Tailoring: a craft worth pursuing?
Conducting live bespoke trousers drafting demonstration.
It was a couple of months before turning 25, having just completed two years of mandatory conscription service, I was figuring out what are my choices for a career. My mother before me started out as a seamstress from the age of 14 and has been on the path of a tailor since, and naturally I would think to do the same with the intention to help grow my mother’s business that has been seeing several years of downtrend in growth. The decision was made without knowing the challenges that lies ahead.
Navigating through the next 6 years with an extremely thin safety net turned out to be extremely tough, financially, physically and mentally. And yet, it is from the challenges faced on the journey that I understood what it means to live as a craftsman, a perspective I would like to share in this article.
The opinions I will be sharing in this article can be subjective, as it is a reflection from the experiences of my own. I do hope it will be of value for readers aspiring to venture down the path of craftsmanship, be it tailoring, leathercraft, or woodworking, just to name a few. Anyone can pick up a skill, and yet not everyone who picked up a skill will have the discipline to master it. Mastering a skill requires commitment above all else, followed by discipline and perseverance alike. Here are a few thoughts that I would like to share from my experience:
Time is everything.
Think about it this way, you are picking up a skill that allows you to create value with your hands and offer it the world to make a living in exchange. Consistency and discipline largely decides your pace of development. It is also important to be realistic about the amount of time you have and whether or not it makes sense to pursue it as a career. Having taught individuals between age 25, all the way to 67, the age at which one choose to pursue this skill do in fact determines the amount of time it will take you to achieve mastery. There is therefore a great advantage to starting early, as we tend to pick things up faster at a younger age. Theoretically speaking, someone who started his journey at age 14 will likely to be leaps ahead of another who started at 25. However, I must also emphasise that the journey of craftsmanship is not a race with others but a marathon where you pace yourself towards your mastery goals. It is therefore crucial to fully consider the amount of time you are willing to commit to this pursuit.
Speaking of time, a craftsman should also understand the undeniable fact the pace at which you work largely determines how well you are rewarded. It is as my master from London had said, “If you don’t work fast enough, you’ll starve”. This insight has proven increasingly relevant. While maintaining high quality is crucial, it’s also important not to romanticise spending excessive amount of time on a single piece. Balancing high-quality output with efficiency ensures you can support yourself financially. Always remember that as a craftsman, time is everything.
You will find fulfilment, but not necessarily riches.
While I was focused on honing my skills to become a better tailor, financial stability was elusive in the first six years since the start of my journey. Living in one of the world’s most expensive cities has only amplified the pressure, along with the stress and anxiety mounted upon me. I was able to cope by keeping firm to the belief that my value increases each day as long as I commit to this path, a belief that holds true to this day.
It took me a several years before my first breakthrough, and it may or may not be the same for the rest. However one thing is for certain, the ones who’ve already started their journey should rejoice knowing that once they’ve mastered a skill, they can never starve.
Today, mastering this craft has brought me a profound sense of personal satisfaction and stability. From my experience, the true rewards are found in the joy of creating something with your hands, and in the trust and appreciation of your clients. I can truly say the richness of being able to pursue my passion and achieving excellence in this field outweighed financial riches.
Never underestimate how far passion can drive you.
I always believe that the true measure of passion is less of about how much interest you have in doing a particular thing, but rather how much you are willing to sacrifice to make your pursuit work. The beautiful thing about having a strong passion is that it fuels perseverance, creativity, and resilience. It drives you to continuously improve and innovate your craft beyond your present limits. Passion however, can also die out like a burning matchstick. It is the belief system that an individual hold on to that will see to it that his passion stays on.
There are some who gave up after six months, and some after two years when the rewards they had hope didn’t happen. Does that mean that these people have a lack of passion from the very beginning? Having a passion for something means to be willing to make the decision to commit to the same journey everyday despite different situations. Yet, some as compared to others may find themselves in an environment where they can’t afford the freedom to pursue a passion any further. As such, it would be wise to understand our own threshold before dedicating ourselves to a pursuit of a craft.
The six years of struggle has tested my claim to being passionate about tailoring on several occasions, and I am proud to have prevailed. Even now, I stay vigilant for new challenges and setbacks that may show up in the road ahead while embracing this passion of mine.
A craftsman and businessman are two different beings.
While technical skill is crucial, to be successful in a this pursuit also requires business acumen. A lack of fundamental business knowledge may bring limitations to the rewards in your pursuit as a craftsman (a trend I’ve witnessed from the master craftsman I’ve met in my journey). Understanding how to manage basic finances, market your services, and build important client relationships is essential. Many artisans including myself still focus solely on our craft, and without effective business practices, our approach may or may not translate into a sustainable long-term success. Therefore it is extremely crucial to understand this point and decide the hat you will wear. Balancing craftsmanship with business-like approach is hardly an easy feat and it would work well to have a partner that will take care of the areas that a craftsman is unable to fulfil.
If money is the sole reason that motivates you to explore tailoring, run a tailoring business and hire a team of craftsman. There are several successful tailoring business that provides wonderful case study.
There will always be a demand for the ‘human touch’.
Walking into a tailoring atelier to be greeted by the tailor whom you consider a friend is one of the most beautiful relationship that can and have existed. The conversations which started from fabrics and styles, has evolved to cover various topics in life with numerous visits. Such interactions is one of few examples that can never be replaced with technology.
There may not be demand for what is available in plenty, but there will always be plenty of demand for a specialty. In today’s world, the ability to create and deliver value with your own hands remains a timeless asset, one that technology cannot replicate (I don’t see robots capable of hand tailoring being invented in the next decade). I remember that it was just 7-8 years ago where my friends was telling me about how some tailoring business are using 3D scanning technology that takes body measurement with high precision. As it turns out, it seems like the traditional tailoring remains the preferred choice till this day.
We can safely determine that having a ‘human touch’ in the equation of craftsmanship will become an extremely rare commodity. As humans, we will always seeking the element which reminds us of the warmth of humanity.
In conclusion, I do strongly believe that our world is moving towards (or backwards) an era where mastering a skill can put you in an advantageous position as compared to simply having an administrative specialty which can and will eventually be replaced by Artificial Intelligence technologies. The ability to create and deliver value through your own hands has been tested and proven through time. As we move forward, the beauty and impact of genuine, down-to-earth craftsmanship shall remain as relevant as ever
At this time of writing where I turned 34 recently, I would like to express gratitude to the universal for the people (especially the masters that kindly showed me the ropes) that came along in the past ten years. The things that didn’t make sense before finally did, and I wouldn’t have picked a different path. I believe that with mastery of a skill, imparting it becomes a duty, and I would welcome passionate individuals who would like to pick up tailoring to reach out to our atelier and let’s see what destiny brings.
Sincerely,
Alexander K
