A charcoal grey cardigan is on the left side, a grey circle with a white question mark (covering a woman wearing the result of the upcylcle project is on the right. The text on the image is "from this to".

I bought a cardigan at a local consignment shop in the winter of 2022. I loved that it was charcoal grey, that it buttoned all the way up the neck and had a cute collar. It also had 3/4 batwing sleeves that I didn’t necessarily love but was willing to overlook. I figured that the sleeves of a sweater or dress would look cute underneath it. But I’ve rarely worn it…the window to wear it on it’s own as outerwear is very small for me and it didn’t layer well under coats. So I decided to upcycle it into a vest.

A charcoal grey cardigan before the upcycle, laid flat with a white background. It has 3/4 length sleeves, a collar, 4 buttons up to the neck and 2 patch pockets at hip level.
Before the upcycle.
A small white woman is wearing the cardigan before the upcycle over a white vest with front ties and a midi length black dress. She is holding a silver handbag. The photo is from the woman's shoulders to her knees.
One of the rare occasions that the weather was perfect and I wanted to wear it.

How I did the Upcycle

I had the idea to upcycle this cardigan into a vest a while ago. I couldn’t bring myself to part with it in either of my recent closet declutters (you can view these on my YouTube channel) but I knew I needed to make it more wearable for my everyday life. Removing the sleeves would do that because I’d be able to layer it over sweaters and under jackets/coats.

I was a little worried about how to cut the sleeves off since they had a batwing shape. I knew that the armholes would be huge after the cut. Since I was nervous about going too fast and ruining the item, I made multiple little cuts, 5 to be exact.

During the upcycle project...asmall white woman takes a mirror selfie with her left arm extended to show the cardigan sleeve after the first cut which removed the sleeve cuff.
After the first cut, where I removed the sleeve cuffs, which I later turned into 2 neck warmers.

After the 5 cuts were done, I was pretty happy with how the vest was sitting on my shoulders. I ended up sewing the bottom of the sleeve openings up 3″ so that they wouldn’t be as big and I made about a 1″ hem around the armholes to get rid of the raw edges.

The End Result

I am extremely happy with the outcome. The back of the armholes were a little stretched right after sewing but have relaxed with wear. Since doing this upcycle 5 days ago, I have worn this vest 3 times, which might be more than I wore it over the past 2-ish years!

A small white woman is standing in front of a white wall and 2 white doors. She is wearing the charcoal grey vest over a black chore shirt and black tank top, with charcoal grey sweatpants that are tucked into light grey socks with black quilted boots.
The end result of the upcycle: Styled with a black tank top, Vuori shirt, Mate the Label sweatpants, slouchy socks and Teva boots – pretty much my uniform lately!

I also turned the original sleeve cuffs into neck warmers and I’ve been wearing them non-stop.

A close up of the front of the vest (top) and the back (bottom).

Do you upcycle your clothes? It can be a great way to give new life to an old item that you no longer wear. As I’m currently doing a no buy year, I plan to refresh a couple of items that I no longer wear!

I hope you enjoyed this article. Before you go, read about some other upcycles I’ve done in this article and this one! I think you’ll like them 😊

You can also watch a video of the process (plus, the outcome of washing wool sweaters in the washing machine) on YouTube:

This Post Has 4 Comments

  2. Sarah 12/16/2023

    Absolutely fantastic and inspiring!

Comments are closed.