Refashioned wool sweater

This sweater was about to be consigned to the bin because of a large hole near the hem, which you can see in the photo, but I liked the colour and it was good quality 100% wool so decided to rescue it.

My plan was to cut away the holey area, and the sleeves to make something wearable.

I was worried about fraying but this sweater was somewhat felted and it didn't fray following the surgery.

Using fabric from stash, which used to be a shirt, to add length, and the usable parts of the original hem to bind the armholes, resulted in this:

There are more photos and details here

And I feel its cheating if I don't include a photo of it being worn.

Thanks for reading x

Long skirt to top refashion

I bought this skirt in a charity shop while on the look out for items with decent fabric and lots of it.

I especially liked the border, and planned to use it as the hemline of a top.

The fabric was very slippery but my new walking foot helped.

I used a pattern and this was how it turned out.

There are more details and a bonus feature here

scuba skirt to top refashion

I made this top from a charity shop skirt and some fabric I bought in Norway.

The skirt was in a nice light scuba fabric but it only had a 22 inch waist - a limited market if you don't refashion!

I used the 2 hour top from sewdifferent pattern.  I didn't manage to complete it in 2 hours but it was quick and simple.

The scuba fabric behaved very well under the machine and I will be looking out for more items like this in future charity shop visits.

There are more details and photos here

Snip it, and Rip it

My last skirt for therefashioners2016 challenge, was one of those ideas that kept morphing into something else, mainly due to the amount of fabric yielded by the jeans.

 From the beginning, I had wanted to create a plaid or check using strips of different shades of denim. So, throwing any idea of pattern cutting by the wayside, I got out a pair of my trusty old shears, and began to snip and rip. I have to say, I find a weird satisfaction in the sound of fabric ripping (probably drove my husband nuts while he was trying to hear the TV).

After snipping and ripping two pairs of thrifted jeans, I realized I wasn't going to be able to create a piece of fabric to fit around my hips with all the seam allowances taken into account.
I rifled through my refashioning heap, and found a skinny pair (unfortunately), then took a peak in my son's thrift store donation bag - bingo, 1 more pair!
I stitched a panel of stripes, and liked it, but I was still sold on plaid. So, I made another panel adding the horizontal strips - it wasn't exactly what I wanted....hmmm, time for some thinking nutrition (strong coffee and a mini Bounty)....it morphed into a wavy plaid.

Despite the extra jeans, these 2 panels wouldn't be big enough, so I used leftover leg pieces to make side panels - cutting and pinning till they fitted.
The top edge was finished off with a scrap of the lightest weight jeans, and I added metal buttons (from my stash) on the side, and one pocket on the back.
Nearly done, except it's a little too short for me. I did the last few rips, and managed to get 4 panels to use as a hem border, fraying out the bottom.
Find my other entries for therefashioners2016 here.

Antmacassar to skirt refashion

I have a number of old household linens inherited from my great aunt - no one else in the family wanted them.

Quite a few are hand embroidered but this one wasn't.

I wouldn't normally go about cutting up seriously old items but this antimacassar has been in storage since 1993 and I don't remember my aunt ever having it in use prior to that.  I honestly don't think she would have objected to its repurposing, probably would have been interested.  In her lifetime she never logged on to the internet but she did live through 2 world wars and therefore did see plenty of real life.

Anyway, onto the refashion, which via a convoluted route ended up with me pairing this antimacassar with some panels cut from a couple of cord trouser legs to make a skirt.

As always I have more information here

I am always concerned about comfort so added an experimental yoga type waistband.

Jeans to dress refashion

I don't really wear jeans, but fortunately there are always plenty of barely worn ones languishing in charity shops that the owners have found are too tight, too low slung, badly fitting.

I managed to chance upon a large size and better still flared Tommy Hilfiger pair for £4 (cost maybe £50 new) in my local shop. The denim was quite nice and soft.

After deconstructing the jeans, but leaving one leg seam intact, I had plenty of fabric to make my dress bodice, using the leg side seam as the centre seam at the front.

Once I was happy with the fit, I added the original jeans waistband and bound the arms and neck with some home made bias binding.

