Chanel Relapse

Anyone remember this post from back in September, 2009, where I'd claimed to have caught Chanel and actually gotten as far as making a muslin of KwikSew 3258? Apparently it wasn't a serious case, because most of my symptoms disappeared, though I occasionally thought about it.

Back in March, I was attempting to clean up the workroom, and I found the bag with the muslin in it. I remember when I bagged it up I wasn't thinking it was turning out too well, though I did seem pleased enough when I posted in September, so not sure what happened there.

I decided to leave the muslin and cut into some black boiled wool that I'd been holding for (probably) that purpose. Somehow I've managed to lose the original pattern, but my traced and altered pattern pieces were crumpled up in the bag with the muslin, so I was okay. My main issue with the muslin's fit was that it was still too boxy; I like the look of boxy jackets, but I'm a little too close to rectangular myself to find it a flattering look. The jacket has a center back seam, obviously for shaping, although it had almost no shape, unless you consider a straight line to a shape. I added a curve to the CB seam and also added darts to the front. The center fronts were also too close to overlapping, so I took about 1/2" off the edges and also off the facing. The bust dart was also a little low-slung, so I moved it up about 3/4".
After I got the body of the jacket together, I put the jacket down again and didn't pick it up until this month, when I was up to my neck in PR Weekend planning and should have known better.

I was having trim issues. I had several trim selections in the bag, but none of them were quite it.
So I bought more trim at PR Weekend, which of course was my last choice once I actually looked at all of them. The trim I went on to use was the first trim I purchased. Why is it we don't trust our instincts?

Or do we, and we just use that excuse to buy more trim? I'm not saying a word.

I lined the jacket with a silk remnant I got at my first trip to London Textiles with Kisha sometimem last year. There wasn't enough silk to line the whole jacket, so I used some black and white striped sleeve lining for the sleeves. Mistake or design opportunity? I know what I'm calling it.

After I got the lining in, I decided that all that black and white needed a shot of color, so I added a line of bright red rat tail cord around the edge of the facing. Perked it right up. At the hem, I hand-stitched a length of black chain I got at Pacific Trims in NYC.

The trim. The trim was a pain in the butt. Actually the choice turned out to be the least painful part, but you couldn't have told me that at the time. This is a jacket with at least 6 hours of hand sewing, and probably more. I lost track sitting with it today, repeatedly sticking the eye of my needle into my fingertip because the cats had chased all my thimbles under the furniture.

First I pinned and then sewed the ivory trim. It's an organic hemp (la-di-da, but really I just bought it because I liked it; I'll stick to organic in my food). It had a nice flexibility but frayed awfully so I couldn't miter the corner at the neckline, so I folded it, beat it flat and then ironed it into submission.

Once I got that on, I used the last of my roll of Wonder Tape to stick the black braid along the entire length. I pressed it to set the sticky and then I sewed that on. I trimmed the front of the jacket and the sleeves, but not the hem. I thought it would look less boxy without a line of white around my hips. For the sleeves, I took the trim about 3" up the sleeve seam to mimic a much more complicated sleeve, then I added some black, white and gold enamel buttons I got at M&J Trims.

To the left is a closeup of my lining fabric, an 1893 almanac print. If I get bored at work, I can always read the good advice in my lining.

For the closures, I used some fur hooks that I had in the notions stash. Regular hooks and eyes looked too skimpy, so these did the trick. I want to pick up one more for the bottom, just to balance it out.

As I was taking the jacket's picture tonight, I wanted to put some fabric on Evelyn to make it look like a skirt, and I grabbed the remnant I bought at London Textiles this past Saturday - black and white nubby boucle-like fabric with a fringe.

The entire patternreview is here.

Obviously, now I have to make a skirt to go with my Chanel-ish jacket. Boiled wool. Boucle. Wooly fringe.

Just what I need for the 80 degree May weather we're expecting.

I don't care. I have an occasion coming up in October (to be discussed soon) and I'll wear it then, if I can't wear it now.

