Tilly and the Buttons Stretch - Ribbed Sleeveless Freya Turtleneck

I actually made this top a while ago and never got round to taking photos of it, but considering how much I like it I wanted to share it. As you can tell from looking through my past makes I'm a big fan of turtlenecks. Since discovering the Tilly and the Buttons Freya Turtleneck it's become my most used pattern - this is the first version I made of it. It's such a great pattern to hack, my current favourite hack being a sleeveless turtleneck.

I've posted about the two other sleeveless Freya turtlenecks I've made, one in black and one in white. I wore those two tops constantly in the summer, but I actually made this pink one first. This top is also a refashion of an older make. Depending on how long you've been following my blog you may remember this pink ribbed top - I can't believe that was three years ago! Like many of my refashions I really liked that make at the time but it no longer fit my style. I think I wore it fairly consistently for about a year but I haven't reached for it in a while. My favourite thing to do in this situation is always to turn it into something new, and I've written a whole blog post about the many items I've refashioned. 

I had already planned to make my black sleeveless turtleneck and I thought that refashioning an old item of clothing would be a great way to try out the pattern hack before cutting into my fabric. Because I the pink fabric wasn't new and seeing as I wasn't wearing the old top anyway there was nothing to lose from trying something new. The main thing I considered when making this top was how to finish off the armholes neatly. What I chose to do in the end was double up the fabric. I cut the hem on the fold, so the top is actually fully lined. Because a turtleneck is then attached around the neckline the whole thing is finished off very neatly both on the inside and outside of the garment.

I did end up changing a couple of things in the design between making this pink top and the other ones. If you look closely you can probably see that the armhole doesn't sit quite as well on this one as it does the others. The second time round I added a band around the armhole to bring the excess fabric in rather than line the top. This rib fabric was a lot less stretchy than the cotton jersey though so I'm not sure that the same technique for the armhole would have worked.

The fit of this top might not be quite perfect but it's certainly very wearable and I'm so pleased with it. Like I said I love this style of top and refashioning an old make gave me the opportunity to try out something new. I love how it pairs with my Dawn Jeans too!