lunch hour with a very open schedule. Students come in, eat their lunch at the start if they would like, and get to work. Sewing Club is open to a variety of different sewing options. Members can start a new project, pick up an old one, or even discuss plans for a future project. The beginner members are currently working on little pouches as their starting design. Anyone is welcome to work on whatever their heart desires. 

As Ms. Vicario, the sewing club staff sponsor, mentioned, there isn't a chance for high school students to learn how to sew with a machine in class anymore. KCI offers the grade nine Family Studies course that teaches hand-sewing, but sewing education ends there. Machine sewing, Ms. Vicario believes, is a very important competency to have in terms of sewing clothes, but also, mending clothes to have them last. She notes that it can be tough for individuals to find clothes that they like, which makes it beneficial that once they have found their style, we can maintain these pieces for as long as possible. 

Brand new sewers are welcome in the sewing club, and so are expert sewers with much knowledge to go around. In fact, the reason this new club is available to the KCI community, is because a soon-to-be post-secondary fashion student wanted a space to share her love of sewing. She explained that it is a very encouraging environment. 

Ms. Vicario expressed that she can help out with any project that requires a bit of extra support, and so can the many members willing to lend a helping hand. She noted that some sewing projects may take longer to complete. In The Edge’s short visit to a club meeting, members were visibly helping and supporting one other with their projects. 

Ms. Vicario also added, “If there’s something that you want to make, just try to make it. Even if that’s a shirt and it ends up looking terrible, at least you mostly made a shirt and you’ll know what to do better next time.” 

She additionally mentioned the idea of “thrift flipping” that has been floating around. Thrift flipping is when someone takes pieces of clothing they would like to alter, either to change the fit or style of the item, and makes these changes themself. Ms Vicario informed The Edge that there has been talk of possibly doing this as the club progresses. 

Ultimately, the Sewing Club is a fun, uplifting learning environment filled with positivity. Sewing club is giving young sewers a great outlet to express their fashion creativity. As Ms. Vicario concluded, “The door is always open.” So pop in if this creative club sounds interesting to you!