Revamping Old Clothes

The other day as I was cleaning my table at school, one of my teachers asked me if I wanted to get an old top that they are about to throw away. It was a stretched shirt with ruffled lace sleeves with a big angel wing print in front. Apparently they only collected the embellishments and have no more use for it.

Can you see the threads sticking out?

Without skipping a beat, I said I wanted to have it.  I took that offer as a challenge on how I can transform that sad little shirt into something more interesting.

The following day, I simply laid out the shirt on the table and started playing around with ideas. Someone suggested that I should create a halter top but I decided to go with my gut feel.

Changing the print's orientation

The first idea that came to mind is to put the print at the back by changing the shirt's orientation. I've always wanted to have a shirt with wings at the back and so I ran with that idea.

From sleeves to shoulder ornament.

Truth be told, seeing the top with big ruffled lace appalled me so that element has to go. After cutting the sleeves, an instructor asked me if he can have one of the sleeves so that he can play it around as a doll dress so I gave him one. I used the other one as a shoulder ornament just to add some contrast to what I did to the lower part of the shirt.

Darts, darts and more darts!

I really played around on the front part of the shirt. Initially, there should only be two simple darts just to make the armhole fit better. Remember, I change the shirt's orientation so the armhole part doesn't fit well so darts must be added. As I was doing the darts, I remembered that the point of this mini project is to experiment with ideas so instead of doing two simple and clean darts, I decided to randomly place them all over the shirt.

Finished product!

The armhole was left raw edged and the threads sticking out of the angel wing's print to add texture to the shirt. The random darts all over the dress left an irregular shape like that of raw crystals. The lace on the left shoulder gave softness to the structured lower half of the shirt.

I don't know about you but I somehow feel that it can pass as a corporate wear  or street wear depending on the styling.

This is definitely out of my comfort zone and my typical aesthetic but I am proud that somehow this style lies within me. It may not amaze most people but this type of clothing is not targeted for most people anyways. I'd like to believe that for this project, my target market are women who are totally secured of physical appearance and are looking for a certain intellectual punch in the clothes that they are wearing. After all, fashion completes the packaging of ourselves so why not be unique instead of following the herd.

So that's it for this post. I think I am already blabbing. Until next time!

Au revoir for now!