With Love Betty's very own....This Old Thing!

I don't know about you guys but I'm addicted to watching Dawn Porters "This Old Thing" on channel 4 on a Wednesday night. It's so great to see a program praising vintage clothing and getting people excited about wearing it. 

Dawn Porter from This old Thing, Channel 4, Weds night at 8pm

For those of you who haven't seen in, basically Dawn Porter, (who I Love) attempts to get people excited about vintage. There is one person per episode who has never been in a vintage store, let alone worn vintage. She/he loves high street fashion and doesn't understand why you would ever wear 2nd hand clothing. Through out the episode Dawn attempts to change their mind and get them into vintage fashion and she usually succeeds! 

She shows you how you can be as outrageous or as sublet as you like and spend as much or as little as your purse strings will allow you. She explains that vintage fashion is NOT about getting "dressed up" but about mixing the old with the new and that it can be incorporated into your everyday wardrobe.

She also has a workshop full of expert tailors, dress makers & designers and through out the episode they show u how you can make sublet changes to vintage pieces so they fit you better or to customise them so they fit in with modern silhouettes and trends. 

Now this show has done absolute wonders for us at With Love Betty, we've had so many people quoting the show, stating that it has inspired them to come in and buy vintage! I even had my own Dawn Porter experience the other day with a vintage virgin. She walked away with a stunning crochet midi skirt and absolutely loves it!! Her first ever vintage piece!! So if your unsure about vintage why not pop in and have a look around, we are extremely friendly and love to do a bit of personal shopping. 

Now the whole point of this post was to show you how easy it is to make sublet changes to pieces you love. The only annoying thing about vintage is that it's one off, so if it's not your size you probably won't find it again in your size. BUT don't fret, there might be a way around it......

My friend Louise, a With Love Betty model and one of my best customers, came into see me yesterday. She desperately needed some smart clothing for work but wanted to stand out and not wear the same as everyone else. Well I had the perfect outfit for her, a pair of gorgeous camel, 100% wool, tapered trousers, unfortunately they were slightly too tight. Fortunately for her though I'm quite good with a sewing machine. 

They were only slightly to small for her, less than an inch so I decided the best way to get over the problem was to add a piece of material into the waist band. Now I could have used elastic but I knew Louise might want to tuck tops into the trousers so I wanted to make the customisation as inconspicuous as possible. So I turned them inside out to see if there's any spare fabric I could use, sometimes the hem might be wide or in this instance there was fabric covering the zip. 

So I literally cut away some of the fabric to use on the waistband and because I took it from the inside you won't notice the missing fabric.

I then very carefully, using a pair of sharp fabric scissors cut down the left side of the waistband and an extra 10mm down the seam. These trousers had a side zip so I was only able to do it the one side. If they needed expanding more and didn't have a side zip I could do it both sides. 

I then pinned the extra fabric in place by opening up the cut area to make a V shape, Louise only needed an inch wide insert which was perfect for the extra fabric I cut from the zip. Then using my mini sewing machine from Dunelm mill I started sewing.....

To make it neat remember to fold over the edges of the cut waistband so the final result with have a hemmed finished. 

That's basically it, as u can see I folded over the top part of the extra fabric and gave it a hem and folded the cut waistband each side to give it a neat final result. I also hemmed the inside where I had taken the extra fabric, just so it didn't fray when Louise wore them. 

And that is how I added an inch to the waistband of a pair of vintage trousers and I'm sure your agree Louise looks fabulous in them......

And as you can see the inserted fabric is hardly noticeable. So if you do find a vintage piece that you love why not ask to see if something can be done to alter it. Your be surprised at what some people can achieve :) 

Please let me know if you enjoyed this post and found it informative,

And why not let us know your views on vintage fashion....

With love, Betty xxxxxx