Crafty
lunarenigme planted this in my head with her love of 50's fashions. I started browsing through ModCloth and realized a lot of the dresses were constructed quite simply.
As an example, this dress is $60 and it's nothing but puffy sleeves, a straight dress, and a sash. You probably only need 4 strips of cloth to get the shape. I could totally make this. I'd still need to find basic patterns (or spend a lot of time making tiny paper dresses until I got the outlines right), but otherwise, easy.
Not a project I'd start until I had more money in my purse, but I'm getting into this sewing thing. I just hope it really is less expensive to make clothes myself. By the time I buy the fabric, zippers, thread, whathaveyou, I'm not sure.