"The R3fashion"

From a useless pair of leggings to a scarf, some boot toppers, and a headband, this 3-way refashion was a great way to get into the DIY groove after a long absence!

The feedstock was a pair of metallic printed leggings that I got from Swap.com.

Even though they were nonreturnable, and even though they cost $3.20 (more than I normally pay for a nonreturnable item), I took a chance on them because I figured leggings are stretchy, so they'd almost certainly fit! I was wrong. These leggings were so tight, I knew I'd never be able to sit comfortably in them.

As with most of my failed purchases, I chucked these into a donation box...and couldn't stop thinking about them! Such shimmer! What a pattern! I couldn't just let them disappear from my life like that!

These days, when faced with a fabric item that looks gorgeous but isn't quite usable as-is, my first thought is, "Can I turn it into a face mask?" In the case of these leggings, while there was more than enough material for several masks, the non-printed parts were too sheer to provide adequate filtration, and the printed areas weren't breathable at all!

Another option was just to use it as a loose-fitting mask cover, purely for decoration. I've been experimenting with scarf-style masks, and I thought the long legs of the leggings would serve that purpose admirably!

So into the fitting room (that's also my office, closet, and crafting room,) I went! The goal was to find a shape that would hang off my nose without immediately falling down from the weight of so much fabric.

I folded the leggings in half and marked a spot on the front seam, then stitched a line.  

It took three tries to find the right fit, but once I did, I could fold them in half the other way, and have a nice face cover with a center seam! Is it weird that I'm using the crotch of a pair of pants to cover my face? Maybe, but they'd never been worn, and no one else needs to know, right?

From there, I cut off the excess from the top part of the leggings, reversed the nose seam so that the stitches were all on the inside, and turned the pair of pants into one long tube with the ankle holes at either end. 

I swear I took more pictures of this process, but they don't seem to be anywhere in my camera. I think either the camera or the XD card is beginning to die, because this isn't the first time I've lost photos in a mysterious way.

In any case, once I had created a scarf-like object, I attached some ear loops to it so it would stay on my face. 

For the finishing touch, I hand-stitched over the nose seam, to hold the two layers of fabric together.

A shiny scarf mask sounds fun, but when I tried it on with clothes, I realized I wanted a little something more to make it outfit-worthy. So, with the remains of the top portion of the leggings, I set out to make some accessories: boot toppers and headband.

I was able to use two strips of the original waistband on my legs, held in place by the original elastic. They look pretty silly as I'm modeling them here, but I think they tied the outfit together nicely when I tucked them into my boots.

With the remaining strip of fabric, I made a headband. I remembered my lesson from the first headband I ever sewed from scraps, and gave it tapered ends with elastic at the bottom. The number of times I had to turn this tiny tube inside out and back again while trying to construct it, I'd rather not remember, but it was worth the effort.

It's a perfect fit! 

I wore the scarf mask and boot toppers this weekend on a date with my boyfriend (who said I looked like I was trying to be a ninja, and not in a good way. Sigh—we can't please everyone!). We were planning to go ice skating, but my best-laid plans, like my photos, went all asunder! I think the boot toppers would have looked adorable with ice skates, but I guess we'll never know!

10 years going on 11

 

I started this blog in 2010, which means I've been an Unfashion blogger for over 10 years (and a few months)!

I wish I'd noticed that auspicious anniversary before it passed, but let's face it: I've basically been living in my own little world since COVID, and my blog's birthday wasn't at the top of my mind. But eleven is my favorite number, so why not make a big deal out of that, and treat my eleventh year with as much pomp as is usually devoted to Year 10?

Since I haven't had, don't have, and probably won't have for a while, many blogworthy outfits to post, this seems like a great year to get all retrospective and talk about those sappy things people like to bring up when marking significant moments in the passage of time.

Things like, what's changed? How have I grown? What lessons have I learned? What funny embarrassments have I racked up along the way?

Well, I certainly haven't grown my blog from a rinky-dink affair on a free website to a media juggernaut with millions in yearly revenue, and I still can count my followers on one hand with a couple missing fingers, so in that sense, I haven't changed at all.

I did grow my salary some, and with it, my clothes-storage capability. I now have a house with 2 rooms to call my own, and I keep garments in 4 closets instead of just 2...so that has been a boon for my blog, I'm sure.

If I've learned any lessons, well, it's that people don't come to a fashion blog to read my purple prose; they do it for the pictures! But nevertheless, I persist. In fact, I persist so hard, I'm going to turn this sentimental anniversary article into a the kind of literary juggernaut I only wish my blogging career could be—post upon wordy post, chock full of musings, anecdotes, navel-gazing, and maybe even a token attempt or two at putting in some pictures!

One of my goals for this anniversary celebration is to take a closer look at how things have evolved over the past decade+, so I'm going way deep into the archives! That's where I need your help—that's right, you! For this segment (which I'm tentatively calling "Would I Wear It?"), I need my dearest readers (if I still have any) to help me choose a few past outfits to critique and cringe at.

So if you want to play, just peruse my previous posts (here's a neat way to view just the main pictures) and comment here with the link to any outfit that you'd like me to revisit. Since oldies are goodies, we're going to focus on the first 5 years of this blog. That would be 2010 to 2014, but since 2010 was pretty sparse and we seem to be doing a baker's-dozen kind of thing with numbers in this story, I'll throw in 2015 as well! The object is to observe how my personal style has changed along with the world I live in, but the bonus is that I'm sure there will be plenty of answers to the final sappy question above. Funny embarrassments, here we come!