DP Studio le 205: Asymmetric zip front jacket

 This has been on my queue for a bit, and I have promised friends I would make my own merino jacket to wear hiking, which prompted me to get on with it.  I actually have loads of hoodies and lightweight jackets and interestingly....none that I've made myself.  I have made nice ones but somehow they have always gotten wings and gone to new owners.  I'm suddenly thinking, as I write this, of a nice scuba hoodie I made, and loved and was proud of... and wondering who it went to.

Anyway so I committed an entire day to this.  Would have cut it out the day before but I didn't manage.  It takes full concentration.  I cut a size 38 as I'm not a perfect match to the size chart and I thought 34 1/2" was a better bet for a jacket than 32".  I didn't look at any measurement below the bust.  

The fabric is lightweight scuba, I bought it awhile ago and made a top out of it then found it beautiful but totally useless.  I love the fabric and hoarded the last piece for this project.  It was quite a leap of faith to use this fabric rather than the merino I have for a second version - especially since I have 3 meters of the merino and it was really really cheap.  

The instructions are nicely illustrated but they are not particularly well translated.  With knowledge of what you are aiming for in general everything ends up where it should be, but in terms of properly finishing seams it was hopeless from quite early on.  This is something I had foreseen and that's part of why I used scuba, but it's always that wee bit sad to have catastrophic pocket/zip/jacket intersections.  

The jacket got put together in the day I had allocated, but sewing down the facings was another story.  Really this needs to be heavily understitched on the facing, collar and hem.  My scuba does not iron.  I mean, ironing doesn't do anything to it at all, so I had kind of puffy parts, like the hem just puffing out.  Understitching would have helped.  I've taken a lot of notes for the upcoming merino version.  After about 2 weeks of sulking about I finally took a very deep breath and stitched in the ditch to get all the facings down.  I strategically tacked the pockets to hold them in.  The facings kind of overlay the pockets, but a few tacks here and there are helpful.  

 

Result was good.  I topstitched the bottom of the hem to get rid of that puffiness but decided not to meddle anywhere else (it kind of lettuced but I hope it settles with time, and it's better than the previous puffiness.)  I adore this jacket.  Everything comes together pristinely on the outside!  The fit is good and I'm glad I didn't size down.  Of course, a wee bit shorter would have suited me but this type of jacket can be a bit longer without looking oversized on me. 

 

 I think I prefer the pocket side with the open pocket, it's perfectly angled for hands and objects, and it's easier to get a good finish on it.  Zip pockets in stretchy fabrics are always a crapshoot and this one does need to be held at the top as you open it so the fabric doesn't pull, but it's a nice secure pocket - both of them are huge and fully fit hands!  This is a functional jacket!  Don't be led astray thinking it's a wimpy fashion piece...

I would add to the instructions the following clarifications: 

-on the open pocket, understitch after attaching pocket to the body 

-really understitch everything - the facing against the zip, the neck at the top and the hem.  

-For a clean finish fold the hem in by the seam allowance before sewing it to the side facings.  Also, baste a line along the front facing and the inside neck piece to know where to fold it in afterwards.   Stitch in the ditch in one go from front up the neck and back to where the pockets get in the way.

-re the pockets: finish every single edge before you start.  So, overlock the pockets all the way around.  Overlock pocket openings first.  Then sew together.  You will not get a second chance!  

The good news is that the mucky bits of my pockets are on the invisible side and actually it looks reasonably neat now.   The only zip that fit is a precious Riri zip which I think I bought in Switzerland so once I'd committed to that this project had no choice but to be awesome.  I'm now quite keen on making the second one and seeing whether I can get perfect innards too! 

DP Studio: le 001 Hoodie review

 In the middle of winter I decided to make this hoody.

I went with the smallest size, 36.  I actually planned really hard on this, to get a mix of fabrics that I envisioned in my head.  However that turned it into a challenging project because the different weights of the media caused some drama.  And in fact, I started to move house, and this went into a corner for six months.  Here we are midsummer and it's done!!

The fabrics are from The Fabric Store.  They are a heavyweight liberty sweatshirting, some lightweight black rayon knit and some black sweatshirt knit which is so cuddly.  In retrospect?  I should have done the whole thing in the cozy sweatshirt stuff.  Lesson learned.  I actually Really Do Not Like the Liberty.  It has a weird cardboardy feel, doesn't stretch much, and the design actually bothers me.  Obviously things can seem great in the shop and just not so great at home, c'est la vie.  

