Upcycling #6

Many years ago I couldn't resist thrifting a bit of yardage with loads of colors that I usually don't wear, but...butterflies and moths...although...manufactured by Shamash and Sons, so: butterflies and moths rendered in the most direct, unstylized--yet vague--way.

I immediately made a skirt

(the files say June of 2013)

I wore it a lot!  And managed to spatter paint on it from an airbrush mishap (not the first or last time that happened.)  And then gained weight.  But I kept it, because, as subtle as they were, there were still paint spatters, so it was completely inappropriate for donating.

Then I decided to do this whole skirt-to-dress upcycling project.

Upcycling #4

Hmm...so...  OK, the last dress, with the new-to-me shirt pattern used for the bodice?  Mmmh.  Yeah.  The sleeves Do Weird Things, as I later saw in many reviews of the pattern (whether or not the person who sewed it even realized.)  Plus, since I had omitted the dart and that meant a little extra work to even things out, I decided i was not going to use Simplicity 8523/8061 again as a bodice

except

I really liked the neckline, especially how it was narrow enough that I didn't have to wonder about showing bra straps. (Yes, I know, I could make loops to keep the neckline from shifting around that much.  Don't wanna.)

So, I went back to Butterick 6470, modified with the neckline/facings from Simplicity 8523/8061

except

The bodice for this one was made from a skirt I made a while ago that had the zipper break, and I wasn't immediately inclined to replace that zipper, so it had been in the "mend?" pile for a while...but...when I was looking for something to use with another skirt (sewn when I was pregnant 12-ish years ago) I was going to turn into a dress, I realized that the purple in both of the skirts was too amazingly close to ignore.

and I ended up with this

It's Curtains Again

This time it's a single lace curtain panel, turned into another attempt at an under dress...that I added pockets to, because it looked cute over the clothes I was wearing when I tried it on.  If a layer might potentially be on or near the top, it needs pockets.  Why even sew if you're not gonna add pockets?

One Person's Curtains, Another Person's Dress

I think it came from one of the thrift store cloth grab bags--this green floral 35"-wide cotton that someone had crudely sewn into two curtains, complete with severe light fading near the top edge of one.

I initially thought I'd use the in a new patchwork bedspread, but then I started worrying that the old cloth might be prone to weakening and ripping--a not-unfounded worry, since the reason I want to replace the patchwork bedspread we have now is because it has a few pieces of an old cloth that has weakened and ripped.  So I found some other prints to mix with it and set the project aside for...uh..a while.

When I sorted and re-organized cloth a few weeks ago, I realized that, even though I worried it might wear out as a bedspread (which is used every night), it might last longer as a dress?  So I combined that with the desire to make a faux Burda 6401 and sewed this

 (embracing the idea of Granny Chic)

Swirl-a-Gray

I showed how I converted a regular sleeve pattern into a bell sleeve pattern in the last post, and now's the post for the first dress made with that modification...which, as I also mentioned, was not the first dress I had intended to make, or even had cut out, with that modification, but I decided it was less hassle to cut out an entirely different dress than to change the bobbin thread.

The original reason for hacking the sleeve pattern like that was so I could use Butterick 6470 to mimic Burda 6401, which also didn't really happen with this dress

If You Sew It Together, It Goes Together

For years I've been sewing doll clothes with mixed prints.  I used to have a list of rules I'd use for choosing what print went with what other prints, but, sometimes, I'd notice two prints next to each other in the storage spaces and think they looked good together.  Whichever way, I always got compliments on the finished doll clothes.  (I used to sell a lot, before Etsy went evil, so the compliments were often backed up with purchases.)  So, eventually, my A #1 Rule For Mixing Prints became: If you sew it together, it goes together.

People might question separates of mixed prints, but, if the different prints are sewn together?  Who are they to question the designer?  Humans are all about pattern recognition, too, so they can find ways to make the prints coordinate, if they really want to think about it.

Now, another thing about my attitude toward mixing prints is this: if you can easily give a name to the entire class of one of the prints, then the brain parses it as A Whole Thing, and it might as well be a solid.  Stripes, checks/plaid/gingham/madras, dots, leopard print, camouflage.  But not florals (and I haven't quite figured out why)--florals, however, will easily mix with all of those others.

So, yeah, I'm sitting here now wearing a dress I sewed with a mix of a madras plaid and a Star Wars print and really feeling like it's not much of a pattern mixing achievement, because, pfft, "plaid" is neutral.

But, I wondered...could more aggressive print mixing work on a grown human, or is it something I should keep for dolls (and small children)?

So I made this

As far as I can tell, yeah, it does totally work.

Pink & Green Are Always In

Still working on getting over my Sewing Snobbery about thinking that simple construction is "below me."  Listen, Self--simple construction means fast, finished, and, for the most part, really really forgiving in fit.  Also, inasmuch as I barely pay attention to trendy style lines, it does certainly look like a lot of the popular indie patterns are aggressively simple, and I can find similar shapes in the stash of thrifted patterns I have (albeit, I'm sure, without the expert drafting that so often seems to go with reviews of the indie patterns.)

Which also means I have a lot of new (to me) patterns to try out, which means everything is going to be "wearable muslin" for a while.  I have downsized my fabric stash a bit, and I still have a lot of Precious pieces that I don't want to use unless I know exactly what I'm doing with them.  But, there are also the odd little bits that came from thrift store grab bags or that one DollPerson's destash--nice fabric, but not things that I feel like I have to "live up to."  You know what I mean, right?

So that's how I ended up using this pattern, Butterick 6470 from 1999, for the first time

to make this shirt