Self drafted Childs DIY towelling poncho from a beach towel

 

This was a very quick make and a long time to think about exactly how to make it. Two weeks in thought and just about 45 minutes actually cutting and sewing!

I do not have any photos of this on a person as yet but it does fit - goes over head etc. It cost just £5 using a beach towel from Asda. The small person I made it for says he loves it. I reckon it will fit up to age 3-4 years though current small person is around 2 years.

When you cut a towel it has ( like fabric with nap) all the designs going the one way so originally I cut in half, turned one piece the opposite way up, then realised to keep both pieces the same length and to keep as much fabric as possible available so I had to unpick the original hem on the front of the towel so that there was enough fabric to have it the size I wanted because I did not really want to have to use two towels for just about 1cm extra length due to cutting off a hem so I went to the trouble of unpicking. The unpicked edge then became my shoulder aand neck edge on the front. It could just as easy be the back but in my case it became the front. 

Then having unpicked the new top edge I hemmed the other end and I did a slight shaping for neck hole on both pieces. To do this I cut round a hoody coat in a similar size ( I used an outdoor coat hoody for sizing to make sure its a large hood. My outdoor coat actually has 3 seams but I squashed the hood to get a flat half a hood with just a central seam. It works!

The really big deal with this was to remember to turn the second half of the towel over before doing anything else over so the crab motifs were all the right way up hence I unpicked one original hem to give me the right length. I then hemmed it the opposite side to provide a new hem the right way up. 

Then I sewed the hoody central seam and used the original edged hem so I never actually hemmed it at front edge. Not perfect but it works.

  

and then overlocked along the edge to keep it from fraying. That does mean for a slightly imperfect centra front hem edge as you can see above but I topstitched it down. 

This is the central hood seam. I took minimal seam allowance so you can see the original hemmed edge is fraying just a little. Top stitched along the top seam and also the shoulder seams. Its not perfect but by the time I hand sewed the frayey bits in it looks as good as any RTW poncho. No one noticed ( but me!)

Top stitched the shoulders. Again the hem edge is the original towel edge carefully lined up as best I can do.

Below overlapping hoody central front.

No pattern matching due to minimal fabric available.  But it will work for swimming for a small person who feels cold after swimming. And its bright and affordable. RTW pochos for small children are £15 upwards in the UK so this is much better at £5 and actually has a nicer print than most.

All in all its a successful money saving swim poncho and looks as good as many RTW ones. Our small person likes it anyway. 

If you fancy making one of these and decide to give this a go please do let me know. With two towels you could make an adult sized version easily. Its shown below on an adult sized manekin.  So if you wanted a short poncho you could get away with just one beach towel. Two, I think, would work best for adults though.

My only advice, because this is really a very easy make, despite there is no pattern, is take your time cutting and think, think, think. It took me a full 2 weeks just contemplating and working this out in my head, but really its very easy, and very rewarding as well as useful.

Have a great week,

Bracken