Jena, fashion designer entrepreneur and Contemporary Fashion Education student, pictured on the right, is about to begin a fabric internship in India. This is the first in a series of occasional posts about her adventures.

Jena designs comfortable, elegant, and sensual clothing for ladies. You can see more of her designs at her Etsy shop. She also makes funky Western-style shirts for men.

She tells me she just ordered a vintage kurta, a traditional dress of India, to wear on her upcoming trip. It is a woven fabric with block printed designs. Unfortunately it was too small. I could barely get it over my shoulders comfortably. So here is what I did to make it fit.

– removed the traditional cap sleeves
– cut new sleeves from a knit fabric that were longer and to my liking
– Removed the back
– cut new back from knit fabric which would give me the stretch I needed to fit comfortably
– From original fabric, I cut bias strips and finished the back neckline, hem and sleeves
– From original fabric, made a patch pocket (barely visible on the bottom left side of the garment front).
– serged the front and back pieces together so the stitches would have some stretch due to merging the woven and the knit
Now I’m ready to go! (well, I still have to pack up my apartment).
Thanks for the class! I’m sure I’ll be using more techniques in the future.
Love,
Jena