Monday, August 24, 2009

Fabric Decision Made & Questions


I finally chose this fabric from the 5 or 6 possibilities in my stash. I purchased this from Peggy Sagers of Silhouette Patterns at the Puyallup sewing show several years ago. Peggy & I discussed how this would be beautiful made up in Chanel-style jacket. It is a kinda loose woven wool with variegated yarn running both directions to create boxes approximately 4" square. The yarn running from selvage to selvage (Is that the warp?) is a smooth yarn with blue, purple, green, yellow colors. The yarn running the length of the fabric adds the pink with a thick/thin yarn. After reading the post from Claire Schaeffer about trims, I am playing around with pulling out these colored yarns and braiding or twisting them to create my trim. I have almost 4 yards of fabric so I should have plenty of fabric for the jacket with extra from which to make the trim.


Questions-In nearly everything I have read it seems that Chanel did not use interfacing in her jackets. In the Vogue pattern I'm using, #8259, Claire Schaeffer interfaces every piece. I am interested in what interfacing others are using in order to keep the jacket light. I'm almost settled on black silk charmeuse for the lining; white would get too dirty and I haven't found anything with a pattern that I like.


Have I missed a source for the chain? Also, I'm having a tough time with the buttons. If you have any additional sources I'd love to hear about them.


I am off work today so I plan to trace my pattern and cut out the muslin. I'm so excited!

5 comments:

  1. General Bead in San Diego has a web site with a page featuring chain that may be suitable for jackets. I used to shop the physical store and what they had was the right size and heft. It might be worth looking into. http://genbead.com/

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  2. I'm planning to buy my chain at Pacific Trimming in NYC. Here's their website- I've heard of people calling in orders to be mailed to them, and the people there are extremely knowledgeable.

    On the website they have an entire page full of chains:
    http://pacifictrimming.com/ProductList.php?value=Chains&cvalue=All

    NAYY, just a very happy customer for several years.

    Funny story, when I stopped in the first time after starting my new job, the saleslady yelled at me for not having been in to visit recently. Man, you know you go somewhere too much when the help notices that you haven't been in for 2 or 3 weeks. ;)

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  3. The Chanel-style jacket does not use interfacing or facings. It is the quilting that gives the jacket it's structure and softness. Instead of a facing the lining is brought to the front edge of the jacket and the large seam allowance of the jacket is turned under the lining. Your jacket pattern has the style of a Chanel jacket but she is just using different construction techniques.

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  4. I don't know why there's interfacing in Claire Shaeffer's pattern. I'm not going to interface but was thinking of underlining all of my pieces with a stable cotton to prevent stretching or bagging. I'm curious what others will do.

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  5. I'm using the same Schaeffer pattern and I was confused about the interfacing part also.
    I am considering using linen as the interfacing. I read in one of my couture technique books that linen was sometimes used since it is light and strong.

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