Pattern Hack Alert: Sanne of @s.a.n.n.e_s.e.w.s. and her #Mabel jumper

The social media-sewing combo is trending hard. Making unique garments and posting them in a blog or on Instagram to inspire others? The growing number of blogger and Instagrammer Sewist(a)s worldwide shows no sign of slowing. That’s why Fibre Mood regularly features Sewist(a)s with their original hacks of Fibre Mood patterns.  This time, we’re showcasing Sanne from over @s.a.n.n.e_s.e.w.s. and her #Mabel pattern hack. Check out her oh-so-gorgeous make here!

Hey, hey! My name is Sanne, but I go by @s.a.n.n.e_s.e.w.s. over on Instagram. I'm 37 but still feel 27 at heart. I've lived in Ghent for 15 years now but was born and raised in Brussels - Ixelles. 

To tell the truth, I haven’t technically been sewing for all that long. However, I've been into fashion for AGES. Long story short, creativity has been my co-pilot since I was little. I grew up in Brussels, but back then, finding Dutch-language hobby help in the heart of the city was no walk in the park. I've always been creative and taught myself to sew as a child. It was super simple stuff, but looking back on that now, they were still pretty awesome. I turned an old pair of jeans into a bag, a pair of trousers into a skirt, tore apart t-shirts I'd bought and pimped them... At first, I tried to do everything by hand, but it wasn’t long before I hit the limits of my hand-sewing abilities (plus, my fingers were killing me). So, my mum bought me a cheap Singer. Manual? Never read it... Really, it was more fiddling around than actual sewing, and come to think of it, I never did manage to wind the bobbin thread on the bobbin properly. Anyway, long story short? I've always been creative and always made do with what I had, with lots of tinkering along the way. :-)

Five years ago, I literally picked needle and thread back up. I bought myself a new sewing machine and an overlocker, and started taking sewing lessons. And actually, I’m still doing that today, because there’s always room to learn. And I always relish the challenge of learning new techniques, really mastering them. However, I do always try to add my own touch to a pattern. Hacking started out with super simple things, but now that I’ve got more experience, I occasionally venture into deeper waters. 

What's great about pattern hacking, or the whole sewing process – to be honest – is the creativity I can pour into it. Matching patterns to fabrics and then sculpting those patterns to meet what I'm looking for or need? I'm all about it.

Truthfully though, I didn’t change the Mabel all that much (compared to some other patterns). I'd already had the fabric lying around for a while, but initially intended it for my daughter. That was also why I only had a metre of it. With the fabric right next to me as I was flipping through Fibre Mood 13, it may as well have been destiny. The pieces just fell into place. :-)  

That said, I still didn’t have quite enough fabric since the chart says you need 1.45 m of fabric for a S. Some folks would take that and sigh, thinking, ‘Too bad, a different project then’. Not me though, that's exactly what gets the gears turning... ‘How can I whip a Mabel out of this anyway?’

A guide to my Mabel pattern hack

So, I started by tracing a size S, but shortened the sleeves by 5 cm and the front and back by 7 cm. I wear high-waisted trousers, so jumpers that are a smidgen shorter are no problem. To show off the elegance of the white cotton embroidery, I wanted something narrow at the waist but with a slightly more feminine finish than the standard hem band. I drew both hem bands 6 and 7 (the pieces for the front and back) together, turning them into a single long one (on the fabric fold), and I lengthened it by 17 cm (these become the ties). Before attaching the hem band to the front and back pieces, I first folded the long hem band in half with the right sides touching, and sewed both short ends and 23 cm of the ends together (these are the two ties of 17 cm I'd drawn in the beginning + 6 cm extra). I trimmed the edges, turned them the right way out, and then straightened out the corners. Next, I pinned the hem band to the front and back, as described in the tutorial, but stopped at 6 cm from the centre line each time (so a 12 cm opening at the front), also making sure that this was also the end of the unfinished hem band. I hemmed the unfinished 12 cm edge to the front at 1 cm. That allowed me to knot the ties, while still having a 12 cm margin to tighten them a little more.

I've already worn this jumper a lot. And my daughter? I bought a different fabric for her. :-)

Fancy making your own unique Mabel? Buy the pattern!