Making it work.

sewing and styling your way to "new" clothes.

We’ve all had moments where something you bought a long time ago (or yesterday) just isn’t working for you. Thanks to my packrat nature, I’m loathe to get rid of that stuff, so I always try to find a way to make it work for me, this post is half guide, half archive of how those experiments have gone for me.

Part one: Styling

The first way to bring life into your wardrobe without buying anything, is doing some experimentation. Maybe stuff you got tired of will excite you again if you wear it in a wildly new way.

The examples I chose for this are these two Rogue Territory pieces that I got so long ago that my camera looked like shit and my slim raw jeans had no holes in them. This picture is circa 2014. In the intervening near decade, I’ve found both pieces to be a little slim and a little stuffy for my tastes, but I like them well enough that I haven’t been able to sell them, so I challenged myself to make them work. I wanted to pull the pieces into the more fashion forward/casual era I’m in right now.

The pants are doing a lot of work here but buttoning the jacket differently also changes how the piece feels.

Not actually wearing the jacket makes the slim fit unimportant, the jacket just ends up being fabric.

In this one the jacket becomes the super dressed down element to go with the ball cap.

Again the pants and boots are carrying here dressing down the stiffness of the shirt.

This one is the farthest from how I would have worn this shirt in the past, pulling on more streetwear elements and the workwear elements that streetwear likes to pull on.

Part two: Modifying.

When wearing it whacky style isn’t enough, make stuff your own.

These are two uniqlo short sleeves shirts I was given as a gift, they started out long and boxy and awkward, I didn’t ever wear them and I never got rid of them. The first one I cropped by a whopping 7 inches bringing it all the way up to my beltline. The second one I did the same but instead of chopping off the excess, I turned it into large pockets on the front, a fun unique detail that makes it something special.

This is about as simple a sewing project can be assuming you have a machine. Measure while wearing, mark with pins or marking chalk, give yourself enough room to fold the fabric over at least once and cut. Iron really well, that’s the most important part for doing a neat job, and sew.

This one was a bit more involved but not by much, I followed the curved hem with my stitches on the back and sewed up along the side seams and the placket to make the pockets on the front. The last button was also moved and handsewn back on.

Next project was a used jumpsuit from the hardware store. I had no plan when I bought it, just thought it would be a fun project, and starting with fully constructed garments takes out a huge amount of work as far as making something unique.

I basically just chopped it in half and finished the hem of the jacket, then rebuilt the seat of the “pants” so they would fit better. They had a lot of extra fabric in the crotch that made them hang really strangely so I would just put them on inside out, pin a new line for the seat, sew it, cut off the excess, try on, repeat until satisfied. It was laborious but not particularly difficult. Then I moved the back pockets to the front, as the original pockets became part of the rolled top.

I chopped the jacket a little short on this one but it still works depending on the rest of the fit, they look best as a set though IMO.

Based on the jacket I made a super simple jacket out of dropcloth with a little bit less of a crop. This is obviously a much bigger undertaking, but dropcloth is cheap, and something with this type of very oversized, boxy cut is pretty forgiving, if anyone wants some tips on how to do something like this in more detail, let me know, but I am no means a talented maker of clothing.

I made some pants to match but lost them at some point.

Next up, another jumpsuit I saw at the thrift and couldn’t resist.

Unfortunately the fit was super awkward and I never found a good way to wear it. So I took out the seam ripper and went at it.

There was already a seam at the perfect spot so I just took it out and cut the placket and the jacket was done, the pants were a little more work.

I added 2 pleats in the front and 2 in the back so they fit in the waist.

Then did a little finagling to turn the weird button/zip situation into a slightly strange version of a normal zipper fly + button. Still need to finish the top of the waistband by just folding the edge in and sewing a top stitch all the way around, but they work great as is so I haven’t gotten around to it.

I’m super happy with this one, both pieces are super unique and they work as well separate as apart.

Last thing for this section are the two suits I thrifted. The pants of both have become some of my favorites, super wide and drapey and subtle put interesting fabrics.

These are both absolutely massive, the pants were about 8-10 inches too big and the jackets are David Byrne level. All of the work on these two so far was just hand sewing with a needle and thread. It helps to have tweezers or pliers as well because you’re going through quite a lot of fabric to form the extra pleats without taking off the waistband. The first thing I did was add extra pleats in the pants to make them fit in the waist.

The back pleats on the first pair were a little awkward but I figured out a neater method for the second.

I also sewed in the cuffs on the grey pair to keep them neatish.

(The brown jacket hasn’t made it into one of my fits yet so thanks charlie for this one)

So yeah maybe you don’t need to buy a whole bunch of shit yet, go check that closet out again and see if you can make some magic happen with what you’ve got.

thanks for reading….