Kimono Jacket

Create a kimono jacket

We created this colorful, lightweight, no-cost kimono jacket from a man's pique dress shirt and materials we had on hand. Here are the steps:

[1] Square off the shirttail. Add a border and topstitch it to give it a little body.

[2] Cut off the button plackets and collar. Add a border and topstitch it. These borders are like the binding on a quilt; that is, they're sewn onto the front and then folded over and sewn on the inside.

[3] Cut off the cuffs above the button plackets on the sleeves. Add cuffs. Ours have pink-and-white trim on the edge and are long enough to fold up. We made our cuffs with a double layer of fabric, sewn into tubes, inserted into the sleeves, and stitched. We had to fudge a little, by taking a tuck in each cuff, to make them fit into the sleeves.

[4] Sometimes it's hard to remove the pocket from a shirt without leaving little holes in the fabric. We decided to leave the pocket and cover it with flowers made out of yoyos and buttons that we hand-stitched in place. Yoyos are gathered circles of scrap fabric.

[5] We drew a vine and leaves freehand, then embroidered them using a stem stitch, adding a few yoyo blossoms. We used a water-soluble marker. When we were finished stitching, we made sure to remove our marker lines by dabbing them with cool water before ironing!