Vintage Dress to Shortie Set Refashion Tutorial

Hands up if you have a fabulously patterned but incredibly frumpy vintage dress lurking in your stash:

Dig out that dowdy dress and transform it into stellar summer style with my Vintage Dress to Shortie Set Refashion Tutorial:

I’m pretty sure this vintage dress was handmade from a fantastic cotton bedsheet.

Unfortunately it had a few rips and tears that needed to be mended before I could start the transformation from dowdy dress to stellar shortie set.

That sleeve had definitely seen better days.

I chopped off the torn bit and then cut the same amount from the other sleeve too.

Then hemmed up the raw edges and my sleeves were as good as new!

The back of the dress had a few torn areas as well so I simply zigzagged them closed then added a few heart patches (cut from those sleeves leftovers) to conceal the mended bits.

Once all of the mending was done I chopped the dress to the length I wanted my top to be + a few centimeters of seam allowance.

Shortened the back zip.

Then gave it a nice hem and the top was done!

I snagged the chopped bottom of the dress and removed one of the side seams to create a long length of fabric.

Then cut it into 2 equal pieces.

Folded each piece in half and stitched the sides of each together to create 2 tubes.

Then placed one of the tubes on top of the other, grabbed a pair of loose fitting pants, folded them in half & put them on top of the fabric tubes with the crotch seams lined up with the edge of the fabric.

Then chopped out the fabric using the crotch of the pants as a guide – be generous with seam allowance, a tight crotch area is the worst!

I then had 2 fabric tubes, each with a “V” chopped out.

I popped one tube inside of the other with right sides facing the V’s lined up then stitched the V’s together.

Once stitched, I pulled one leg out of the other and my shorts were looking fab!

I created an elastic waist casing by simply folding & stitching down the top edge of the shorts

but once I had inserted the elastic I decided I didn’t really like it so…

I removed the elastic and added a fabric belt created from the scrappy leftovers instead!

At first I thought I’d wear this fab shortie set as pjs but it looks so groovy with my vintage straw bag I just might have to wear it out and about as well!

Grab another DIY shorts method right over here + all of my vintage tips & tutorials here!