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Welcome to another edition of Refashion Friday, where I take hideous thrift store finds and turn them into something I will actually wear. Because who wants a closet full of things you won't wear. That seems a little pointless, don't you think? But I digress... Let's talk some refashion, shall we?
(Please excuse the terrible hair here.
Now you know the real reason I got it all cut off...)
I call this the Red Carpet Dress not because I want to wear it to a red carpet event, but because it looks, well, like a red carpet. There is so much red going on here and so much width that I considered carpeting my bedroom with it, but it wouldn't be a very soothing, restful bedroom color, ya' know? I'll stick to refashioning it.
I liked the drapey-ness of the top part of this dress, but there was a little wee bit too much of it. Let's face it. There is a difference between "drapey" and "potato sack" and this dress was leaning hard toward the potato sack side of the equation. Some of that width was going to have to go.
I laid the dress out on the floor and took a good look at it. (Stared it down, really.) I didn't want to lose the drape, just tame it down a little. I ended up taking about 3-4 inches out of each side, starting at the bottom of the "bat-wing" style sleeve and tapering gradually until I reached the waistline. I only took about 1/2 inch from each side of the waist. I marked with pins, but if you are new to this kind of thing, you might want to use chalk. Or maybe pins are easiest. Just do what works for you.
Next I needed to deal with the hem of this dress. It was just too boring for the style lines of the top of the dress. Something had to be done. Boring-ness must be stopped.
I wanted to match the drape of the top, but I didn't want to lock myself in, either. I wanted to do an angled hemline with drape, so usually I would sew in some shirring. This time, though, I wanted options. I wanted to be able to change how high the angled hem went, whether I angled both sides or just one, or if I wanted to wear this as a dress instead of a tunic. Instead of sewing the shirring in (which I may decide to do later), I just used a couple large safety pins. (Don't worry. They are totally hidden. No one will ever know. Except you. And the rest of the Blogosphere...So much for anonymity.) I folded and arranged the drape, then pinned. Easy and quick.
I added some black accessories to break up that sea of red, and Voila! All done!
The Red Carpet Dress has been tamed into a funky, wearable closet staple.
And here's the side-by-side:
Have a great day!
Angela
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