Upcycled leopardskin print mesh skirt.

 Some of my me-made clothing is so old now I have worn it out. 

This particular high low top is possibly the best item of clothing I ever made. Its certainly one of my most worn tops hence its gone all out of shape and no longer looks good on me so I decided its time to recycle.The problem is even though you love it and you actually made it these clothes still wear out!

So along with several other old clothes (mostly me-made because its what I own nowadays) I stuck this out for recycling.

But the recycling company ( for a local charity) never turned up. Well I ended up removing this top and 3 LBDs from the four bags of clothing I had put out. It made my partner laugh!

Anyway I made the sleeves into a version of the sleeves I made a few weeks ago. These are OK but being an upcycle not really as good as the first set - which incidentally were also an upcycle. But I used a pattern to make them from scratch and with these I just chopped them off the body and hemmed the tops. Thats the difference and quite a difference there is too, although both sets of sleeves are wearable. I do not have any photos of these as yet but will add when I get round to wearing them.

Then I was looking at the rest of this top and I decided that its the body thats worn out and the hood is like new so I started off just cutting off the hood and then ended up also salvaging the facings inside the neck.

The main part (but inside out so the plain outer becomes the new lining) was a possible skirt and the facings could become a sort of waistband.

Then I sewed it all together. Its not perfect but then its an upcycle of the class - "you can so why not?" rather than use a nice pattern to make a new item from old cloth.

The waistband is a little twisty - but then thats a fashion statement!

It works. And needs no elastic because the leopard print powermesh over the grey cotton lycra is stretchy enough and works really well and with comfort!

and the skirt is high low - another fashion statement.

The only quibble I really have is the back seam is slightly off centre ( due to the original garment being somewhat out of shape I think)  but I enjoyed wearing this and its very lightweight yet also warm so I can ignore that minor problem and get some extra wear from a rather unexpected new clothing item in my winter wardrobe.

And its such fun!

So it really is an "I made it cos you can" item rather than a well planned, well made skirt. 

Its been years since I did something so instantaneous with my old clothing but it used to be something I did all the time. My clothes were definitely not as well made then but they were cheaper and usually they were fun. I probably should be looking to do this more often I think. 

And to top this off, I get extra wear from my original fabric and a small bit less makes its way to landfill for now, which has to be a good thing.

Its worn here with a basic black top. I do not really much like this top hence despite the age its in great condition. Still its a basic for the every day life I suppose.

Have a lovely week and I wish you all the best of fun...............

Bracken

Sewing update: glittery pixie hoody dress

I  have very little to show you this week sewing-wise. 

I hand sewed a bit of my coat.

Then I had the great idea to add patch pockets to cover the mess I made if the welt pockets. 

That looked terrible! To cover the welts ( which are different lengths and one is far wider than the other!) the patch pockets need to be huge which is fine but they sag to show the badly made welts inside. They only looked ok with my hands in them to hide the welts and I will never constantly have my hands in my pockets. Its just not realistic. The new patch pockets also completely ruin the look of the coat so its just not viable. 

So I then removed them - sorry no photos. I then decided to unpick my welts which are different widths - as in the side to side width ( not sure how well you can see here but one hole is wider than the other and I had also totally missed out a flap and really do not know how to make these so it's bodge it time I am afraid to try and save a coat and make it wearable!)

I am now going to make part of each patch pocket into a fake welt flap which will I hope cover the badly made welt holes. Sorry no idea for the technical terms here at all.

I think it should work and my would-be fake welt flaps are looking good so far. They are tweed one side and faux fur the other. I have yet to determine which fabric will be the outer layer. Probably the tweed since the coat is such a mess I had probably tone all the details down and keep it as wearable as possible rather than draw attention to the dodgy bits. 

 What's left after that, assuming this idea works, is all hand sewing and I am finding it hard to get motivated to do it. The coat does now have a button. 

A very nice family heirloom button which is I believe bakerlite. At the least its a pre-1960s button anyway that came from my great-aunts. They both died in the late 1960s. I vaguely remember them. They gave up their lives to bring up their younger brothers and sisters when my great grandmother died leaving them all children. My Auntie Lydia was eldest and only 15 when she took on the upbringings her 9 younger siblings. I think Auntie Annie was a year or two younger. Nowadays, the authorities would take over and maybe that's a good thing though I really am not so sure it is. My great aunties did a very good job of bringing up their siblings and they would probably have been split up in the modern Care system we have in the UK. Anyway it was a different time. 

I inherited this button from them and have decided to make use of it. I had already decided last winter after several attempts at a machine made button hole that I will hand stitch one and I even bought embroidery thread to do it so that's now my next aim for this coat. Then it will just need a hem. But this is all if hand stitching so it's on my to-do list. Once the weather gets colder I will probably finally get this coat finished. I then have at least two more half finished coats so will make a start on one of them over winter I think. 

I seem to feel coat making motivated once it gets cold but it seems I rarely finish them!

In the meantime, I have  my camo short skirt I have been making since 2013 to finish. It's not difficult. I just don't seem to do it and always sew something else. 

Similarly, last winter I began making a sweatshirt. It remains half sewn. It turned out to be a difficult sew and I needed a break to get my head round it. I think I have now got it sorted (in my thoughts anyway) so I just need to get on with the actual sewing. Both skirt and sweatshirt would be good for my winter look - as would the coat. So this is what I am currently working on.