It's been a week since PR Weekend, and I'm feeling like myself. I didn't do much all weekend except futz in the garden and sew, and that's just how I wanted it.

Oh no, I've caught Chanel!

There's a bad case of Chanel jacket going around on the blogs these days.

I thought I was immune, but then I started getting occasional flashes of inspiration. When I was really tired, I'd start seeing jackets in my head. Fringed trim and interesting buttons started to catch my eye.

I started wanting to wrap myself in tweed, in boucle, in boiled wool.

In . . . home dec fabric?

It's come to this. A muslin. A real, live muslin, which will end up wearable but which has already told me what to do with the real jacket.

I'm using KwikSew 3258, which looks like everybody's idea of a dowdy old Chanel suit on the envelope, kind a Chanel suit as reinterpreted by Dress Barn or maybe Fashion Bug. Like you can tell there's as good idea under there, you just have to figure out how. to. find. it.

Being that it's a KwikSew pattern, it's ridiculously well drafted, though I can say I like the drafting of their knit patterns better than their wovens. Still, this gave me enough information on the first run-through to know what changes need to be made, and there aren't many.

In their knit patterns, I tend to cut somewhere between a small and a medium. I traced a medium in this jacket, just to be safe, and that was the best choice. I'm pretty much a medium. The only changes I'm going to make for the final are to move the bust dart up by about 3/4 of an inch - it's a little . . . low slung. The girls don't need the help, thanks very much. I'm also shaving about a half inch off the center front (and the facing). The body of the jacket fits well, excepting the lowness of the dart, but the center fronts overlap just slightly. So off they come.

The jacket has a center back seam, for shaping, but honestly, there's not much shape to their shaped seam. I reshaped the seam for the next time around.

The fabric I used for the muslin was a double-sided home dec fabric that's been in stash for about 8 years. Maybe longer. It's always wanted to be a jacket, and I always liked the idea that I could use both sides.

I haven't necessarily decided to use the reverse for the pocket flaps here; I just pinned them on to get an idea of what the flaps would look like, and self flaps are almost invisible until the trim goes on.

The trim, by the way, is just the selvage of the fabric. If I decide to keep going with this, I'll put some black braid over the selvage part and just keep the neat little fringe.

For the inside, again if I keep going, I'm going to get a wad of black seam binding and just do a Hong Kong finish on all the seams. I'm not going to the bother of lining this, and if I do an HK finish, I'll still get to see both sides of my fabric.

So this is what a bad case of Chanel feels like, huh?

Does chicken soup cure this, or do I have to sew it out of my system?

BWOF 5/07 #102 Jacket - Finished

And what a long, strange trip it's been.

I've really enjoyed recycling / refashioning, but I think it uses a different part of my brain than regular sewing does, because this project really wore me out.

First off, my apologies to Carolyn, who suggested that I use a colorful lining for this jacket. I feel it, but the jacket didn't. It wanted to continue its neutral theme, so I used an ivory lining that I had on hand. It's not exciting, but it didn't want to be. I promise, Carolyn, double bright exciting lining for the next jacket.

The last thing I had in mind when I started this project was accumulating another serious contender pattern for the Chanel jacket, but this really would work well, either with the front redrafted the way I did this time or with the original diagonal dart (so long as I was using a plainer fabric). It's got that almost sweatery feel of a good Chanel jacket.

Decisions, decisions.

Apparently despite my worries in the previous jacket post, I saved myself from 80s-ness. My roommate came down through the living room while I was taking the photos and her comment was, "Nice save. If you'd put shoulder pads in this it would have been 80s all the way." Whew, dodged that bullet! (I know, I know, they're trying to bring back the 80s, but having lived through them once, I'm not ready yet).

Next up . . . what? Kisha brought me a few new Simplicity patterns the other day, two blouses and a dress. They're calling to me, but not with any specificity yet. Staring out my office window at the white sky, gray buildings, and gray and white sidewalks isn't inspiring me with any desire other than to do something colorful next time.

