refashioning: sizing up

Whenever you visit a refashioner's blog, the basic lesson on refashioning is always the same:  "when buying clothes, Go a few sizes up!" This makes a lot of sense: the bigger the clothes are, the more fabric you've got to work with, and every seam will eat up some of that fabric.

But what if you want to refashion something that is actually too small?


Ugh, clothes that are too small... Those damned things that do nothing than make our waists look like muffin tops, and make us feel guilty whenever we see them, reminding us of everything we aren't ( or rather: are too much of) ..

Well, I've got a few of those...

like this one!

Wait untill you see it from the sides..

this is my "oh no!" pose

They look positively painted on!
Even if I was confident enough to wear pants this tight (I'm not), I definitely wouldn't choose them to be a color so much like my own skin tone. Come on, that just screams 'naked lady' doesn't it?

So today I decided I had enough of it! I'm tired of waiting for the moment when I will miraculously look good in them, so I decided to make them look look good on me instead, Right. Now. ("It's not me, pants, it's you")

But how to do that? Well, the answer is very, very simple: just add some fabric panels on the sides!

I grabbed a seam ripper, and started unpicked the side seams ( only the outer seams)

work in progress!

carefully cutting the waist

Then I went through my fabric stash looking for the right fabric.

options, options....

To avoid the band camp-look, I went for muted, matchy tones. I think an ochre or auburn colour would have looked quite good as well, but that's more for autumn, and I picked the light grey on the left.

I cut long strips..

they're about 4 cm wide, and about 6 cm longer than the pants are, to allow for seams. 

Adding a seam on the bottom...

Then, I simply sewed the long strips in place, and when I reached the waistband, I folded the extra fabric over two times, to form a solid waistband insert.

I finished of the rough edges with a zigzag, and was done!

sneak peak..

And finished! I happily hopped in he pants, this time without any wriggling, and they fit!!

With Joost being absent, I had to DIY a camera stand to show you my work..

failed!

Of course, I completely missed the mark, accidentely beheading myself in the process.. Whoops! But I can assure you my face is still there!

And of course it took me a few photo's before I realized what was going on... 

Ah there's my head!

According to Joost they look like "fancy horse riding pants"
But I like horse riding, so no insult there :)

no more muffin tops, and no longer feeling  guilty whenever I open the wardrobe!

I'm most excited about the fact that this opens a whole new world of thrifting: now I can buy basically anything I like in thrift shops and worry about sizes later. How's that for a change?

I hope you liked the refashion, and that it may have given you a few ideas about what to do with those jeans and pants that you just couldn't throw away.. Do you have any of those in your closet?

hugs!