Butterfly Heart
Kayla Bryan
Maria Immaculata
Community College
Kayla wanted her outfit to be casual, comfortable and unique and to include a nature theme - which can be seen in the butterfly and flower designs added throughout. She also wanted a more relaxed ("messy") vibe and decided to use a fraying technique on the denim butterfly on the back of the top and on the flowers on the jeans. Kayla used Pinterest to brainstorm ideas and created a moodboard and sketch of how she would combine all the elements she wanted to include.
Cork county council
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Kayla sourced most of her materials from charity shops and the clothes that they were unable to sell.
Kayla asked in her local charity shop if she could look through the unsellable clothes, and picked out items she thought she could use. She also gathered some items from her own or family member's wardrobes.
Kayla ended up collecting two pairs of jeans, a black t-shirt, a white pillowcase, two patterned pillowcases, a white sheet and a scarf to use for her outfit.
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She started by naturally dyeing some of the bed sheet/pillowcase fabric with red cabbage, using lemon juice and baking soda to alter the pH to achieve different shades.
Kayla used this fabric to cut out heart shapes and sewed and turned them to create patches without any raw edges.
The jeans have been altered by inserting large denim godets to the outer seams of the jeans and the heart patches have been machine appliquéd onto the godets.
The jeans also feature embroidered details on the front pockets with lavender motifs and pink topstitching.
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For the jacket, Kayla found a pattern online and printed it.
She harvested fabric from the bed sheets by removing the stitches and used it to cut out her pattern pieces for the outer, lining and inner batting made from a scarf.
Kayla used a sewing machine to sew these pieces together and finished the raw edges with bias binding she made herself.
The jacket also has a denim flower detail on the inner lapel.
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The t-shirt was cropped and the sleeves altered (folded up and sewn) and features a large butterfly detail on the back, with layers of denim machine appliqued and frayed.
There is also a denim heart on the front, covering a logo on the t-shirt.
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With the leftover fabrics, Kayla decided to make a small lined bag to go with her outfit.
She used denim for the outer body and bed sheet fabric for the lining and braided strips for the strap.
The flower patch on the front of the bag was made by sewing small scrap pieces together on a larger backing piece and then cutting out the heart shape. This has been handsewed to the bag.
