Refashioned Skirt and Satin Blouse

refashioned upcycled coat skirt

Recently I was given a beautiful but oversized 80’s wool/cashmere two toned coat by a lady I instruct at my gym. She knows I am a sewer and thought that if I didn’t fancy the coat that I could use the fabric and transform it and refashion it into something else. A great challenge,  how could I say no to such a lovely gesture?

At first I thought I could just cut it at the waist and make a little cropped jacket but the shoulders were very wide and I wasn’t sure it would really work. My best option was to just rip it apart and use the fabric laid out with a pattern. Luckily I have a very big pattern stash so it wasn’t hard to find one! I chose a two toned skirt Vogue 8928 semi-fitted lined skirt with a side front slit. The coat was lined so this pattern was perfect as it had the two toned fabrics and the lining which I could use.

Fitting the pattern onto the fabric proved a little challenging and I had to be very creative laying it out  to fit onto the salvaged fabric but eventually it worked out. As this coat was a designer coat and I’m sure was very expensive at the time I decided I would make sure I tailor tacked, thread traced and basted every thing before starting.

The pattern itself was fairly easy to sew up although I found the instructions a little confusing.  As I am a fairly experienced sewer I worked them out but it’s a bit misleading as it’s called an “easy options” pattern. There were a lot of darts and  the lining was a pain in the butt! I could not get it to sit nicely on the split seam. I trimmed the seam, under stitched and pressed but it just wouldn’t sit neatly. I seam ripped the lining seam open and made the lining a bit smaller which fixed it a little bit but it’s still not perfect, you can still see the lining poking out.   Also, when I tried it on I was a bit shocked at how high the split is! It does look high on the pattern envelope but I wasn’t quite expecting that high. I topstitched it down to prevent an accidental sneak peak at my underwear. :0 I might have to purchase a  nice pair of woollen stockings to cover up a little.

While I was sewing the skirt, I found some emerald colour satin fabric in my stash that looked like it would match the olive colour in the skirt perfectly. I found another blouse pattern in my stash Simplicity 1467  (a top, jacket, pants and skirt pattern) which I thought would work really well. It is sleeveless with a gathered yoke and button closure at the back neck, simple. It was very easy to sew up and I am really happy with it. Highly recommend it and I really want to make up the jacket and pants in this pattern as well.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with my little re fashion project. I kind of wish the skirt split wasn’t so high but it’s too late now so I’ll just have to show off my pins!

refashioned upcycled coat skirt

refashioned upcycled coat skirt

refashioned upcycled coat skirt

refashioned upcycled coat skirt

refashioned upcycled coat skirt

refashioned upcycled coat skirt

 

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