There are various tricks with this - in the beginning the pieces aren't obvious because of their strange shape.  You have to pay attention to which side of the sleeve is what, but once a few pieces are together it isn't too complicated.  I had trouble at the three way intersection of the body, the sort of hidden pocket, which is under the body, and the side piece.  That's partly because the weight of my fabrics was so different.  There were little holes I had to go and overlock shut after the fact.  I recommend using a stable sweatshirting fabric for this to make it easy to sew.  I also double layered the hood because I was using a really lightweight fabric.  I used self fabric bindings and they were insanely floppy.  I think I understand now that the instructions provide you a really long binding piece for you to put elastic into.  I bought some actual rib, and I think my piece was 2/3 of the length of the pattern piece to get enough actual pull in of the sweatshirt.  

 

The instructions are good enough, but they are not excessive.  It's not a difficult project overall but I do recommend working through it slowly due to the unique construction.  I don't recommend very loose or floppy fabrics since it's already a very loose and floppy thing.  

In the end I'm happy it's done, and I actually really like the concept.  I think to make this work I would need to use a single colour and keep it simple.  I will probably source some cuddly, easy to work with sweatshirting to do it for next winter.

DP Studio 504 sweatshirt

Ever since Sophie of @adaspragg changed our world on Instagram with a post about DP Studio, people have been pinning and tagging and generally lusting over these patterns.  French pattern companies have something that we all want these days.  These patterns are available directly from the studio and they have instructions in English.  I had some issues with my order and was in contact by email with the studio, who were friendly and helpful the whole way through.  I know that Stitch56 in Australia also has them in stock, but not sure of other stockists yet. 

Upon moving to New Zealand, as always, my luggage was a mess and most of my stuff was left behind.  Although this is tragic, it does give me a free canvas of things to sew because I actually need stuff!  That plus my new sewing machine plus overall overwhelm led me to choose this sweatshirt as my first sew.  To simplify the crazy options I picked a doublefaced merino blend from The Fabric Store.  I used the lighter pink face as the exterior and the bright side as all the details.

You can go really crazy with details for this - the sleeve stripes on the pattern are one contrast fabric, with a second contrast fabric/ribbon sewn over the top.  

Although I knew it would be roomy I went with the size 38 as my first pattern by this company.  The pattern pieces were all clear and I just cut it out.  Using the same fabric for the bindings meant I had to pull really hard to get the front waistpiece in, and that adds to the gathered look of the front.  This was overall a pretty easy sew.  However I got to the neck and had some thoughts - I decided first to skip the neck zip.  The neck is actually a tight high neck and so without the zip, I had to make it bigger.  I went through a few tries to get a size I liked and it did end up wonky because of all the cutting by eye.  If you use the neck as designed you really must have the zip in, no matter how stretchy your fabric.  Also I found the band would have been too short for the neck as designed, but again my merino doesn't have as much stretch as some knits.

Other changes & notes:

-The sleeves were ridiculously long.  I cut off 2" or more from each arm.
-There is a little facing for the corner where the bottom tie comes out.  I found it hard to understand exactly where and how I was supposed to sew this so I sewed it on the front edge which is genius, as it creates a clean hem for the drawstring but I left the top free since it didn't seem to matter.  It's not beautiful on the inside but my fabric doesn't unravel.

The front is actually pretty short.  It hits just below my belly button and I'm very short waisted.  The back is of course very long, it covers my butt, but once the drawstring is in I pulled it quite tight so it curls inward. 

I used a silk cord from The Fabric Store as my drawstring.  This stuff is beautiful, it's really strong and has an amazing sheen.  I'll be using more of it!  I went with grey to balance all the pinks as the pink would have been too much.  Also I only had one of those little clip things for the end of the drawstring so I stuck it on and tied a knot on the other side, but I will eventually get more clips, maybe even silver ones to match better.

I've been wearing my sweatshirt all the time since I made it.  I think if I made it again I would change the hem to go straight around the back rather than dropping down over my butt, and I would be more careful with how I changed the neck.  I doubt I'll ever do the high neck as designed.  It would be tempting to take some fabric out from under the arms for a more fitted look...but for now I'm really happy.