I know, all I do is complain about what's wrong with patterns and then I go and make four of them. (here, here and here.)
Wellll you'd think by now I would have perfected this one.
This concept came to me fully polished while I strolled through Upper Mustang in Nepal. Yep, it was hot and I was sweaty and hiking up hills of dirt, and I was thinking about making a vest out of animal skins. I never said I was logical. I did however drive straight to The Fabric Store from the airport to pick out my skins, and the vest was put together the following day. However they were one skin short so I had to hold my impatience together while waiting to put on the hood.
I had some trouble figuring out the size. My last post was oddly vague and all my pieces appeared to be size 36. I thought I had sized down. I decided that on a shearling vest, oversized was totally ok. I went with about 1 inch longer than the pattern piece length, but no waist binding.
For the stretchy side panels I used two layers of merino which I sewed together along the top and bottom to enclose them. Then I just sewed them to the front and back as normal since those seams won't unravel. (Note: I topstitched them down *to the merino side* not to the shearling side, a fact I just recently thought may have caused later problems...)
I then relocated to Greymouth but luckily my new office manager had a sewing machine so there was no problem! I managed to just barely tease the hood pieces out of that finicky little Singer.
I didn't have leather needles, and my usual sharp needles were not very good - I did most of this using the needles that come with sewing machines that are always in the little hidden storage area. It was heavier duty and generally didn't skip stitches. The borrowed Singer was not as good as my Pfaff, and I was really nervous about putting on the pockets. They aren't perfect, but they are definitely fine and are so so cozy! I just used a piece of paper to measure about how I wanted them, and then traced two.
This project stalled after that because I was moving and didn't manage to keep all my little bits in one place, but also because I noticed something right away - little rips occurring forwards and back of the merino stretch panels. I could see that is a spot which has increased wear from pulling it on and off, and the leather can't give the same way the merino can. I had no idea what to do to fix this. I thought anything I put on it to bind it will be hard to get on and might make things worse. I don't have access to an industrial sewing machine that might be able to manage lots of layers. I asked a lot of friends, and my mother, and didn't get any useful ideas.
Luckily despite my impasse, I planned the rest of the steps for this vest! I bought the bone buttons in Kathmandu specifically for this project, and then got thick waxed leather thread to apply them.
I planned to use strips of the original shearling for the button holders, and I saved the edges of the skins where there was no furry back. I strengthened them by stitching down the middle of each piece. All the bits were together, waiting for success. I even realised I could use grommets in the front for the buttons to strengthen them.
Friends told me that if I used grommets around the armhole it would redistribute stress. I was finally reunited with this project, all those bits, and my grommet kit, however when I was making shoes recently the grommets were a huge catastrophe and all came out bent, so I worried I wasn't on the road to grommety success.
Fast forward to Isolation 2020! Haha in between binging on whatever project enters my head in a wheeling free for all of sewing, I decided it was my duty to do my old, scary UFOs. (Also two bras sitting on my desk collecting dust ughhhhh). I got out the grommet kit and -ahem- read the instructions. And realised I was using the wrong bits to put grommets in.
I tried to sort through these pictures but I couldn't choose which strange expressions were less strange than the rest so I kept them all. Go figure I decided I needed an exotic photo shoot right when gale force winds started blowing!
So that's it, in one morning I: installed grommets all over the place.
Put in the buttons.
Sewed down my button holders, just as I had imagined MANY TIMES in the past two years, thank god I'd already marked placement and everything!
I glued the little rips with shoe glue
And for extra support I did a few sets of stitching down the seamlines of each of those suspicious seams. I'm hoping between the grommets, the glue, and the stitching I will have redistributed stress enough that it won't rip any more, but I'm also more prepared to glue the entire armholes, or even add little strips of leather for support if I have to.
And then I was so excited I went and took those pictures.
This project really stretched my sense of what I could do. I started out with inspiration and my inspiration was totally, perfectly fulfilled. Did I mention that I even reshaped the front of the hood to cup my head without a hood drawstring? So many perfect plans went into this, but it actually took me all of those two years to get the skills, equipment (shoe glue, miracle worker!!) and sheer determination to deal with the unexpected issues that cropped up. Sometimes things do need to sit in time out for awhile.
