Friday, April 29, 2016

The higher the shoulder pads...

Today's refashion was quite the looker upon purchase. I found this amazing piece at the Salvation Army and made it mine for just $0.69. I think you will agree that it is worth every penny, just for the before pictures:

Red silk - befores

There was much to be done to get this dress up to date. First step, tackle those shoulder pads.

Oh, what's this: 
Red silk - double pads
Yup, that's a second set of mini shoulder pads under the first set of large ones. Frankly, this could have 5 sets of pads and they'd all end up in the trash.
Then, it was time for the sleeves. Much like previous refashions, I prefer to seam-rip the sleeves off, rather than cut them, because it leaves behind a 1/4" hem that is already permanently folded and easy to pin.
Red silk - removing sleeve
It is incredible how time consuming this is. Seriously, I'm talking hours! Delicate material and heavy duty serging make the process even more slow-going.
I took the sides in and had to say a sad farewell to the pleated skirt as it was just too long and I didn't trust my skills to relocate it higher. However, the end result is quite lovely!
Red silk - afters
Head over to my blog Hems and HaHa's  to see the whole seam-ripperiffic process and to weigh in on whether it looks better forwards or backwards. 
Happy refashioning! 

5 comments:

TheRefashStash said...

Oh my that before is a mess! Love the end result!!

-TheRefashStash

g.satansbraten said...

:-D :-D :-D - yep, you could have used the shoulder pads separate to create at least a nicely cushioned foot-stool. Yet: once upon a time ... this was high fashion; I remember since being of, aehem, 'matching age'.

As for the pleated skirt: I think I would have tried to incorporate it as well despite similar jitters like yours.
What's your problem/ 'hook for hesitation' ?
I think I'd tried first pinned outside to the inside-out worn dress and probably NOT even right sewn onto the edge of the dress. Rather with an approx. up to 5 cm 'overhang' (= declared 'fashion' = flight forwards when in despair ) of the dress hence a second visible sewing line above the thus created overhang/-lap of the dress over the pleat-fixture ?
Problem with this way:
- the weight of the skirt cold be pulling too much
- horrible precision work of sewing, to get TWO close horizontal lines (= edge of dress AND sewing line for skirt fixture) into a really nice level line*

Yet: this way, dress and pleat-part get a slightly better chance of their own 'drop freedom' - mM !?

LG, Gerlinde
... admires colour of the dress on you as well: suits you very well - mho!



* After aaaall my years of sewing there is still hardly anything else I fear more than a visible straight line of longer than 30 cm; worst: 2 of them pretty close to each other :-o + ;-) !

Andrea said...

Came across a similar black dress that I was tempted to take on just for the before and after sans shoulder pads ;) But it didn't have your price tag, so I passed. Great update!

Andrea EOD

alyrocco said...

Great vision for this monstrosity ... I personally vote for buttons in the back! It turned out very classic and super cute!

I Can Work With That said...

Love the color. Nice re-make.