Finishing Touches

Since I last checked in, I finished bagging the lining and pressed everything. Have I mentioned how much I love pressing this fabric? It presses almost to a knife-edge, which you wouldn't expect from something bulky and fluffy. And yet it retains its bulky fluffiness while somehow looking neat and tailored. I love good fabric.

I pressed and steamed and rolled the collar and it's behaving just the way I want it to.

I've sewn on the pocket buttons. I love that the small buttons are full-size facing animals, while the large buttons are just animal heads.

I've marked where I want the snaps, and I've started to cover them. Once I've finished, I'll sew on the rest of the buttons. There’s a great tutorial on Patternreview for covering snaps - good thing, because my first attempts looked like a kindergarten project. These were a little more difficult anyway, because of the size - the tip of the snap can't just poke through the fabric because it's too big, so I put a tiny drop of fabric glue on the back of the lining fabric, let it dry partway and then cut a small X in the fabric so I could slip it over the snap. The tacky glue just makes it adhere better to the metal so there'll be no fraying.

It seems like I've been working on this forever, but I think that's because I was sewing it in my head for a week solid before I ever took scissors to fabric. Actually the project has gone along pretty smoothly, considering the number of extra steps I've added to a more or less straightforward jacket pattern.


And considering that I've never actually looked at the instructions for the pattern, either. When I laid out all the pieces and started working on the muslin, everything made sense without the instructions, so I decided I would look at them later. Later on nothing ever happened that made me need them, so I'm pretty happy about that. Once I'm done the jacket I'll read through them, if only for the sake of the pattern review. Interesting how sewing lots of BWOF and Patrones has made me less reliant on instructions.

Open Jacket, Insert Lining

Wow. That's all I have to say. Every time I look at that lining, I smile. Maybe the insertion could have been better - there are a few tiny puckers along the top that don't seem to want to press out - but the combination of fabrics just makes me happy.

I still have to attach the lining to the sleeve hems and finish the bottom, but the facing part and the neck seam are done.

Before I sewed in the lining, I dealt with the pocket issue. I've been flip-flopping between patch pockets and faux pocket flaps, and I finally went for the patch pockets, mainly because I had two scraps of boucle big enough to make pockets. They are lined in the silk as well, and since I have 6 buttons and only need for the jacket front, the last 2 will go on the pockets.

I am so loving this jacket.

Full Steam Ahead

And I do mean steam. I put in the sleeves last night, and I have to say, between removing the excess ease and the magic of steam on wool, they went in beautifully. I literally had to put in about 5 ease stitches, and I think I did that mostly for the joy of steaming it into shape.

While the sleeve was resting on the pressing ham, I played with the collar. I really like the shape of this collar, and I can see that I'll have more quality time with lots of hot steam getting it to stand and roll the way I want.

I debated about the collar - there was only enough boucle for one, and I thought that doing the under collar (for which there is a separate piece - I love thoughtful patterns!) in the boucle would make it bulky anyway. So I was torn. I probably should have done it in the solid sleeve lining fabric, but the pattern-loving part of me couldn't resist using the lining silk.

Speaking of the the lining silk, I constructed the lining tonight - patterned body, boucle facing, solid sleeves. I like it. A lot. I think I finally understand how women can forget the pain of childbirth, because when I was fighting tooth and claw with that slippery silk charmeuse, I didn't think I'd ever be able to sit back and admire my lining without remembering the pain. Guess what? Looking at the result, I can barely remember how much trouble it gave me.

I suppose that's how the human race has survived this long.

Moving Right Along

I've been busy, busy, busy with the Chanel jacket. It's been hard to drag myself out of the workroom to do anything else. Isn't it fabulous when a project takes over?

Oh, the picture. That's the back of the button. Not only are they from Paris, but they even say so. How cool is that?

