finished my jacket after 18 months
Published: Friday, September 7th 2007
I am on a little roll at the moment, finishing a few odds and ends I have had on the go for ages, and I mean ages.
One of these loose ends, was an odd jacket I cut for myself a couple of years ago.
It is always hard to make something for yourself, as of course, clients work always get priority, so no matter how desperate I may be for a new suit, it is not always possible to squeeze one in.
I have over the past 18 months been picking this jacket up and doing a little bit on it, and then putting it back under my board until I had some more free time to work on it.
The cloth is a belter, read it and weep, a 22oz all wool beauty from my Yorkshire cloth friends!
The first picture shows my finished jacket, I wore it for the first time yesterday to a clients second fitting. Sorry for the distortion, I have tried several pictures, and my camera is not having it!
The next pictures show the inside lining and the colour I chose, my Desmond Merrion Bespoke label and the in breast pocket and finally the nice real horn buttons on the jacket front.
The next picture shows a portion of the under collar section. You can see the hand stitching I have done felling the seam around the neck of the melton under collar.
The very top edge of the collar which is called the leaf edge has also been hand stitched by me.
In the picture below you can see the gorge dart I have cut out and sewn up ( this seam is where the checks don't match up ).
The gorge dart helps to give shape to the chest of the jacket and also has the effect of keeping the lapels nice and flat to the chest without bulging.
You can also see the back of the hand worked lapel ( hand sewn ) hole.
The next picture shows one of the outside flap pockets. These are cut on the straight with this jacket, you can of course have them cut any way you want, straight or slanted.
I have cut a one-piece forepart on this jacket ( which I have explained about on previous blog entries ) this ensures the pocket flap matches both ways cauing no interruptions to the pattern of the cloth.
The seam to the right of the flap is the front dart which is taken out to give the jacket some shape and the seam on the left is the under arm dart.
The differences between a one-piece, versus a two-piece forepart has been covered by me before on past entries, so I shall not go over it again here.
The next picture shows one of the hand button holes I have worked ( hand stitched ) on the front of the jacket.
Making hand button holes is not easy and to get even any kind of reasonable hole takes a LOT of practice.
The next picture shows some of the crown on the top sleeve, and part of the shoulder of the jacket.
The shoulder has nothing in it and is known as a neopolitan shoulder because of it having no wadding at all, I really do prefer my shoulders made this way.
When made this way the shoulders are totally 100% natural. The shoulder line of the jacket must conform to your own shoulder line and when they are made this way they are soft, very, very soft.
The jacket has a very loosely stitched canvas, with maybe only 30 padding stitches on the dommette portion of the chest this is to keep the whole feel of the finished jacket as soft as possible.
The actual pad stitching ( the hand stitching inside the jacket lapel ) of the lapels however has been done tight with plenty of stitches to give a good strong lapel roll.
The last picture shows another shot of the jacket shoulder with the jacket on a suit hanger.
You can comment on this entry, or read what others have written (4 comments).