Re-fashioned, re-purposed, recycled sweater to hoodie!

I have been "thrifting" wool sweaters...and I always throw them in the washing machine and dryer to felt them (ie. shrink them) once I bring them home. So when I decided to sew some clothes from my stash of thrifted felted sweaters imagine my delight to realize that this lovely--now very soft (after the felting in the washer) men's wool sweater now fit me perfectly. It was rather an ugly plaid sweater though--so I decided to make it into a "hoodie" for myself.


I started by adding the hoodie pocket on front---I cut the pocket from another sweater, hemed the curved edges with my sewing machine and sewed it on by hand with some lovely rainbow variegated wool yarn (actually I used a sock yarn) with a blanket stitch.

Then I decided to do some embroidery over the black plaid lines to brighten the front up to go better with the bright colored pocket...again I used the rainbow yarn and a herringbone stitch. I sure wish I had taken a photo of this sweater before I re-purposed it---but sorry, I didn't!

Next was the hood--I cut out the ribbing around the neck of the sweater---being careful to cut right at the seam so the neck wasn't to big. I hada couple of argyle sweaters--but after felting they both seemed to have some holes in them---so I used parts of 2 of them to sew the hood, and then turned the neckline under and sewed the hood to the neckline by hand. Then I also embroidered a herringbone stitch around the neckline to finish it off.

and voila! I now have this very comfy hoodie---which I have been wearing everywhere! I love having the pocket in front for my cell phone or keys, and the soft wool is just the right warmth for this time of year. And so far I have been receiving many compliments on my "new" sweater....despite the funkyness---folks seem to like the obvious handmade look of this sweater and so do I....