The interfacing is done, and the batiste is hand-stitched to the boucle. I like underlining so much more than interfacing; it really adds to the texture of the fabric, where most of the time interfacing changes the nature of the fabric completely. I still needed some interfacing for the collar and facing, but without using a fusible, I got less stiffness than I expected – which was good.

Last night I stitched the body of the jacket together. I think it works. Because the front/facing pieces are cut shorter, it looks a little odd when I put it on. But all will be well in the end, or so I hope.

I've decided not to attempt buttonholes in this fabric – bound or traditional. Bound buttonholes would be really nice, but I haven't done them before and I don't know as this is the fabric I want to experiment on. Boucle just fuzzes everywhere – ask my sewing machine. I picked up some oversized snaps (almost penny-sized) and I'm going to cover them in leftover lining fabric. Yes, the urine sample lining fabric will be prominently displayed so that all those who turned up their noses at it will be staggered by how perfect it is.

Up next: setting in the sleeves. Otherwise known as spending lots and lots of quality time with the iron and the pressing ham.

Pattern Alterations

Last week I put together of a muslin of the jacket pattern out of some mismatched home dec fabric I had in the closet. The pattern fit pretty well right out of the envelope, but isn't there always room for improvement?

My main change to the the muslin was to take in the top between the front piece and the side front piece – it seemed a little roomy up there, and I could envision it getting worse once it had a big collar sitting on it.

And even though it's easier to ease a sleeve in wool than in just about any other fabrics, I still folded about 1 ½ inches out of the sleeve cap. Honestly, I don't know why pattern manufacturers think we need that much space in a sleeve. Most RTW doesnt require that kind of easing, and RTW manufacturers have all kinds of steam gadgets and pressing hams outside my wildest dreams. If it was necessary, I'd like to think they'd do it.

The third alteration was for my own satisfaction. The front of the jacket is princess-seamed, but the back just has a center seam. That seemed off-balance to me, so I redrafted the back pattern piece so that the seams mimic the front. Not that it will really be visible in the boucle, but I'll know it's there, and it'll fit better because of it.

So other than those 3 alterations, the pattern looks good as is. I like the length – even though it is a little short and boxy, not always a good look for me, the appeal of the pattern is its vintage style, and that's the length this jacket should be.

One Minute Past Midnight

And I started my jacket. I've been itching to get at this project ever since the stars aligned and I found the perfect lining fabric in NY for the Chanel boucle I bought in Baltimore. And when I realized that my animal head buttons from Paris would work with those fabrics - well, I've had to sit on my hands not to pick up the scissors before the official start of the contest.

So last night, after watching the end of the Knit Contest on Patternreview to make sure there were no problems, and having taken myself a nap earlier in the evening (I wasn't kidding about that 12:01 start), I laid out my pattern pieces very carefully on the boucle and started cutting. And there was almost enough. Actually, there was enough - the shortage was expected because I had laid out the pattern pieces on the boucle and altered the pattern to suit what fabric I had. The center front piece doubles as the inside facing, and when I came up the tiniest bit short, I decided that I didn't need a full-width facing, I just had to make sure there was enough facing to support the buttons and buttonholes (or covered snaps, I'm still torn at this point).

I'm also limited on silk for the lining - when will I ever learn to buy enough fabric? - but there was enough to compensate for the half-facing I'd cut. I went to my local fabric store last week with a scrap of the silk to try to find fabric for the sleeve linings and came away with an acidic green that matches the yellow-green of the silk almost perfectly. One of my co-workers refers to it as "urine sample green." Isn't that lovely?

The jacket fabric, the cotton batiste underlining and the lining fabrics are all cut out. I also cut interfacing for the collar and the jacket facing. I'm using a lighter weight woven interfacing. I decided to go with a sew-in rather than a fusible because even though the boucle irons beautifully, I don't trust most fusibles to stick properly, or forever. On a project that means this much, I'll suck it up and sew it in by hand.

Since nothing photogenic has happened yet in the workroom, I leave you with a shot of hazy, hot and humid Philadelphia, as seen from my train stop this morning.