
Chloe Skye Nagraj
She / Hersewist / maker / landscape architect
I’m Chloe, I’m a sewist / landscape designer / gardener living in central Virginia. I learned to sew at a local sewing shop in my early twenties. I originally got into it so that I could shorten thrifted clothes to fit my height. I dabbled in sewing from patterns during this sewing stint but ended up frustrated when the clothes wouldn’t magically fit me straight out of the pattern envelope and set the hobby aside for years.
In 2020 I came back to sewing. I had just graduated from grad school and was floundering in the tumult of that year. I had an itch to make a jacket and decided to make one since I had something specific in mind. Two things about sewing for me clicked differently in this moment then they had when I was younger. The first was that it became a grounding respite during the pandemic. Sewing gave me a sense of self sufficiency, mindfulness, and control that I really needed. The second was that translating patterns from 2D to 3D mentally made sense to me when in the past they hadn’t (I chalk it up to just finishing a degree in an architecture program). Feeling more confident in understanding sewing patterns has allowed me to be more freely creative and have fun with sewing in a way I haven’t ever been able to.
I’m now transitioning to another phase in my sewing practice that isn’t rooted in anxiety. I’m looking to what I love about gardening to inspire me: a slower, ongoing relationship that isn’t solely centered around consumption and production. I don’t know what this looks like yet, but hopefully I’ll figure it out!
What influence does music have in your life as a creative?:
I rarely listen to music when I sew! Sometimes I’ll listen to music on speakers, but I often find it distracting. However, I listen to music while doing just about everything else. Music helps me focus, pumps me up, calms me down. I love making playlists and have different ones for writing, drawing, when I’m tired but need to work, when I’m wired but need to sleep. Now that I think of it, it’s kind of weird that I don’t listen to music when I’m sewing. Maybe I just haven’t made the right playlist yet!
Tell us about your playlist:
This playlist has a pretty full range of the music I listen to, from more low-key relaxation music to bangers to sad songs. It’s a mish mash but I think it works as a playlist! It also is a mix both of stuff I’m really into right now and music that I’ve been listening to since I was a teen. It starts chill then revs up then ends chill.
- スポーツマン (2019 Remastering) – Haruomi Hosono
- After I Met You – Rüdiger Lorenz
- Go Home – h hunt
- Tomorrow’s Gone – Charlie Megira
- All Alone – Mal Waldron
- I Love You – Willie Griffin
- A Little Lost – Arthur Russell
- messy – serpentwithfeet
- Numb – Portishead
- Haunted Water – Spellling
- I Wanna Be a Winner – Vickie & The Van Dykes
- Ariadna (ариадна) – Kedr Livanskiy
- 17 Años – Medio Mutante
- You Make No Sense – ESG
- Your Turn to Run – Malaria!
- I Heard It Through The Grapevine – The Slits
- Contort Yourself (1st version) – james chance
- Stretch (12″ Version) – Maximum Joy
- Mr Clarinet – The Birthday Party
- T 3.2 – Carter Tutti Void
- Spur – Helena Hauff
- Make It Up – Tirzah
- Pain – Boy Harsher
- You Never Knew – Negative Gemini
- I Am Alive – E. Myers
- King of Hosts – Tzusing
- Paténipat – Charlotte Adigéry
- Gaut – Fauxe
- A New Error – Moderat
- Baby Forgive Me – Robyn
- Oh Baby – Micachu & The Shapes
- Noise – Zsela
- I Can’t Stand the Rain – Ann Peebles
- symbol – Adrianne Lenker
- You Bring These Things – Karen Marks