Thoughts on SWAP changes

While I totally understand why Deepika changed the rules of this SWAP, I feel that the person who initiated the changes did more damage to herself and her company than she did to the PR SWAP (and I will continue to call it a SWAP, not a Wardrobe Contest). First of all this did not start until after the yearly SWAP was over, voting was completed and the winners were declared. The PR SWAP was initiated by PR members, not Deepika. D was just following the wishes of her members with no intent of stepping on anyone's toes. There was a momentum started because of the earlier SWAP on Stitcher's Guild--people who were not part of the first one, like myself, decided it would be fun to finally get one going now that we were inspired by the earlier one. For goodness sakes, the PR SWAP was nearly six weeks old and half over when this bomb was dropped--at least she should have discussed this with Deepika before blasting the contest on her site. Deepika is very easy to deal with and I am sure that she would have been happy to reach some compromise without everything being made so public by the offender. The majority of us are participating in the PR SWAP to get some coordinating clothes, the prizes are nice, but they are not the inspiration. Had there not been any prizes, I wonder if there would have been such a stink. Competition with the other contest was not the intent--just having fun sewing. I will continue to support Deepika. She has a great site which I have been following since day one.

Besides, the idea of a coordinating wardrobe did not begin with a SWAP. It has been around ever since I can remember. In the early 1980's it was published in Working Wardrobe by Janet Wallach when she introduced the concept of wardrobe capsules where all pieces worked together. I love this book because it is such an inspiration even if it is a little dated with the big shoulder jackets.