Red Sweater Refashion

Thanks for all your help on my first sloper muslin. I'm still working on its perfection. In the meantime I thought I'd share this sweater refashion I did recently. No sloper required!

I made this out of an old sweater my mother didn't wear anymore. I was wearing the sweater around the house for a while but then decided it would be much better suited for another refashion than just lazy lounging. It's excellent quality and a silk and cashmere blend so light enough to be worn in spring and summer but still decidedly unflattering.

This refashion was a bit more complicated than my last because I decided to change a lot more. First I cut off the sleeves. Then I made the sweater a bit more form fitting by taking it in at the side seams.

Next I opened the sleeves up completely and cut them into a new shape giving them a proper sleeve head. I fiddled around with this quite a lot and eventually ended up using the sleeve pattern from the Burdastyle Lydia pattern. I also made the shoulders on the sweater shorter so that they wouldn't hang off my arm like they do on oversized sweaters. Then I re-inserted the sleeves making them into little puffed sleeves.

I also cut the neckline deeper. I marked the new neckline with the sweater on my dress form and basted along the new neckline while it was still on the dress form. Then I stay-stitched along that line on my machine to make sure it wouldn't stretch out of shape once I cut it. I made bias tape out of a cheap cream white polyester (not the best choice but it worked) and applied it to the neckline and shortened sleeves.

As you can see I'm enjoying the sun quite a bit in my new sweater. The sweater is really comfortable and I wear it a lot. I'm always sad when I see it in the wash basket and quickly run off to wash it so that I can wear it again and again.

P.S.: Photo credits go to my little stepsister, who excitedly exclaimed "I want to be a photographer when I grow up. This is so much fun!", when we were finished with the shoot.