A renaissance of the feminine arts?

[Beware_of_Doug]

@Mighty_Girl

It seems that in the last years young women have re-discovered the feminine arts, and the greatest things is that now the boys are joining us!

Uhoh, the master plan is going awry. Somewhere gender essentialist theorists are pounding their desks and tearing out their hair.

[thirdwarning]

@Lynn_Bodoni

In another high school, I was allowed to take wood shop. My teacher hated the fact that girls were allowed in shop class, and had never given a girl an A for the class, before me. He admired my work, and the fact that I wouldn’t let the guys carry my materials and projects around, as most of the other girls would. In this high school, I had to take another year of science to graduate, because they didn’t allow girls to substitute a year of home ec for science.

I was the first girl in my high school to take shop. When I talked to the couselor about it in the spring, he told me to come back and see him when school started. So I did. I think he was disappointed I hadn’t forgotten. I also think my shop teacher was happy to have somebody in the class who actually wanted to be there and would pay attention.

In junior high we were required to take one semester of home ec and the boys had a semester of shop. I always thought they should have reversed those.

This resurgence of interest in the feminine arts seems different from the spurt that happened when I was about that twenty-something age. That seemed to be a bit more about usefulness, whereas this time seems to be a bit more about the fun or the sheer creativity. Not objecting, just noticing.

[Mighty_Girl]

@Mama_Tiger

And in many parts of the world, all children learn things like basic knitting and cooking in school; I guess it’s considered part of a complete education. I’m just glad I can find so many lovely yarns these days, and people (or online videos) to answer any knitting question I could possibly have!

My school went co-ed while I was in middle school. The boys had to take basic sewing classes, things like repairing a hem, sewing a button, sewing buttonholes, etc.

My husband, born the same year as I, but in Denmark, attended public school, and he took basic knitting classes as well as the same basics boys in my school did.

[dangermom]

It does go in cycles, and knitting has been huge for a while now. Sewing–clothes, crafty items, bags, etc.–is getting bigger every day. Hand sewing and by machine. I can’t even count how many pretty books have been published lately featuring 15+ simple sewing projects. These books have hip fabric and nice photography, and although the authors have usually come up with their own patterns and designs, the projects tend to repeat a lot. Simple pajama pants, various sorts of bags, aprons, easy skirts, etc. abound. And tons of people are coming out with their own small, chic lines of patterns for children’s clothing, too.

Fabric design has gone in a whole new direction in the past couple of years. There is so much new, wonderful, modern fabric that it’s impossible to keep up. (My favorite is Heather Ross.)

Cross stitch, meanwhile, is pretty moribund right now. I still like it though, and have 3 projects lined up.

IMO the ‘feminine arts’ suffered for a while, but they’re back in a pretty big way. As a dedicated sewing-type person, I’m happy about it. (But I wish they’d put something good in those new books.)

[Tamex]

I took up crochet about five years ago, when I was in my late 20’s. I was working in a call center, I had a strange schedule with lot of free time away from my family, and I think I was just craving some sort of work I could do with my hands. I really do think I felt incomplete not doing things with my hands. I have a much more “hands-on” job now, and I crochet much less, although I still do enjoy it. Perhaps as many people’s lives involve less “hands-on” work, they crave it.

Also, as a kid, these “feminine arts” were not presented as an outlet to creativity. You followed a pattern and you got what the pattern said. Boring. Nowadays, it’s more acceptable to see these skills as a way to make exactly what you want.