altering vest patterns

My DH has been looking longingly at photographer’s vests ever since we met.  I finally decided to take the plunge and make him one for his birthday.  Since his birthday was yesterday - it’s finally safe to post about it

I started off with McCalls pattern #5538

Which is a pretty cool looking vest, but it didn’t have all the extra cargo pockets he wanted.

I’ve made enough cargo pants over the years that I decided I didn’t need a pattern just for pockets.  I made the basic vest and then measured where I thought the pockets should go.

I hauled out my trusty quilting ruler and cut rectangles (making them approximately twice as long as I wanted the finished pocket to be - cargo pleats take a lot of fabric)  There was one little problem though.

I ran out of fabric.

Oops!

I ended up having enough fabric to make two large hip pockets and two smaller chest pockets (complete with flaps).  Oh well, serves me right for trying to use fabric out of my stash

Here’s the finished vest:

I think he liked it