I am heartily jealous of those sewists who can give/throw away clothes they have made when they are having wardrobe cleanouts – for some reason I can never bring myself to do this and as a result I have quite of lot clothes stuffed into my wardrobe that I made but never wear because something is not quite right or they are complete & utter wadders. I am working on this though, I have started getting rid of things made from cheap or ugly fabric, salvaging the zippers and buttons etc and putting the clothes in the ever growing rag bag. The rest though, I hang on to thinking I’ll re-use the fabric, refashion it into something else or try and fix the problems to make them wearable. I never get around to doing this of course…..
But whilst I was having my hiatus on the lounge a few weeks ago when I had that pesky cold, I pulled out a pair of navy blue stretch linen pants that I made years ago but only wore a few times because they fitted badly (most of my pants do, because there is such a large difference between my waist and hips, the joys of being pear shaped!). I unpicked the waistband and zipper, and let out all the seams as much as possible, sewed on some stretch cotton knit for a waistband and voila, I have the most comfortable pants that are nice enough to wear out and about.
Well these pants had a matching jacket that I made from some long forgotten pattern, but just a standard princess seam, notched collar blazer style that was a bit longer in length so that it hit mid thigh. Because I made this years ago, my sewing skills were a little dodgy to say the least and the notched collar was pretty appalling, I didn’t line it or use the proper interfacing and it was just overall a bad look. But I absolutely love linen fabric, especially where it has a little stretch in it so I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away.
So to make it work (Tim Gunn style) I fixed the notched collar (much better now), put in some interfacing where needed, lopped off some length of the jacket and rounded the fronts off which I think is much better look on me, replaced the navy blue buttons with some light coloured timber ones, and top stitched around the edges in a caramel brown colour cotton and it’s made a world of difference:
But whilst I was having my hiatus on the lounge a few weeks ago when I had that pesky cold, I pulled out a pair of navy blue stretch linen pants that I made years ago but only wore a few times because they fitted badly (most of my pants do, because there is such a large difference between my waist and hips, the joys of being pear shaped!). I unpicked the waistband and zipper, and let out all the seams as much as possible, sewed on some stretch cotton knit for a waistband and voila, I have the most comfortable pants that are nice enough to wear out and about.
Well these pants had a matching jacket that I made from some long forgotten pattern, but just a standard princess seam, notched collar blazer style that was a bit longer in length so that it hit mid thigh. Because I made this years ago, my sewing skills were a little dodgy to say the least and the notched collar was pretty appalling, I didn’t line it or use the proper interfacing and it was just overall a bad look. But I absolutely love linen fabric, especially where it has a little stretch in it so I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away.
So to make it work (Tim Gunn style) I fixed the notched collar (much better now), put in some interfacing where needed, lopped off some length of the jacket and rounded the fronts off which I think is much better look on me, replaced the navy blue buttons with some light coloured timber ones, and top stitched around the edges in a caramel brown colour cotton and it’s made a world of difference:
Because it’s unlined I didn’t put in shoulder pads or a sleeve head which I think it needs because I can see that the shoulder cap collapses a little, so it may still need a little more work in that regard, but apart from that I’m pretty happy with the salvage operation. I've worn the suit with my now finished but formerly oldest UFO, because the colour matches the top stitching perfectly. Although with the matching ballet flats I'm wearing today, it's all a little matchy matchy but hey I do still work for the government and I'm not yet pregnant and barefoot in the kitchen LOL!
Too bad I left it so late to do this, because I’ll only wear it today to work and then it will go back in the cupboard for at least the next 12 months since tomorrow is my last day as an office lemming. I will keep on wearing the pants though until I lose the baby weight and they don't stay up anymore, because they are just so comfortable and much better than track suit pants. and neighbourhood.gal I love the thought that you are talking about me to some real life friends - I tell my husband and real life friends about what blog 'friends' are up to as well, but for those who are blogless it's pretty hard to explain how you know so much about strangers who live half away across the world!
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