Well hello there friends! It’s been a hot minute, hasn’t it?
In true covid fashion, it’s August and I barely recognised. I’ve been having a really hard time being alive right now, which sounds dramatic as hell. But since I’m still not at work my life has mainly been playing Animal Crossing and watching Game Grumps compilations. Who knew five months at home would be so difficult, huh? But I wanted to get back into the swing of things with blogging and creating things. So today I’m going to show you some altered fashion!
I got this dress from SHEIN (sold out) back in June, alongside the dress in my last post. Which was waaaay too long ago, really! But hey, we’re trying to survive over here guys! Going forward with the blog, I want to give you guys some ideas of how I make, alter and customise my clothing. I’ve literally been doing it since I started sewing when I was 14, so why not document and give you guys some ideas how to do it yourself?
Making Fast Fashion Work For You
The story of this dress is simple; cheap dress from SHEIN (you know I love them) ended up looking a little cheaper than I wanted. The fit was okay, but the length was more ‘house on the prairie my than ‘vintage summer dream’. And as much as I loved the neckline, satin-y bias binding rarely looks nice on anything. I’m usually pretty good at discerning bad quality items on fast fashion websites, and although this isn’t necessarily bad quality, a few simple things would have made it a bit nicer.
The most important alteration of this dress was taking up that damn hem! Five whole inches too long, and I’m not exactly short at 5’7″. Taking a hem up isn’t as terrifying as you may think, actually! Simply measure up from the existing hem how much shorter you want your skirt, plus seam allowance. For instance, I went for a straight 5 inches, which includes my usual seam allowance of 1.5cm.
The second alteration was an annoying and utterly personal-preference of bias binding. The satin looked a bit tacky, and was a really bad quality trim in general. It took a while to unpick, but I replaced it quickly with a heavier-cotton bias to keep it cleaner and neater. It also unexpectedly gave a better structure to the neckline — you can see in the first photo it looks a bit flimsy? Seemed to disappear after being replaced. I also added some quick little bra holders so I can wear it either on the shoulder or off. Would anyone like a little tutorial on these? They’re super handy.
Altered Fashion
As you can see, it looks quite a bit better now! Funnily enough I gained a little bit more weight so it fit better without having to take it in. But it’ll be a real easy job to do if/when I love some weight. It makes something that has been made for limited use have real longevity, and I can see myself wearing this quite a bit from now on. Not bad for an £11 dress, I guess! The one thing I didn’t do that I should’ve? Added some damn pockets. Guess I’ve still got some work to do!
Do you alter clothing to suit your style or size more? Let me know in the comments!
Also can we all agree this style of dress is totally @Iridessence styled? Literally my style goddess at the moment!
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