I was making things up as I went along, hence I now realised it takes more than one pair of jeans to make a dress and I had already used the best bits of the ones I had bought in making the bodice.

Fortunately, I had in my stash, a pair of jeans of similar weight and elastane content which had been donated to me by my daughter.

I deconstructed these, and laid it all out on the bed for ideas.

Yep, that would work, I think.

I had enough denim left from the original jeans to make triangles to fit into the front and back but used the trim fabric for the side fill in.

The best bit is the pocket.  I sewed both original pockets together to make one big one.  This pocket is my pride and joy, I was able to breeze through airport security with passport and boarding pass safely tucked away in there.

Lucky for me, a younger model (aka my daughter) was available for the main photoshoot.

There are more details and photos here  and I am going to enter this into The Refashioners 2016.    

Scarf to Top refashion

I made this top from a scarf I found. 

It was a large 100 x 100 cm square in a silky but synthetic fabric.  I had been intending to make it into a Kimono.

I have a lot of scarves and am often looking for ways to repurpose them but one issue is that sometimes a lot of the pattern action is in the corners, which makes sense for scarves but not for much else.

This is the original scarf.

I found a simple tutorial on pinterest which involves cutting a square and 2 triangles out of a square scarf and putting them together to make this top.

For more details and the link to the original tutorial look here

Here is what it looks like on me.

Vintage top with lace insert

I bought this top for £4, it's from the early 1980's.

The fabric was a silky polyester with a subtle swirly pattern.  The fit was not too bad but a little tight on the bust and a bit long.

I had bought it with this refashion in mind.

I undid the side seams and added a lace insert.  The fabric was the type that frays a lot so I added a small hem to the side seams first.

Finally I cut about 2 inches from the bottom and re-hemmed to make it shorter.

More details and photos, and a bonus feature here

Another skirt made bigger

I bought this skirt for £1, I knew it would be a bit small but that could be fixed.

The basic element of the waistband was a nice Indian style tape, which had no stretch, but there were also 2 types of belt loop and skirt lining so I would have to add an insert to make the waist bigger, merely cutting a strip from the top wouldn't do it.

I removed the tape and added it to my stash.

I opened the centre back seam and added 2 inches to the waist with a triangular panel, also adding a new waistband from some stretchy fabric I already had.

This skirt is now a perfect and comfy fit, more details here 

I've worn it a lot, at home and on holiday, because I like the style and colours.

Skirt made bigger and shorter

I made this skirt bigger and shorter in one fell swoop

I bought it for only £1 from a local charity shop in a size smaller than I normally wear but that could be fixed.

The shape and simple construction of this skirt meant that by removing an inch of length from the waistband end it was made both bigger and shorter.

Here is what I cut off.

I made a new waistband from a thin strip of t-shirt fabric, stretching it slightly as I sewed.

More photos and details here

And here is me wearing the skirt.

Skirt to waistcoat refashion, with help from shirt and cardigan

This skirt belonged to my daughter, she was going to donate it to charity but with no shame I extracted it from the charity bag for my own use.

It was destined to be a waistcoat but there wasn't much fabric. I deconstructed the skirt and cut out 2 panels for the waistcoat front, lining them with plain white cotton from a shirt in my stash.

The stripes don't line up, that wasn't me, it was like that in the original skirt.

I needed a back piece, a cotton/elastane cardigan in my stash was ideal.

Basically I just cut out the back of the cardi then neatened it up.

There are more details and photos here

Here is the finished waistcoat.

Coming soon : Kimono!

Vintage scarf meets men's shirt

I love scarves and have a large collection from various sources but I bought this one for £1 specifically to use in a refashion.  Its the luxurious silkiness of the scarf fabric and the vibrancy of the designs which is so appealing.

Its the old Marks and Spencer St Michael brand , Satin Rayon, Made in Italy.  I would guess it was approx. 1975 vintage.

I also had this thin cotton shirt, approx. 1995 vintage, made in Macau, which had been hanging patiently and quietly in the other side of the wardrobe for at least 10 years.

I used a pattern to make a new top, using the scarf for the central panel and sleeves and the shirt for the other pieces.

The scarf even enjoyed a trip back home, to the rooftops of Milan cathedral.

More details and photos here