Chanel Jacket Sew-A-Long

A few weeks ago, I joined the Chanel Jacket Sew-A-Long. It seemed like a great way to get back into sewing and create a more labour intensive project while getting to know some of the online, fashion sewing, community. A lot of the women are making the iconic Chanel jacket in this Vogue pattern. It involves handwork reminiscent of the quilt as you go method. Too funny when I'm leaving all that behind right now.




I prefer clothing that is softer and less structured than a typical jacket. I'm more of a sweater person. I wanted to be inspired by Coco's attitude toward life and fashion rather than directly copy one of her pieces. When I saw this New Look 6632 jacket pattern last Friday, it seemed Chanel-ish with a twist. In a later post, when I'm finished, I'll tell you which parts of my jacket are inspired by Chanel and which parts are a traditional Chanel technique.

When I taught Creative Wearables online, it was difficult to convince students about the importance of sewing a muslin to test their pattern. They just wanted to sew. BUT... the muslin is a step that can save a LOT of frustration and expense. With it, you find out if the pattern even suits you, if there are any glitches in the instructions, sizing, or piece information, and what adjustments are necessary for your body all before cutting up your "real" fabric and spending hours and hours sewing. It has DEFINITELY saved many of my projects. Sewing a muslin has become just one of the steps in a project for me. The muslin for this jacket went quite easily. I made some standard (to me) adjustments ahead of time and then focused on more specific items like...




... do I want to make the long or short version - short. Do I want to leave the princess seam where it is or move it closer to center front - move it. Is there enough or too much ease - some of both. I usually flatten seams down the front and sides and add slightly more through the back. You can see that these were true on this jacket as well and that there needs to be more fitting through the back waist. That's also typical because I have a high hip that tents the fabric. The back is where I do a lot of fitting work. The front...

... fit quite well right away. I moved the princess seam a half inch toward center front which makes me slimmer and more shapely. LOVE the neckline. I added three inches to the length and narrowed the sleeve circumference to be more flattering. A wide sleeve hem ending at hip level adds inches. For me, a triangle, that's not a good idea. For an inverted triangle, it's perfect.

The fabric is from my stash. YES YES! When I told Howard and the boys that they looked at me like I was crazy and I had to explain. When I told my daughter, she got it and said cool. I haven't done much in the way of fashion sewing for the past twenty years even though I've steadily acquired fabric and patterns and have weeded through them at least twice a year. At some point, you either need to sew it or stop buying it. Since I kept right on buying, it's wonderful that I'm finally sewing.




I created the jacket fabric by layering a stable knit with satin. They are spray basted wrong sides together, marked with a one inch grid, and then stitched with a medium grey zigzag. Each section was cut about 2" bigger than the pattern piece and took about a half hour to stitch. After that, they were washed to remove the chalk.

When I started pinning the pattern to the fabric, I realized I'd created a plaid and would need to match the lines. Duh! My lack of current sewing experience showed up at this point. I forgot a few things but for the most part, it'll be okay. Here's a detail of the finished fabric. The lines at center front matched up perfectly.




The dress form - Millicent - is working out fabulously. Being able to stand back and look at the garment from all directions makes a HUGE difference. Now I'm wishing I had bought one years ago but I wouldn't have known what to do with it so now is great. I'm being careful not to over-fit the jacket but... see how the side seams are winging out? That's the flattening I was talking about earlier.




And see how there is a lot of excess fabric through the back? That's where it needs more shaping.




First, I pinned the back in tighter and basted that seam. When I tried it on, the shape followed mine much better only now it felt too tight under the arm so I off-set the side seam making the back slightly bigger. The picture below shows the offset all the way down but in the end, it was only from the underarm to the waist. From the waist to the hem, I straightened the seam taking it another 1/2" to get rid of that winging out and then basted it together. I finished one side last night and...




... will match it this morning and then try it on again. If all is well, I can sew the seams with a smaller stitch and then set the sleeves in remembering to offset the sleeve underarm seam by the same amount as the side seam. I plan to use Hong Kong seam finishes but I'm not sure how I'm going to finish the outside edges yet. I'll figure that out later.

Yesterday, I had the most interesting conversation with the drummer at church. He had been practicing several nights a week for over twenty years, had played in numerous bands, and lots of "gigs" every weekend only he'd never really made any money at it so he also worked days. He said that some nights he'd be lucky to bring home twenty bucks when the dust settled. He quit. Now he's spending his nights making music for himself. He said we're never going to make it, we're never going to be the next U2, so why are we spending our nights in endless practice and giving up our weekends for not nearly enough cash?

The whole conversation sounded a lot reminiscent of my why am I spending my time, money and energy creating pieces to pay to ship to galleries where they most likely won't sell so I can pay to ship them home while I'm buying fabric and patterns to sew that I don't sew so I buy clothes because I'm spending my time and energy on creating pieces to ship to galleries - that whole vicious cycle. We totally understood each other.

Remember back when I said that 350 meters of fashion fabric and a huge collection of patterns must indicate a yearning of some kind? SO TRUE. This past week and weekend, I have been happier working in my studio than I've been in forever and ever amen. The pressure is gone and it has - rather quickly - become a place of personal creativity again. I am SO GLAD.

Talk soon - Myrna

Grateful - a great sewing weekend