Ship 'n Shore - Refashioning a Man's Shirt For A Vintage Style Blouse

Refashionistas are everywhere. To see garments that are oh so blah and totally last year transformed into something awesomely today and actually wearable is a sight to behold. But not all refashion projects are created equal. Far too often I see transformations that look like a pillowcase with holes for head and arms and a belt holding it all together. Fine for a beach cover up but not a sustainable refashion and probably more wasteful than if it was just left to the rag bag. 

Would you attempt to make a cake without following a recipe? So why would you attempt to draft a garment without a pattern? Refashioning doesn't have to be the lowly cousin of couture design. Remember that every garment, whether in fashion or not is a potential resource - fabric. Consider the garment and visualize what sort of pattern you could apply to it to create a refashioned masterpiece.

I was a kid in the late 50's and early 60's. Nothing said summer more than the little cotton Ship 'n Shore blouses we wore. They remain a staple in my wardrobe for their easy wear and easy care. 

My husband outgrew one of my favorite shirts - a pinpoint cotton button down oxford. The fabric was in great condition and the tiny blue and white stripes would make a perfect little cotton blouse for me using the Advance pattern for a front button blouse. I carefully removed the collar buttons.

This shirt had one breast pocket and I very carefully removed it by pulling up on the threads and not ripping the seam to ensure a nice clean removal. The tiny stitches make this step a bit tedious but those tiny needle holes will vanish after a couple of washings so it is well worth the extra time. If however, you are making a blouse that has no bust darts and you want to keep the pocket, just skip this step.

Depending on the size of the shirt and the size of your pattern, you can cut the collar and sleeves off and cut the side seams. If you think you may need that little extra seam allowance for size you can carefully split the seams as I did here.

I folded the back of the shirt to resemble the fold of a length of fabric.

I laid out my pattern pieces, adjusting the position so the shirttail hem would be equal - I wanted a longer shirt than the pattern allowed. I used my nifty DIY Pattern Weights covered in Plasti-Dip. You can find the instructions to make your own set of weights HERE.

The front bodice for this pattern had a button band which I lined up with the seam allowances and pinned to the bodice piece. This helped me line up the buttonholes on the front of the shirt with the buttonhole alignment of the pattern.

Using tailors chalk I marked the front and back with cutting lines and markings for darts and tucks. Tailors chalk washes out easily and allows you to mark the entire stitching line which makes sewing straight darts a breeze.

And then simply follow your pattern instructions for sewing darts and seams. I chose to add armhole facings cut from the shirt sleeves.

But decided on white bias tape for the neckline.

 A single little snap keeps the front neckline intact.

The bias tape gives the neckline a crisp, finished look to a front buttoned blouse that didn't require any buttonholes!

This blouse buttons opposite of a woman's blouse. There are a couple of things you can do if you prefer a blouse that buttons correctly. One thing you can do is to find a much larger shirt than the size you require and simply turn the front of the shirt upside down after separating the sections. Another thing you can do is to turn the front of the blouse to the wrong side. (Inside out) For most plain weave fabrics it won't make a difference but you will have to move the buttons to this side of the shirt and be comfortable with the button band on the inside.

However you plan to refashion-up a garment, use a pattern as a guide. It may require a bit more preparation but the finished product will be something you will be proud to wear again and again. 

Find vintage patterns to pair up with your next refashioning project in my CynicalGirl shop on Etsy.

Chunky Yarn - Repurposing Waste Yarn by Plying

My mother dabbled at weaving for a brief period of time, as many often do. The term "Handwoven" conjures images of a quieter, more peaceful time when quality ruled the day. That imagery is not a fiction. Hand weaving is an art and hand woven textiles are precious. But weaving is a slow art and one that takes a good deal of planning and a lot of tedious work before you ever sit at your loom to actually weave. My mother skipped most of those early steps and because of her back problems I was called upon to warp her loom, a process that I found much more enjoyable than weaving. 

My mother has been gone for almost 9 years and hadn't done any weaving since 1995, when my father died and she moved into an apartment. So imagine my surprise and delight when I opened this tub of yarn and found hanks of wool right off the warping board but never woven. Why, I wondered. Well, like I said, weaving takes a lot of planning and my mother was not very good at envisioning the process from raw material to finished product. She chose yarn that was simply not strong enough to use as a warp. So there it sat.

The yarn she purchased is wool and the colors are beautiful. Such a shame it was never used. I have been a spinner for about 25 years, a process that to my mind is as meditative as it is productive. I decided to join the 16 yard lengths and then ply them into a chunky yarn for my sister who is just starting on her knitting journey (and loving it!). 

I began by separating the strands and tying them together and winding them into balls. There were warm and cools in the tub. I began with the cools - the blues and greys because I just like blue and grey more than pink and orange.

This process took a couple of days, working when my little grey tiger Saskia was sleeping to avoid excessive tangles from her irrepressible need to play. 

Then to dust off my Schacht wheel. I honestly had not spun anything since I spun paper for the collaborative paper wearable project with Julie McLaughlin that I mentioned HERE. 

I packed the balls of wound yarn into a small enough box to keep the tension tight as I pulled the strands. In hindsight I might have been wiser to have wound the strands directly onto spools but I was going to be plying 2 each of the blue and 3 of the grey and only have one spool holder with tension adjustment for 3 spools. So this box would have to do.

After the plying was complete I wound the yarn onto a niddy noddy, an amazing little tool that winds your yarn into a hank in one yard lengths. 

The hanks are secured with string woven between the strands and removed from the niddy noddy. The hanks are washed and hung to dry with weights to straighten out the crimping, a result of the twisting while plying.

The result was 10 full pull skeins of my mothers yarn being used to make Christmas hats and scarves for her grandchildren. I think she would be pleased.

The Scarf Blouse

The Scarf Blouse

Transforming a square scarf into an easy to sew blouse is easy! The concept is not new. Women have been upcycling, repurposing and reusing to make do when budgets and availability necessitate it. This 1940's Mail Order pattern shows how to cut and sew an ordinary scarf into a day or evening blouse. Download HERE.

There are many of these patterns floating around. Cassie Stephens blog posts another way to tackle this project HERE.

Make do and have fun!