Project #2: Tie One On/Men's Up-Cycled Neckties

This was originally going to be my first sewing project, but then I found all that thrift shop denim, took a detour, and went off on another tangent.  That adventure is the post just below this one.

​So, how this began is with a project by Kim Montagnese (It's Sew Easy) called "Necktie Upcycle" that I found on-line.  In her project she attaches a necktie skirt to a vest, but she uses about 15 silk neckties.  I didn't have that many, but I did have the collection from my sons' high school fancy dances and events.  I'd, of course, kept them lo these many years for something, as we do.  So I deconstructed them and learned a ton about how they are made.  Pressed them, sewed them together using both pointed ends and alternating them, and fashioned a skirt to attach to my closet raid, a black waffle-weave vest from years ago.  

I removed the vest zipper (just snip-snip, no problem at all with weird edges), then gathered the length of tie-skirting to fit the vest hem, and hand-stitched it on the inside of the hem so it would lay flatter.  Then I put the whole thing on Annie, my muse, stepped away, and saw right away that it needed something else.  After I ran it by my friend Shawn through a flurry of text photos,  she suggested something was needed to "funk it up" like another tie point going the other way.  Luckily I did have one extra tie so I cut it up, gathered it, and sewed it to the bottom front.  Equally luckily, I had leftover bias strip from the same tie, so I bound the right front and collar.  Much better.

​All in all I spent several days between this project and making jewelry.  On to the next one.