Make do and mend: a hedonist’s journey

The philosophy of make do and mend can be applied if you stick to the following:

Make – the effort
Do – keep going
Mend – your ways.

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try and try again. It’s soooo easy to fix! Your behaviour I mean. I wish I could say that about kettles, radios and bikes. I’ve still a long way to go before I can say I’m any good at mending the like. Whether I want to is another matter, as I’m far more interested in objects that you wear! I started out with the idea of sprucing up a few things around the house and sharing this with friends on facebook. The more I got into it though the more I realised just how big a subject it was and also how many people were interested in the philosophy of make do and mend. A backlash to modern consumerism perhaps, or a necessity in hard economic times? I’ve often found that the less choices or resources I have at my disposal the more creative and resourceful I become. It can be exciting but the flipside is that if the choices or resources are stripped away it can also become stalemate and quite depressing too. I often wonder how people really managed in the war years and post war years. There’s no wonder that after years of making do and mending there were the swinging sixties. The boom years and the start of fast fashion, fast everything. Which brings me back to the title. Is it possible for a wasteful, fashion-loving, DIY disaster to mend her ways to not only enter the spirit of make do and mend but to fully embrace it? Keep reading the posts to find out. 😉

The original hedonist – detail of textile by Sewboytenesque. Freehand machine embroidery on black velvet, gold satin and loadsa bling! x

Talking of spirit, my all-time make do solution to ambiance and romance is to get an empty wine bottle (preferably having been drunk the day before!) and place a candle in the top and light. For added value you could always play some jazzy Stefan Grapelli and Jango Reinhardt and add a red gingham tablecloth into the mix. For any pyromaniacs out there, have safe fun cultivating the layers of dribbled wax. Enjoy!