DIY stitched open knit sweater

take an open knit white sweater, 

add a Rebecca Minkoff Resort 2013 inspiration...

and DIY the perfect summer open knit.

For mine, I got lazy and didn't knit one myself

(although that was the intention and here you can find the how-to )

but I found the perfect candidate at 20$ on the TJMaxx sales rack.

A plain white cotton open knit 

that was begging to be refashioned!

picture in the center: Rebecca Minkoff Look Book - collage by moi

Than, yet, again, I got super-lazy and didn't cut several old plain white t-shirts, 

but bought t-shirt yarn at my local yarn store for 1 Euro. 

(I bought about 100 yr)

Dyeing the t-shirt yarn

Why I decided to dye the t-shirt yarn when I could have bought a colored one:

My sweater is white, and t-shirt yarn is colored with the same dye as t-shirts...

and bright colored t-shirts often bleed the color.

By dyeing my own color with fabric dye I'm 100% sure that my sweater 

will stay white, wash after wash.

Divided the yarn in 4 balls of 25 yards each

* I prepared the dye in a small plastic container using Pebeo Seta Color fabric paint: diluted 1 part of fabric paint with 10 parts of water;

* then I soaked the t-shirt yarn into the dye;

* made sure that the dye was deep into the yarn;

* once all the colors were ready, still very very wet, I put them on a piece of paper (outside on the patio in a shaded area) and waited to be dry (a heat wave helps to speed the process);

* the morning after, I press the yarn with the iron, to fix the dye.

For three out of four of my colors that was it.

I liked the inspiration one where one of the color is muting between black and yellow (although I wanted the yellow to be more predominant).

* After I fixed the dye with the iron, I spread the yarn onto a piece of paper, and prepared some watered black dye (always using the fabric paint);

* I used a chunky brush to splatter random black dots onto the yellow yarn;

* Waited to be dry, and press with the iron.

Here is the result of these operations: 

the yarn is now multi-colored, 

and I obtained the perfect tie-dye effect.

Stitching the sweater

I did some cross stitch, some needle point, and some straight in-and-out stitching, counting the spaces between stitches like a bigger scale of Aida fabric that is normally used for cross stitch and needle point.

... and I'm going to rock this sweater all summer 2012 !!!

xox, d.

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