The last two weeks of my life were incredible: non-stop sewing with occasional breaks for lunches/dinners, fabric shopping and tourist visits. Not bad, eh? Because after one week in Baltimore and a couple of days in New York, I spent an entire week in Montreal! But most importantly, the purpose of my trip to Baltimore was fulfilled!

The real color is clearer to see in the picture below. This one was shot with artificial light.

I am probably not the only one who associates Chanel jackets with rich old ladies and finds them rather on the ugly side. But in signing up to Susan's class last year, I wanted to prove myself wrong and create something different and young, yet learning new techniques and hanging out with a gang of women crazy about sewing. It was a success, at least, on the last two fronts! During the week in Baltimore we talked mainly about seam allowances, fraying, grainline and pins with nobody saying that it was boring! A full week of ooh'ing and aah'ing and admiring each other's fabrics and sewing tools!

For those of you who are scared even to think about working on a similar project, good news - the classic French jacket was not that difficult after all. Once the muslin is fitted, gear yourself up for hours of straight machine stitches and hand sewing. Don't expect to find any underlining or super-difficult techniques: everything from the beginning to the end is straightforward and logical.


The only annoying bit (for me) was sewing in the lining under the armscye area! The stressful part was closing the seam without turning the sleeve wrong side out and thus distorting the amount of fabric under the arm.
When I first showed my fabric to the class, many of the students said their eyes ached from the amount of yellow. Judith, who I met during the class last year and who I visited in Montreal after the seminar, wears mainly black. But even she, by the end of the class accepted that "Colors rule!" and bought herself two colorful cuts of fabric!


In my previous post, one of the readers made a comment about the generous seam allowances on the cutting layout and I feel like giving this topic a bit of explanation. The fabrics which we worked with for the creation of the classic French jacket, tweed and bouclé, fray like crazy and so if you cut the seam allowances very short... I'd rather not think about the consequences! Also, wide seam allowances act as emergency spare parts. Quite often during fitting, we adjust parts of the garment so that a spare piece of fabric becomes vital in the construction process.

Luckily for me, most of my fitting alterations required me to remove some fabric rather than the opposite. But here's an example where the wide seam allowance saved the project!


This happened the next day after the muslin was fitted - my shoulders somehow increased in volume and Susan added approximately 2cm to the shoulder seam. If not for the seam allowance, I would have been doomed!

But it was not the case with the lining! This little patch of weird shape would not be there had I cut the seam allowance slightly bigger. Good for me that this was only the inside of the jacket! I would not be thrilled to re-cut the whole section, re-quilt and re-stitch it together if I lacked 2cm on the outer fabric. From now on, my sewing commandment: More (seam allowance) is Less (headache and work and stupid patches).


I'll continue the story of our seminar over the weekend!