Fretex tunics

I come from a family who seldom threw things away. At a time, reuse was a necessity, but still now, when we have everything we need, I like the idea of reuse. We throw away too many things in this part of the world.



These tunics are made from one sweater from Fretex, the Salvation Army's second hand shop in Norway. The rest is fabric, ribbons and buttons from my stash. By making the two "flowers" with buttons, I managed to use the whole sweater! The darker green turtle neck is from the bottom ribbing. The rest of the ribbing was turned into a flower (see collage).

I don't have a photo of the original sweater, beeing too eager to cut it up. There were some stains in the front, those are now hidden behind the cuffs.

I intended to make a sort of tutorial. for the flowers. But when it came to finishing, I got to eager, and the last steps went without photographing. But you can probably work out how they're made, it's quite simple. Here you see the first steps, anyway.

Then you just sew the cutted edge with tack stitches, pull tight and fasten. Hide the stitches with a button. Voilà!

This little girl wanted to help sewing, too!