But I did finish the pixie dress. And although its a make I have made previously its making me happy to wear this. Its very cold today ( for the UK!) so not really cold if you lived in many other countries.

This is therefore a not very original glittery sweatshirt dress which I have made numerous versions of before although this is far thicker and stiffer fabric than my previous ones. Well its sweatshirting, so not actually stiff but it does not hang as my previous versions. The godets kind if stick out a bit. I will wear this though because it's a dress pattern I love so hopefully the godets will just wear in. 

So I am happy enough this week and I actually love my new pixies hoody dress.

Have a really great week and thanks for popping by. Hopefully my next post will be about some or other UFO I finally got finished.

Take care

Bracken

Burda Style dress 125, 03/2002

 

 I have decided to eliminate as much stashed fabric as I can, so instead of my usual tactic, which is find a nice pattern and then find something from the stash to use to make it, I am now pulling out season suitable fabrics and using all of it. This does mean lots of co-ordinating items in identical fabrics which is good and bad depending on your view.

Since I probably have enough stashed fabric to get me through the rest of my life without buying anything this seems the way to go. It gets rid of huge amounts in a few weeks. I started with the glitter grey sweatshirting a while ago and cuts several items and I still have two other items to sew up after this dress.

The downside: well its very unlikely I will come accross this kind of fabric at a bargain basement price again. I actually bought 12m of this so its been going for a while. Its the second lot of grey glitter sweatshirting I bought. I used the paler fabric a few years ago and because I enjoyed the tracksuits I made so much I bought this bolt of 12m. I then made a couple of tracksuits but the rest has been sitting there ever since. I had at least 6m of this in the piece of fabric I pulled out of my stash, but its now cut and being sewn.

 I will be making another pair of track pants - slightly different to my previous versions but still using the same pattern as a base in the next couple of weeks and also another dress. Thats a lot of warm winter clothes though and will keep me happy I expect for this winter. That frees me up to make some more glamourous and also practical stuff - like finally finish the hand sewing on the coat I started last year. I am also altering that slightly but more once thats done and I can finally wear the thing. Its not too cold as yet which is lucky for me because I will need that coat once it is.

In the meantime I have made this dress. Its model Burda Style dress 125, 03/2002. I made it before but in a far thinner fabric. That one has always seemed too thin but it actually worked better in many ways.

Neck version one

When making this I cut as I said several items and because of this I made the tube neck much shorter. I was sure when sewing this up that the front neck was just a bit too high. I cannot find the old version. I started to pack to move house 3 years ago and its somewhere ina  box. I do not want to be unpacking stuff so its going to move with us and I will decide after if I still want it. Anyway its not around to have a look at so I need to go by the magazine not what I did previously. 

Neck version two

I had some issues with the fit of the neck here as I will explain:

 

So the tube neck on this is shorter than my black faux suede dress. Its probably best like that because the sweatshirting is far more bulky than the black faux suede. 

I think it may not be comfortable if the huge tube neck was doubled and so long as the pattern dictates. Either way I do not have enough offcuts for such a massive tube neck so this is smaller. 

But as you can see from the photos this neck is really very high at the front and you can see the inside seam which I did not like.

Yes I was very much not happy with the neck hence the face!

 So I redid the neck - at front only so a bit of a bodge really but only I will see the inside of this and it also meant I was less likely to reck it if I only altered it slightly because this was difficult to sew. 

And at this point I will say, I began sewing this with my Janome 9300dx overlocker.

I love that machine but I relatively recently bought a new one which is the Brother 4234D. Now the Brother is supposed to be easier to thread. For me its an absolute pig ad I never so far managed to thread the thing. I always get someone else to do this for me. And really thats so far from ideal its just awful. I just cannot get it to chain when I do it and  have no idea why. The Janome is fiddly but I always manage to successfully thread that so I have previously slagged off the Brother machine but when faced with 6 layers of sweatshirting my Janome could not do it and I nearly recked the garment. I swapped to the Brother and it made such easy work of it, its definitely worth having. I still prefer my Janome even though its old and the cutters continually go out of line meaning I have to fix it - thanks YouTube for being so helpful!

Anyway, the Brother finally came into its own for this dress.

And end result?

Well its very 60s really with the weird sleeve seams (which I have to say I do not like) so sleeves are in two parts like a jacket rather than a dress. 

Sleeves could accommodate shoulder pads!

 Or maybe even 80s because you could easily accommodate shoulder pads here and I took the sleeve seam in as far as I dared without risking recking the dress. Perhaps the oversized shoulders will wear in?

I also added cuffs to lengthen the sleeves - possibly slightly too much. Perhaps I should have also added thumb holes? Hmm not sure. I do not like short sleeves ( unless they are actually meant to be short). I prefer a longer sleeve but maybe this is slightly too long? Its ok when the cuffs are turned back though.

And despite the sleeves, I like the end result. It does have a very 60s feel and the neck ended up more as a collared boat neck but thats actually something I very much love so thats ok. If I make this again I will alter the sleeves but otherwise I will be wearing this a lot over this winter I expect and its so cosy.

Have a great week and hope to see you soon,

Bracken