Hello there!

I am Candiss and I welcome you to my little corner of the internet!

For the short version,

This is a place where I can share my tips and tricks for all sorts of creative projects, with a major focus on knitting and sewing/pattern making garments, and finished projects. I have an extensive background in garment creation with a degree in apparel design and a good chunk of time working for fashion labels in NYC. My roles were in the behind the scenes of the fashion industry where I facilitated the creation of the clothing you have seen grace the runway of the brands Zac Posen, Diane von Furstenberg, and Rachel Zoe. I have since moved on from those days in high/contemporary fashion to develop footwear back in my home state of California and love it! I look forward to sharing the knowledge gained in my decade plus of experience with you!

Now if you care for the long version,

I have been a creator of things my entire life starting very young by being the kid in class with all the art supplies for every project. I learned to crochet, embroider, and basic sewing from my Grandmother in elementary school and only continued to learn more in the decades since. My serious perusal of garment making started In high school when I decided I wanted to knit and taught myself how to knit via books and the newly forming blog world. I definitely got so deep that I wanted to learn to spin yarn and took a drop spindle class at the Dixon Sheep and Wool festival before my senior year of High School! I decided to pursue a career path in the world of fashion and went to school at the now defunct Art Institute of Portland Oregon where I received my degree in Apparel Design. In school I learned all the basics of garment construction, patternmaking, draping, sketching, and more.

In January 2010 I moved to NYC to pursue my dreams of working in the fashion industry. It started with an internship that I quickly left for another which turned into a full time job and a wild 6 1/2 years in the city (it still seems like SO MUCH longer). That first job was in the Atelier (French for sample room) of Zac Posen’s fashion house. In the simplest explanation my job was managing the flow of work from the patternmakers, to the cutters, to the sewers, in reality it was more than this but that is a story for another day. I credit my time there with really solidifying and expanding on the knowledge I learned in school. I worked with some of the best patternmakers and sewers in the industry and I am forever grateful for them sharing their expertise with me. I continued on to Diane von Furstenberg followed by Rachel Zoe in related roles, though I transitioned to working primarily with our factory partners in Asia rather than with the in house team and domestic factories. I moved back to my home state of California in the Fall of 2016 to help my family with some things and for a break from the endless grind of NYC and the fashion industry. Once settled back in CA I happened into a Footwear Product Development role and haven’t looked back since!

During those years in NYC I was too burnt out to really pursue any of my extra curricular creative pursuits outside of work. It has taken me until the year of the pandemic (2020) to feel ready and willing to jump back in and reclaim those activities with the vigor I once had, this time armed with a decade of professional experience to aid in my making. Another push to return to garment making was I noticed my practical skills and theoretical knowledge were getting rusty with not using them daily anymore. Those skills and knowledge were hard earned and letting them fade to time is not an option, especially when I enjoy them so much!

My goal with this blog and instagram is to grow my practical sewing skills and to share my knowledge of patternmaking, garment construction, fit, and knitting with you! I hope you will follow along and hopefully pick up a thing or two along the way! I am always open to suggestions of topics you would like to learn more about too!