striped vest

A couple of years ago while in North Carolina for work, I had some extra time at the end of the day and stopped in at a Goodwill on the way back to my hotel. Felting sweaters was the big craze at the time and I figured they would have more to choose from in the colder climate of the Carolinas than in Florida. I was right...I ended up buying an entire cartful of beautiful sweaters perfect for felting and scored a bunch of vintage printed polyester fabric. I already had a full suitcase so I purchased a pretty vintage turquoise suitcase from the same store, which I brought the sweaters and fabric home in and that I now store my yarn in. I didn't have anything just perfect to make out of the polyester fabric until this week when I thought they might make good vests (I'm pretty sure it is polyester, but not positive...whatever it is, it doesn't ravel).

I penciled a vest shape on some large white paper and cut it out. I tried it on, cut some paper away here, taped some more paper on there, tried it on again, until I ended up with something I thought would work. This is half of my pattern (the straight edge on the right is the middle of the back)...


Once, I flipped the above pattern over to do a mirror image, the piece I cut was one piece - I just had to sew the shoulders together...


I did some zig zag stitching with turquoise thread all the way around. And, also sewed back and forth, back and forth where I discovered some holes in the fabric. This all created some "Free People esque" fun to the vest...


I was aiming for a vest that was sort of drapey in front, but once I got it sewn together I discovered the fabric didn't drape as much as I thought. So, I took the end of each triangular front piece, folded them up towards the top of each side of the vest and sewed it down leaving one side open so it kept an origami like shape. Then, I folded another triangle up again leaving one side open to create more of an origami feel...


I thought it turned out very fun, and I love how the fabric is machine wash and dry.