Deer and Doe Lupin Jacket

This jacket was inspired by a woman who used to work in our building (our shop is in an old schoolhouse, converted to offices and shops, if you did not know). She would wear the classiest trench coat, taupe with black piping, and I loved it. So this is my homage to her and her cool jacket.

This is the Deer & Doe Lupin Jacket. It's a little blousey, cropped to the waist, and princess seamed for a shapely fit. The main fabric is this putty-colored moleskin. At first I was unsure of how I would like such a light color, but I've fallen pretty hard for it.

I made my own piping, which was nice because I could make it the same width as the seam allowances. I used most of the 5 yards that I made. You, too, can make your own black piping with this poplin and this piping cord. Adding the piping was tricky in some places, like the tight corners of the lapels and around the epaulets, but nowhere near as tricky as gathering the fabric! My first try I had a lot of unsightly tucks rather than soft gathers.

I did get a hot tip from a sewist friend though : gather at a smaller stitch length for bulkier fabric (I used 4mm rather than my standard 5 mm). Also I did two rows of gathering stitches, both inside and outside of the stitching line, and stopped and started at each seamline. It looks so much better.

It's fully lined, with Liberty of London, of course! I used Tree of Eden B.

You may notice my sleeve vents... Those are not included in the pattern, but I like to be able to roll up my sleeves. I left the sleeves, main fabric and lining, unstitched 3.5" from the bottom, then sewed them together. One edge of each cuff is extended for the buttonhole.

There it is!

Like my dress? You can read about it here, if you would like. It's the Colette Moneta.

Over the weekend we went to a wedding, providing me with an opportunity to test drive the jacket. Not that I wore it much 'cause I was on fire on the dance floor.

But real quick the week before said wedding I decided I wanted to make a new dress.

I had been hoping to wear the floral Victory Simone dress that I made at the beginning of the summer, but I let the shop mannequin borrow it to wear on the patio every day, and the fabric faded. So I remade it in a polyester crepe de chine.

Normally I would be like "polyester = gross and hot", but this material is so smooth and floaty, and hangs and moves so luxuriously, and it's easy to sew with, and it made the perfect dress to dance in. For the yoke I used Liberty of London Poppyseed Dreams because I can't have just a plain black dress.

This dress looks so good in pictures, but sadly I was not very happy with it in real life. I couldn't figure out how I should finish the neckline -- it uses bias tape, but I didn't want to make it with the Liberty, and there was no way I could get clean folds with polyester, and we didn't have any shiny enough blacks. So I thought it would look really nice if I used fold-over elastic, but that ended up just stretching the neckline out, and caused one end to curl in and the other to fold out. That's why I had to close the neckline with a button, which is okay I guess.

Of course I had to make a new bra to go under it, too! I was just going to paperclip to pull the bra straps together on a regular bra, but I went the extra mile and just made a bra. I converted the Cloth Habit Watson Bra to a racerback. The back is the same pattern piece as the front (so there are no closures), but I extended the height of the bridge. I love this because my straps fall down on almost all my bras. I'll have to make more!

If you made it this far, here's a brag shot of the Lupin Jacket. I just felt so much went right with this jacket! I mean, look at those pockets!