Happy New Year, folks! Hope you all had awesome holidays! It’s a bit late but I wanted to share one of my holiday makes with you: A cropped embellished sweater! It’s super cosy and the perfect thing to wear with all my sleeveless fit-and-flared dresses.

I often find it very hard to find the perfect cardigan with the perfect length. If they’re too long and paired with a flared skirt or dress they make the whole outfit look awkward and bulky. Making a sweater was on my to-do list this winter and I found some really awesome sweater fabrics lately (some of which I had ordered by accident). For the pictures I paired the sweater with one of my Hepburn dresses.

The Fabric:

I got the fabric on ebay. It was pretty much cheaper than any other tracksuit fabric I had seen in the shops, so I gave it a go (despite hating to order fabric online). I ordered it in the wrong colour by accident – I wanted school grey fabric to make a hoodie for the Mr. For some reasons I got the colours wrong and despite emailing back and forth with the seller the fabric was navy when it arrived a couple of days later. I mean, to be honest, I wasn’t disappointed or anything. Navy blue is my absolute favourite colour, the fabric was cheap and the quality very nice. And I had loads of it. So no regrets.

I bought the ribbing from the same supplier, so the colours were a perfect match. I had 1.5m of it and managed to make a Lola dress (Victory Patterns) and this sweater, the latter using up less than a metre. The Lola dress is not blogged yet, but it will be pretty soon 🙂

The acrylic sew-on gems are also from ebay, I bought a pack of 50 mixed shapes and have enough left for a second project.

The Pattern:

The sweater pattern is more or less self-drafted. I hacked Tilly’s Coco Dress, changing the neckline a bit and making the waist less fitted. The ribbing is cut a bit smaller than the waist and sleeves, so it cinches everything in nicely. I drafted a facing for the neckline, cut out from the same fabric and used understitching to keep it in place. I sewed the sweater mostly using my overlocker, and it only took 2 hours or so.

When I made the Coco dress a couple of months ago, I had to take it in a lot and it still was a bit on the wider side. So for the sweater I went with Tilly’s size 3. The fabric is quite heavy and has a bit of stretch, so the loose fit was perfect and it fits me nicely.

Will I make it again? I love this sweater and you see a lot of these on the high street at the moment. I got more tracksuit/sweater fabric for Christmas in light grey and brown and am planning on making at least one more sweater and maybe a Lola-hack. Next time I want to try some other embellishments, maybe lace or zips but I have yet to figure out what I want it to look like. So keep your eyes peeled 🙂

Happy sewing!
♥

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