So, I find those blogs that buy nasty thrift store clothes and remake them extremely inspiring, so I decided to try it myself. I got this suit from Goodwill for $3. It was a size 16, I think, which is several sizes too big. The jacket was shapeless and I'm really not sure if the sleeves were supposed to be 3/4 sleeves, or were just really short. The pants had a gathered elastic waistband and were super baggy. They looked awful. The nature of the black suit is such that you can't really see how bad it fit, but it was really awful. So I took the thing apart.
First, the skirt. I have lots of practice turning pants into skirts, I've done it half a dozen times this summer, the challenge this time was I wanted to do away with the gathered elastic waist and go to a much smoother pencil shape with a zipper. So I cut the waistband off, cut the length to where I wanted, took out the crotch seam and stitched it into a skirt shape. I added a zipper using some techniques I'd picked up from a pair of pants I recently made. (which I really ought to get a picture of, they turned out nice.) I added a lovely smooth waistband that you cant see, you'll just have to trust me that it's much nicer.
The jacket I cut down based on this tutorial here: http://autnott.deviantart.com/art/Up-Cycled-Hobbit-Vest-Tutorial-339969518
The jacket was big enough that it lent itself perfectly for the kind of double breasted look I was going for. In fact, I may add a second row of buttons, but I'll have to go buy more first. I had to reshape it to fit, taking in the side seams, and the seams on the back so it would actually fit me, giving the nice curvy shape you see here. I relearned how to do buttonholes, and bound everything up with bias tape.
All in all, I'm pretty happy with how it came out. Much, much sexier.
Also, for the record, it's not plain black, it's got a light blue pinstripe that doesn't show at all in the pictures.
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