Thrift Style Thursday: An Unexpected Match

For this week's edition of Thrift Style Thursday, Martyna, of Spoolish, wanted us to rock a surprise thrift score - something way too big, something intended for a man or a child, something like that. What I had in mind may not seem like such a great find at first glance, but let me explain.

A couple clothes swaps ago, at the end of the night when everything had been thoroughly picked over, I began my customary last-call scramble. Grab anything with fabric you like because clearly, no one else wants it at this point. That's how this vintage, handmade dress came home with me. And after a tumble through the laundry, it hung in my refashion closet for several months, waiting its turn to be made into something new.

Then one day, I pulled out a bunch of stuff for "before" pictures and tried on this dress for the first time. It fit! It didn't flatter, sure, but it fit perfectly! It caught me completely off guard! All this dress really needed was a few tweaks.

First, I cut off a sizable chunk of that overwhelming collar.

Then I sewed the remaining collar sliver back onto the dress. The raw edges were then folded over and sewn down on the inside while the collar was folded up, so that those stitches would be hidden under the collar from the outside. I gave it a good press to make the collar lay flat again.

I cut off the sleeves, leaving about 1/2 inch of fabric, which was folded around and sewn to the inside like a facing.

Finally, I folded the bottom hem up about 2.5-3 inches, then folded it up again. Once sewn, I had a nice, wide hem about 5-6 inches higher than the original.

And there you have it! Just a few quick changes, and this handmade dress is ready to get a little love again.

I'm loving the 1950s housewife vibe going on here. I'm thinking, when it gets warmer, I'll exchange tights and boots for my black heels.

Maybe I'll also swap out the chunky necklace and light saber earrings (yeah, that's right, light saber earrings) for some classy pearls.

And hey, even after collar reduction, it's still high enough in the back to cover my tattoos! Wouldn't want to show my ink and have people thinking I was anything but a proper lady, now would I?

Dress: clothes swap and refashioned // Cardigan: $3 thrifted // NY&Co belt: $2 thrifted // Tights: $10 Target 
Grey suede boots: $5 Yerdle // Necklace: inherited from Granma //  Light Saber earrings: Etsy

Want to see what kind of surprise thrift scores the other Thrift Style Thursday ladies have to offer? Just click their pics to visit their blogs, or the TST icon in the middle to go to our Facebook page.