How to Sew to Upcycle Clothes or Recycle Your Old Used Dresses to Make Clothing, Which Will Be Worn More Times, Loved More, Eco-friendly and Save Money as well.
This is the year of Recycle-Upcycle-Redesign-Reuse to minimize burden on the environment and the Earth.
So, this is the year of sewing with mindfulness and create upcyled clothing.
There is no limit to your desires.
And you can not make yourselves so deep in consumerism that you start cluttering your home, mind and life with just everything and anything that catch your fancy.
These are some upcycled clothing ideas, which you can try to make everyday life simpler and upcycle your clothes at home.
Table of Contents
4 Steps to Upcycle Clothes
#1. Check what clothes you have for upcycling
Before upcycling, focus on maximizing the utility of your existing clothes.
It is important to ascertain what exactly NEEDS UPCYCLING!
To maximize the usefulness of your wardrobe, you need to look at different aspects of it. Some of these are :-
- How to wear the existing collection in interesting pairing up combinations?
- How to turn your favorite collection (but not wearable ones) into wearing mode?
- How to cut and sew with minimalistic efforts to get something new and usable?
In this process, you can create space in your wardrobe.
Rare are those people, who have an organized, neatly arranged wardrobes and they don’t have to think a minute more if they have to decide on what to wear for what!
(*Condition Apply that – they have not SHOPPED the night before and bankrupted themselves to buy the latest fashion trends just recently!)
All the other mere mortals like you and me – have to either sit at home wondering our wardrobe conditions or have to devise creative ways to get something different out of ordinary.
So, the first condition is to concentrate on what all you have and be grateful for having such a full closet to work upon.
An open space in closet makes you drool and feel like sitting inside it and having a cup of coffee lying out there.
Relaxed!
But, beware !
Don’t sink into that feeling for too long!
You got some work to do...
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What all would you like to carry with yourself, if you have to carry only a single suitcase of dresses, to leave this place forever?
Keep these dresses and accessories back, neatly piled up in different sections and labelled.
This process is called decluttering and if you are sincere to yourself, it would create enough place in your closet to fit things back.
Sort the other pile, which you have taken out and don’t wear anymore.
#3. Start to Redesign – Restyle – Recycle : DIYs
Take out these dresses which can be redesigned, mended, mixed and matched in different combinations, can be cut, lengthened and worn again in a different style.
It’s not always that you need to buy things. Sometimes, you already have what you need, but in a different shape.
Investing only a little time and efforts, you can upcycle clothes easily. I created some nice things out of the used clothes, which I didn't like. Check out -
#4. Use scrap fabric pieces to make yourself a dress
People have this perception that if you have a good length of fabric, then only you can make a good design for a dress.
It may hold true in some cases, when you need to make same color dress, requiring a proper length of that dress material.
Whereas, in most of the cases, the best designs come out when you run short of fabric or material.
Your brain starts storming for better ideas and imaginations to get your pattern pieces together to come out with something which is unusually good.
Therefore, the professional dress makers and experienced hobbyists keep saving those tiny scraps during their sewing projects.
Though, it may lead to Clutter Collection but here you have to be careful that you do not collect the clutter but good scrap / fabric pieces, which prove useful to you in the process of dress making.
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There are so many perceptions attached to sewing, stitching or dress making.
Many sewing enthusiasts leave the idea of sewing before beginning due to their apprehension that they need a lot of things to start their first sewing project.
Whereas, sewing is the most productive hobby - you can make new clothes, upcycle old clothes, decor your home, redesign your dresses and do a lot many things with any piece of scrap.
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