When the theme for Sew Together for Summer was announced, I wondered if I could make a coordinating set from upcycled jeans. I had already been thinking of making a Tauko Magazine Centrefold, but knew I wouldn’t get it from a single pair of jeans, so thought I could get two garments from two pairs of jeans.

I failed to get a photo of the first pair of jeans but this is the second pair – they are quite sizeable!

I fiddled around quite a bit, tracing onto the denim to see what went where. It’s hard to see here, but I had so many chalk marks I couldn’t work out what was what.

The legs of the Play Pants came from the legs of the second pair of jeans. I decided to modify the pattern a little. I took 4cm off the rise, front and back, tooks a small fold of .5cm from each of the front and back legs and shaved about six centimetres off the hips. I incorporated the original side pockets and the fly lining piece from the first pair of jeans, giving them a faux fly. I wasn’t going to do this as I didn’t want them to look like jeans, but they just looked odd without it. After I had finished and worn them I decided that this fly piece was too long, so I unpicked it and the waistband and shortened it by about 3cms.

I also added the hems from the first pair as they had better fade marks.

I tried to stick to the rules of Sew Together for Summer, and as I had used this mustard linen on the top, I thought I should use it somewhere on the trousers. I decided to line the waistband with it. I had unpicked and opened out the original waistband from the second pair of jeans, but it was far too wide with the lining, so I took off the linen and used the waistband in its original form.

I had managed to cut a hole when I was wrestling the belt loops off – these jeans were part of a workwear range and everything is sewn down very well.

I cut out a heart and sewed it over the top of the hole using harvested thread from these jeans. Please note that the new topstitching had not yet been done and the old was still hanging around.

I added a second heart for good measure and added French knots – just because!

Unfortunately I had unpicked the hems, so sewed them on to the Play Pants and then had to redo the topstitching. I had just enough to go round.

I have worn these a lot since I made them whilst I waited for the Centrefold pattern to be released.

Initially I didn’t put back pockets on, but I kept feeling for them.

So when I got home from a trip away I found the pockets from the first pair of jeans, as they are smaller, and added them. I’m much happier.

Even though these Play Pants are a size 0 and I’ve tweaked the fit, they are still quite loose, although the fit is much better now. I don’t mind them being a bit loose as they are supposed to have a relaxed fit, but I’m so used to jeans which fit firmly round the top that I feel the need to do further tweaking.

So here is the coordinating set – the top and trousers. I’ve managed to wear this combination a couple of times already.

It was a lovely outfit to wear for a walk in the bush on a winters day. And yes, I posed by my favourite snottygobble tree!

and the seated shot, which you may have seen in the previous blog post

A couple of days ago I took a further 3cms off each side and I do think the fit is getting closer to what I like. The waist elastic might be a bit loose, so I have more unpicking in my future. I think tighter elastic will result in the trousers sitting higher on my waist, which will resolve a couple of other issues.

It’s a really easy outfit to get about in and the temperature was just right for me to wear the outfit on my daily walk.

Finally, a little girl and her dog.