Wellll you'd think by now I would have perfected this one.
This concept came to me fully polished while I strolled through Upper Mustang in Nepal. Yep, it was hot and I was sweaty and hiking up hills of dirt, and I was thinking about making a vest out of animal skins. I never said I was logical. I did however drive straight to The Fabric Store from the airport to pick out my skins, and the vest was put together the following day. However they were one skin short so I had to hold my impatience together while waiting to put on the hood.
I had some trouble figuring out the size. My last post was oddly vague and all my pieces appeared to be size 36. I thought I had sized down. I decided that on a shearling vest, oversized was totally ok. I went with about 1 inch longer than the pattern piece length, but no waist binding.
For the stretchy side panels I used two layers of merino which I sewed together along the top and bottom to enclose them. Then I just sewed them to the front and back as normal since those seams won't unravel. (Note: I topstitched them down *to the merino side* not to the shearling side, a fact I just recently thought may have caused later problems...)
I then relocated to Greymouth but luckily my new office manager had a sewing machine so there was no problem! I managed to just barely tease the hood pieces out of that finicky little Singer.
I didn't have leather needles, and my usual sharp needles were not very good - I did most of this using the needles that come with sewing machines that are always in the little hidden storage area. It was heavier duty and generally didn't skip stitches. The borrowed Singer was not as good as my Pfaff, and I was really nervous about putting on the pockets. They aren't perfect, but they are definitely fine and are so so cozy! I just used a piece of paper to measure about how I wanted them, and then traced two.
This project stalled after that because I was moving and didn't manage to keep all my little bits in one place, but also because I noticed something right away - little rips occurring forwards and back of the merino stretch panels. I could see that is a spot which has increased wear from pulling it on and off, and the leather can't give the same way the merino can. I had no idea what to do to fix this. I thought anything I put on it to bind it will be hard to get on and might make things worse. I don't have access to an industrial sewing machine that might be able to manage lots of layers. I asked a lot of friends, and my mother, and didn't get any useful ideas.
Luckily despite my impasse, I planned the rest of the steps for this vest! I bought the bone buttons in Kathmandu specifically for this project, and then got thick waxed leather thread to apply them.
I planned to use strips of the original shearling for the button holders, and I saved the edges of the skins where there was no furry back. I strengthened them by stitching down the middle of each piece. All the bits were together, waiting for success. I even realised I could use grommets in the front for the buttons to strengthen them.
Friends told me that if I used grommets around the armhole it would redistribute stress. I was finally reunited with this project, all those bits, and my grommet kit, however when I was making shoes recently the grommets were a huge catastrophe and all came out bent, so I worried I wasn't on the road to grommety success.
Fast forward to Isolation 2020! Haha in between binging on whatever project enters my head in a wheeling free for all of sewing, I decided it was my duty to do my old, scary UFOs. (Also two bras sitting on my desk collecting dust ughhhhh). I got out the grommet kit and -ahem- read the instructions. And realised I was using the wrong bits to put grommets in.
I tried to sort through these pictures but I couldn't choose which strange expressions were less strange than the rest so I kept them all. Go figure I decided I needed an exotic photo shoot right when gale force winds started blowing!
So that's it, in one morning I: installed grommets all over the place.
Put in the buttons.
Sewed down my button holders, just as I had imagined MANY TIMES in the past two years, thank god I'd already marked placement and everything!
I glued the little rips with shoe glue
And for extra support I did a few sets of stitching down the seamlines of each of those suspicious seams. I'm hoping between the grommets, the glue, and the stitching I will have redistributed stress enough that it won't rip any more, but I'm also more prepared to glue the entire armholes, or even add little strips of leather for support if I have to.
And then I was so excited I went and took those pictures.
This project really stretched my sense of what I could do. I started out with inspiration and my inspiration was totally, perfectly fulfilled. Did I mention that I even reshaped the front of the hood to cup my head without a hood drawstring? So many perfect plans went into this, but it actually took me all of those two years to get the skills, equipment (shoe glue, miracle worker!!) and sheer determination to deal with the unexpected issues that cropped up. Sometimes things do need to sit in time out for awhile.
