I grabbed a pair of sparkly tights from American Apparel that I had destroyed after only a few wears and here's what I did.
Did I make this awesome dress covered in ribbons and sequins? Nope. I bought it at a vintage store for $20. The focus here is my super sparkly tights. I didn't make these either, but I did alter them to extend their life and make them way more comfortable in the process. I love wearing dresses in the winter which neccessitates a lot of tights and leggings. I love the colours and options at places like American Apparel and Joe Fresh but their sizes just don't fit me. I'm the wrong shape and I'm too tall. the tights tend to get pulled down so that I have drop crotch and they also tend to split first along crotch seam first. Not to mention they tend to be so uncomfortable and annoying. I was reading Marilla Walker's blog a week or two ago and she was releasing a pattern for tights. I have seen a few people make tights before but a light sparked and I realized I could just replace the tops of my tights. This is by no means an original idea as a few days later this exact technique was outlined on her blog and I'm sure it's been done by many others before. You can check out her post here. There's a great tutorial by Carolyn here to draft your own tights pattern here. I grabbed a pair of sparkly tights from American Apparel that I had destroyed after only a few wears and here's what I did. I cut the legs off the body of the tights at the point where the fabric changed. I used my self drafted leggings pattern and folded it so the leg in-seam length was only a couple inches and cut it out on some nude stretch fabric. I constructed the leggings as usual including adding an elastic waistband so they looked like nude booty shorts. I then zigzag stitched the legs of the original tights to the openings of the shorts. I had to stretch the original tights quite a bit during this. Also it was important to figure out the orientation of the feet before attaching so they were on the right way. It was super easy. They look very odd when they are not on due to the different qualities of both fabrics but they look fine on as they stretch to fit your body. Life changing. It's the little things in life. I'm planning on slowly doing this to all my current tights. Hurrah!
4 Comments
Renee van Doorninck
1/28/2015 02:41:22 pm
So much more comfortable. It makes large dinners in a dress a whole lot less daunting.
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Kerri
3/27/2015 03:08:40 am
So indecent! I'm going to contact the Internet people and let them know you're posting R rated stuff here.
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AboutA blog to document my attempts to create a well-fitting wardrobe for myself and my family through sewing and knitting. Archives
August 2018
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