How was your apprenticeship?

[Pink Cat]

Hello everyone,

For those that had a formal apprenticeship, how was it?

Were you trained by a tailor with many years of experience? Do you use most of the techniques you learned until today? Or over the years you just found your own way and picked up better finishings along the way?

I don't think I am learning in an optimal way. For example, while I was exercising trousers, it kept going wrong until a co-worker said that the seam allowance was too big (1,5 cm for zipper and crotch area), making it hard to iron and get the topstitch nice and flat. After I changed that it went better but I had to make this aware to my tailor and the cutter.

Right now it feels like my only option is to finish this apprenticeship the best I can, hopefully pass the exam and after that find a work place where I can exercise and learn better techniques.

By the way, I did bring this up and let them know I was unhappy. They said that the training is fine, I am too ambitious and that I need to be patient. My boss (tailor) even made the point that her apprenticeship was also not good and she also had to learn everything again after the training.

I am afraid of hearing from a future boss: "Didn't you learn anything during your training?".

Do you have any tips for me? Is every good technique being forgotten and that's just how the training goes nowadays?

Ps: for a little bit of context, my apprenticeship is in a theater in Germany.

[Schneiderfrei]

I'm not a professional tailor, but I have heard that in Italy, an apprentice may never be taught anything by the Maestro.

G

[peterle]

I trink you could learn a lot in a Theater, because there are so much different things to be done. Do you also visit  the Berufsschule? (dual system?) then you could ask the other about their experiences.

[Der Zuschneider]

Just try to finish the apprenticeship and later you will do everything different anyway.

[TTailor]

I think in most schooling situations, what you learn there is something that you use to build on once you leave school. School or apprenticeships will probably never be able to provide you with the skills that years of experience brings.
There is instruction and there is practice.
If someone is teaching you how to do something, then absorb it, and learn it while keeping your mind open to the fact that there are many ways of doing things.

There is nothing stopping you from self directed learning at the same time as you are apprenticing.

[Hendrick]

Mmm, it basically inspired me to "do something else"in fashion. I did thousands of buttonholes and made trousers by the rackload, basically. So, in hindsight, I agree with Peterle; find a place where truly creative stuff is done. If you don't, follow der Zuschneiders'advice and wrangle your way through as efficiently as possible. I only did it because it was a great opportunity to get an associates degree at an extremely young age.