How to Make a Cute & Sparkly DIY Sequin Jacket for the Holidays

Tools and materials:

• Denim jacket
• Sequin fabric
• Scissors
• Sewing pins
• Thread
• Sewing machine

Tip: When you are buying sequined fabric for clothing you want to make sure that it will be comfortable to wear. Feel the back of the fabric with your hand to make sure it’s soft enough to be against your skin.

If it’s at all scratchy, and you still really want that fabric, then you may need to cut extra pieces of fabric from lining material.

1. Disassemble your jean jacket

Cut the sleeves of your jean jacket, as close to the seam as you can. Do not use a seam ripper to open the seam – leave the seam attached to the jacket. You will be replacing the original sleeves with sequined sleeves.

Cut the cuffs off the jacket sleeves above the seam line, leaving enough fabric for a seam allowance.

2. Make sequined sleeves

Use the jacket sleeves as your template to cut sleeves from the sequin fabric. Fold the sequin fabric in half and lay the jacket sleeve on the fabric with the outside of the sleeve along the fabric fold.

Cut the sequin fabric around the sleeve, allowing for extra length and width if you want a billowy sleeve.

For the underarm, do not make it any larger, just add a seam allowance. That way it will fit into the underarm of the jacket correctly.

Use the first sleeve you cut as the pattern for a second sleeve.

Remove as many of the sequins from the seam allowance area of the sleeves as you can, to enable better sewing and a soft seam against your underarm.

Fold the sleeve in half with the inside facing in and pin the sleeve seam in place. Sew the sleeve seam with a zigzag stitch.

Turn the sleeve right side out and try it on to make sure it’s as billowy and long as you’d like. If you need to shorten it or make it narrower, you can do that now.

3. Attach the sequin sleeves to the jacket

With the sleeve and the jacket right side out, insert the top of the sleeve in the jacket armhole and pin it in place. Make sure the seam of the sleeve aligns with the side seam of the jacket and the top shoulder point of the sleeve aligns with the top shoulder of the jacket.

Now, turn the sleeve and jacket inside out and check that you have pinned the seam allowance of the sleeve into the existing shoulder seam on the jacket. You may need to go slowly for this, because the existing seam is quite thick and not so easy to insert pins into.

Turn the sleeve right side out again and straight stitch it in place on the outside, right along the existing seam line of the jacket. When you get to the thickest parts of the denim, you may need to manually work the wheel of the sewing machine to get through it.

4. Reattach the cuffs

Cut the button end off of each cuff.

Measure the remaining cuff around your wrist and cut enough of it off so that when you attach it to the button part of the cuff it will be the right size to sit at the base of your wrist and gather in the billowy sequined sleeve. 

Sew the two pieces of cuff together to attach the button piece to the non-button piece.

Now, pin the right side of the cuff to the right side of the bottom of the sequined sleeve, using the seam allowance above the original cuff seam. You will need to gather the bottom of the sequined sleeve as you go to evenly distribute it around the cuff.

Leave one section of the sequined sleeve unattached from the cuff. That will make it easier to put it on, and you can then use the cuff button to close the gap.

Sew the cuff to the sleeve right next to the original cuff seam line.

This is how the finished cuff looks with the button closed.

DIY sequin jacket tutorial

The transformation from a simple jean jacket into a sequined statement jacket is amazing! If you didn’t want to reattach the original cuff, you could opt for an elastic casing at the bottom of the billowy sleeve.

Leave a comment to let me know your thoughts!