Hoody Refashion Reveal

Hello I have had a lovely day messing about with my refashion project, it has been so relaxing I think mainly because there is no new fabric involved, or timescale and it has just been evolving as it went along I suppose.  Beware  many photo's coming up, so here is the finished jacket/cardi or whatever you want to call it and it now fits perfect.

What are those flowery bits of Amy Butler fabric doing at the front I hear you say, well let me explain as this jacket has been something of a Frankenstein project when I cut up the original hoody there was not enough fabric to cut many of the burda pieces in full.  As a result I have pieced bits together here and there.  I didn't want a join showing there at the front so I thought I would embellish it a bit.

Here is where I had to patch on an extra bit of fabric before cutting out the yoke as I didn't have a big enough piece of blue jersey for both sides after cutting the under arms.

Here you can see the blue under sleeve, and did I have to patch a bit under the left arm to make the piece big enough, yes I did, ha ha! Told you it was Frankenstein's jacket, it's ok it is hardly noticeable.

The centre front panels are in two pieces but where I remade the pockets and added the blue I found that when I re-attached them I could line them up so it sort of hides the join.  If you look the pocket ends at the navy blue the line continuing across the front to the zip is the join.

There wasn't enough rib for the new jacket style even though the original was really big. So I made these folded strips of jersey from the offcuts and added them at each side.

I kept the back of the jacket all one piece but it had to be recut further down to allow for set in sleeves as the originals were raglan.  This means there are also little triangular details on the shoulder at the back too.

The under side of the collar is blue fabric scraps, I had to cut down the zip after I unpicked it and then line up all my bits on the front.

I handstitched the zip in first and don't worry about the messy seam I will cover that in a minute.

Here I covered the inside of the zip with jersey scrap fabric to make it neat, I am tempted to go over all the inside seams like this or is that going too far?

Just now though I should have taken a before shot of how big it was on me doh!

I hope this has been useful for showing you that you can take old clothes or charity finds and play around with them.  If you don't spend much you have the chance to learn a lot from doing things like this, all the while keeping in mind that it is ok if it goes wrong.  I am aware people go on expensive dress making course and are ushered down the road of buying the expensive pattern you will be making with the expensive fabric!   Wow what pressure that must be, I think you can't beat practising on old clothes, sheets, offcuts or whatever else you can lay your hands on.  As you can see I still like messing about like this after all these years, if you don't spend much you can view it as play and learning without the pressure.

Now under my re-fashion I have on todays me made May day 17, a self drafted skirt (sale fabric) a self drafted t shirt from a pinterest idea I saw (remnant fabric).

That is all for today I hope it wasn't too much with all the images, have a lovely week. 

Jacket Re-fashion Progress

Quite a nice day today and it felt almost normal, my friend called to pick up her birthday present she didn't come in just stood on the drive and we had a chat at a distance for ten minutes.  My husband and I had  a nice walk in the park and a stroll past the Greek pop hut that has appeared locally, after I noticed they had a vegan option my husband went back minus the dogs to stand in the socially distanced queue.  The food we had was nice and it felt like we had a treat.

For me made May day 16 I have on another mock jumpsuit that I made with Minerva fabric last year, this one I adapted a new look pattern for the trousers with a self drafted darted vest top.  It is comfy to wear.

This afternoon has been spent trying   to make the Burda jacket with the hoody re-fashion, there has been a lot of jigsawing bits together as there was no way I could get all the bits out of the hoody.  It would have been easier to size it down and embellish it but that would have been too easy wouldn't it?  I have used a bit of navy sweatshirt scraps but I didn't have much of that either so the yokes on the shoulders have a little triangle addition in the corners.  It is all one big experiment so I am completely relaxed about it.  Here is a peek...

Here that front panel is in two pieces due to lack of bit pieces, it is also upside down and I have already topstitched it across and down.  So that had to come off, see I said I would show the bad with the good.

Here one sleeve on as you see the under sleeve is also blue, the pockets that came off were quite small for a big hoody I have added a blue panel to those too.

I need to unpick the fabric from that zip as I just cut it off yesterday when I was in a hurry to get cutting.  At the moment I am undecided what to use for the front panel that the zip will go on, also I have cut a very small collar due to lack of fabric! If it doesn't work out it may be a tiny mandarin collar, we will see tomorrow.

Thank you for stopping by and enjoy your weekend.

A Bit of Re-fashioning

Another day, and I had to think if it was Friday or not all the days are becoming a blur. My husband is still on a mix of homeworking or in the office, today was an office day.  I did manage to get to the local nursery today and  three grow bags were purchased along with three tomato plants and two strips of impatience.  I thought I would buy a couple of things that will flower soon as my home grown  plants are many but a way off flowering just yet.   I transplanted three courgettes to one grow bag, the tomatoes in another and I am using the  other for planting up as they had no compost.  The whole world has to been to the garden centres in excitement you see so it is slim pickings!

Me made May day 15, half way through and this self drafted dress is just right for in-between weather.  I made a slim tube dress in red jersey to go under it (for modesty as the broderie anglaise  has holes and I didn't want it to be see through anywhere) this means it is a bit warmer than a usual summer dress.

This afternoon I decided to cut into this hoody, my son gave me this one as the arms are too short for him, he got it from a charity shop so it is double recycled.  I have worn it around the house when it was cold but it is ridiculously large on me and I have thought all along I would re size it.  So I thought I would experiment with it, I love my denim jacket pattern and wondered how it would fare in jersey. As this is already in my possession I  thought why not.

Now this pattern will not fit all the pieces on here once it is taken apart so there may need to be a few contrasting scraps of other jersey fabric in the mix.  I did not have enough fabric for  the separate under arm panels or front side pieces.  It will be interesting to see how it looks and either way good or bad I will share, it is only intended as an indoor cardi but will be useful to practise on for future upcycling attempts.

There is also a  mans shirt and a ladies maxi dress both from the charity shop rail in my fabric box waiting to be turned into something this summer.  Maybe another shirt dress with two colours so that may  be coming in the next few weeks.

Both my sons have gone out on a bike ride this evening and that is three times this week, it is so nice to see them doing things together now that they are grown up.  Everyone seems to be enjoying getting outside, I passed the stunt park yesterday and I have never seen it so busy, I know social distancing but try telling children that!  Which could stir up another conversation but I will stop there, I think we are all well aware how sensible young children will be on returning to School during a global pandemic ;) do you think??

That is all for today bye for now.