DIY a Gorgeous Puffy Sleeve Blouse

Tools and materials:

• Pattern hacks
• Fabric
• Scissors
• Pins
• Sewing machine
• Shirring elastic

To get started on making this amazing blouse, I hacked my blouse pattern to get it perfect for this piece. If you want to see the notes on my little hacks go to 0:57 in the video. I then made sure to cut out all the pieces I needed to make the blouse. I chose to use this gorgeous golden fabric but feel free to choose a color that suits your aesthetic! 

Once all my pieces were cut out, it was time to start sewing. Check out my instructions in this sew-along tutorial to help you sew this blouse here.

Now it’s time to add a little one of my tweaks to create this new blouse. I stay stitched around the curved neckline and then pinned on the binding. Once the pins were all in place, I sewed around the neckline leaving a small seam allowance. 

I then needed to sew the two ends of the binding together. I made sure they were perfectly aligned and sewed. 

Next, I folded the binding to match up with the seam allowance I had left and then folded it again. I edge-stitched around the whole neckline to make sure the blouse would have a perfect finish! 

Once I had the neckline looking perfect, I continued to sew my blouse according to my instructions. For this new blouse, I chose to finish the seams with a french seam just because the fabric I chose is a bit more delicate.

It was then time to move on to my favorite feature of this blouse, the puffy sleeve. I started by sewing up the side seams on both of my sleeves. 

Once the side seams were sewed I went ahead and hemmed my sleeves. I chose to fold the hem 2 cm from the bottom and make it a double-turned hem but you can just overlock it and turn it over once if you prefer. 

Next, I changed the stitch length on my sewing machine to its longest length and also made sure to hand-wind some shirring elastic onto an empty bobbin which I placed in the sewing machine. 

It was finally time for the fun part! I started sewing my first row of shirring 5 cm from my sleeve hem. Once I had the shirring all the way around the sleeve I knotted the elastic on the inside to make sure everything would be held firmly in place. I also cut off the threads to make sure the sleeve would be perfect before starting the next row of shirring. 

I made three rows of shirring and was ready to gather the top of my sleeves. To do this, I sewed two rows of base stitching and I then gathered that up to get the desired effect. 

I popped my sleeve into my armhole and started pinning the edges in place. I made sure to match up the seams and then I pulled the gathers to make them nice and even all the way around. Once all the pins were in place, I sewed on the sleeves. I couldn’t wait to see the end result!

For the final step, I hemmed the bottom of the blouse, finishing it off to make sure it looked neat and clean. 

I am so obsessed with this puffy sleeve blouse! How would you style this piece? Let me know in the comments below!