Baby Vest Tutorial & Pattern

Tutorial on how to make a baby sandwich vest for infants and toddlers. Free Pattern.

This is a small undershirt with a back closure that can be worn both front and back. For ease of making, the front and back pieces are cut together. The shoulder closure is designed for front and back wearability.

This cotton undershirt can be worn by babies from 0 to 3 years old, the following data is provided for your reference, these data are the drawing data of the garment, not the actual size of the baby's data ~ For example, the chest circumference here already includes the amount of relief.
 

Clothes reference data and drawing method

The data in the above table is for your reference only. Individual babies of the same age group are still quite different. It is best to measure your baby according to his/her body type, or to find a baby's better-fitting clothes to sample. Understanding the characteristics of the undershirt → The length of the garment is shorter than that of a normal jacket, the bust is slightly smaller than that of a jacket, and the shoulder width is slightly narrower than that of a normal garment. 

The chest circumference and length can be measured, and the depth of the sleeve holes can be calculated according to the chest circumference of the garment, a simple formula → Sleeve Hole Depth = Chest Circumference/5 + (2~3cm)

The diagram below shows how to make the undershirt, you can make the diagram directly on the fabric, or make a paper pattern on paper first if you are not sure. The cutting diagram does not include a seam allowance, but since this undershirt uses piping for all the side seams, there is no need for an additional seam allowance. You will also find that each corner of the paper pattern is rounded, this is for the convenience of piping, the size of the arc you can control, how smooth and beautiful how to draw!

Cutting

1. Calculate the material according to the cutting chart. An undershirt requires two pieces of fabric A and B plus a piece of fluffy cotton, which can be cut into rectangles of approximately the same size before cutting, i.e., a length slightly longer than the paper pattern and a width slightly wider than twice the width of the paper pattern. Cutting, we can only take one of the fabric for cutting, first of all, the cloth cloth front inward folded into two layers → 

2. Lay the paper pattern on top of the cloth, taking care to align the front centerline of the paper pattern with the fold of the cloth, and then cut the cloth according to the paper pattern. Alternatively, you can cut directly from the cloth folded into 2 layers, again using the folded area as the front centerline.

3. Place the other piece of fabric (front side down) and the fluffy cotton on a flat surface, then unfold the cut pieces and place them on the top. First, use a hand sewing needle to sew along the inside of the cut pieces to secure the 3 layers of material in place. After that, use your sewing machine to press a few lines vertically as shown in the picture below. It is recommended to press the lines in the same direction from the bottom to the top, if you are afraid that the lines won't be straight enough, you can draw them beforehand. If you are afraid that the lines are not straight enough, you can draw them beforehand and press them!

4. Now you can cut the bottom two layers according to the top piece.

Piping

1. This undershirt requires very little sewing, but a lot of piping! First, cut a strip of piping long enough to be cut at a 45° angle, about 3.2 cm wide, and join all the strips together to form a single strip.

2. Sew the piping strip around the edge of the undershirt with a seam width of approximately 0.7 cm.

3. Turn to the other side, fold the piping strip so that the edge just covers the stitching left by the piping on the other side, and crimp along the top of the edge of the piping strip to the end of the loop → 

Lastly, attach the buttons to the undershirt. You can use snap buttons, plastic 4-in-1 buttons, or 5-claw buttons. For the back, use 3 buttons for small undershirts and 4 buttons for larger ones. Determine the position of the buttons by placing the top and bottom buttons first, and then use the equidistant method to determine the position of the middle buttons.