Repurposed Crafting

The japanese club, along with chinese language and culture club, hosted an event last Saturday called A Night in Tokyo. I figured this would be the perfect time to make a kimono-style blouse. I’ve seen several that I’ve wanted to make and planned on how I would make them, only to realize that my remnant fabrics are, well, just that. Remnants. I didn’t have enough fabric to make an entire shirt. Luckily, I stumbled across a half-kimono shirt and figured I’d give it a whirl.

I used scrap fabric from a bed sheet to make a mock-up to see if the remnant fabric would be enough to make this top. I forgot to take pics of this process since I was just sewing on a whim, but I took the remnant I wanted to use and cut out the same size using the bed sheet. I ended up cutting out extra strips for the bottom portion to make it tie in the back.

Didn’t you love sesame street as a kid? I didn’t watch much, but I do remember the theme song…

Sunny day, sweeping’ the clouds away.
On my way to where the air is sweet.
Can you tell me how to get,
how to get to Sesame Street?

Anyway…after I made this mock top, I figured that it would be super easy to make the real one since I now had a template. So, I put it off until the day I wanted to wear it. Bad idea. The fabric I was using was slightly itchy so I decided to make an inner lining-read that as: I had to make two identical shirts in the same time it took me to make one. Needless to say, I didn’t finish. I got about half-way through before it was time to go to the event.

But that’s okay! I finished it on time to wear today for Tet, or Vietnamese New Year. However, I was rushing to get it finished and I forgot to take more pictures of the process. In essence, after I sewed the basic shirt, I attached a back panel and sash. Then I inserted and lined up the inner shirt with the exterior, folded the raw edges and sewed the neckline and sleeves together.

Just to see the lining inside…

Voila! A half-kimono! And today, a florist was giving out free flowers in front of our student center. The rose looked and smelled amazing :]

Chúc Mừng Năm Mới!!