Lining the Tails

I was a good girl last week and worked on lining the tails - as tempted as I was to do the sleeves, I knew that doing the lining after the sleeves were attached would be a huge headache.

First, here's the image from the coat interior from Fashioning Fashion. It's the only real reference image I've managed to track down. I was relieved to see that the linings were pieced together and didn't match terribly well, and I think I managed to replicate that aspect quite well. ;)

So first up with the tails lining is making the pocket. This is the only functional pocket in the coat, so don't skip it. It doesn't have to be pretty, either, since it's on the inside, so don't let that intimidate you. I just did a standard welt pocket, and just made an educated guess as to the placement. Function, not form.

And here's the final inside view - it's a little awkward because I never figured out how the lining would work during the mockup phase, so I had to wing it. The first lining for the front tails was a little short and didn't go all the way up to the dart, but I thought that was awkward so I recut the lining for the front to extend up to the dart. Next time I'll raise the back tail vent a little higher so it's all at the same level. 

The side edge of the top body facing is just raw edge, joined to the inside body of the coat with a whipstitch. The melton wool doesn't really unravel, so a raw edge is fine, and the stitches are barely visible on the other side. I hope. 

The outside view is much prettier! I promise! :)

One of the things I'm really enjoying about writing this blog is how I can make notes about something, and then come back later to reference it. I'll definitely be coming back to this post next time to remind myself of what to improve!

Girly Stuff

I'm trying to keep most of this blog relating to menswear, but since most of you who read it are women, I figure you won't mind a little girly stuff. :)

Last weekend a girlfriend and I went shopping for fabric for our dresses, and we both scored! Fabric, trim, gloves, shawl, and purse (we both already have shoes). I haven't had such a productive shopping trip in a LONG time - having a second pair of eyes definitely helped. Love the LA garment district!


My loot displayed for our hubbys to admire...

Fitting the ACTUAL COAT!! :)

Hal & Betty - LA Balboa Dancers, 1939

This past week has been busy! Last weekend we drove up to San Francisco to visit my sister and do some dancing - and in some exciting news, yours truly is the 2010 North American Balboa Champion! Okay, Chris and me both, not just me. That sounds much more impressive than it really is...but then, that's usually the case with Titles. 

Enough with this mid-20th century junk, let's go further back in time.

I've gotten the tailcoat body assembled and the collar attached - looks pretty nice, if I do say so myself! I love love love sewing with this melton wool. It's smooth in the machine, presses beautifully, and is even a dream to cut. I hate cutting! I've adjusted the brightness on the pictures so that hopefully you can see the detail. The actual jacket is deep black, not splotchy. My tailoring book actually recommends using a dark fabric for your first tailoring project, so that mistakes are less likely to show. Good call!

As you can see, I went with modern construction techniques, machine sewing the inside and flipping it right side out. If I had known I was going to use that method from the beginning, I would have picked easier/less pointed collar shapes. The M collar point would be much easier to handstitch together on the outside edge - but I felt that I couldn't just do the collar and not do the rest.

I'm not thrilled with how wide the gap is between the collar point and the lapel - I think that on my mockups the points were closer together, almost touching. I think the difference might be partially because of the thickness of the fabric, and maybe something to do with the roll line/breakpoint placement? Anyway, the right and left sides are even, so that's fine. Something to worry about next time.

I used French Collar Canvas from B. Black, and boy is that stuff heavy-duty! I doubt I'll use it again, and instead opt for a medium weight hymo. But I don't have to worry about his collar drooping!

In the back, I took in a little at the shoulder seam at the armhole, because it was gapping away from the body. That's why the seams don't match at the outer edge. To compensate, I might set the sleeves in toward the center back a little further, but this was an Era of Small Backs, so that should look good.

I haven't touched the tails yet, but already the wool is draping in the back much more nicely than the muslin did. Love that wool melton!

Jacket Entrails...err...Innards

First of all, a big thank you to everyone who responded to my last entry - I'm going to take your advice and just focus on one project at a time from here on out. I don't think we'll have complete outfits in time for the ball in January, so we'll have to beg, borrow, and steal the missing pieces (or maybe just rent them ;)


Subject to change, I think I'll finish the jacket first, then do my dress, and then go back to the trousers etc. if there's time (which there won't be). That's kind of killing me, because the trousers are about halfway done, but it's really best to not risk distraction. Big Picture!


Here's my progress with tailoring the undercollar and front body. As I said before, I'm opting to machine stitch as much as possible. I'm (more or less) following the machine tailoring instructions from Tailoring: The Classic Guide to Sewing the Perfect Jacket, which has options for hand tailoring, machine tailoring, and fusible tailoring on every step. I'm having to improvise a little because the shape of my pattern is a little different from what the book demonstrates.

Undercollar - you can see my
padstitching lines, all drawn out
before I decided to machine it!

Hymo for Front Body -
With Shoulder Patch & Waist Dart

Zig-Zag joined Jacket Front
and Hymo at edges -
Taped Line is machined until
a couple inches from CF,
then the exposed section
is handfinished

We're heading out of town this weekend for a dance event, but hopefully I'll have a nice collar to show off next week. I'm working on getting the collar roll right - that whole "turn of the cloth" thing. It's so fiddly!

Sewing on a Schedule

Several years ago, I decided to stop making clothes for specific events - at that point I was pretty much only sewing 30's & 40's clothes for swing dancing, and it didn't really matter if I wore one blouse or another - if I didn't finish it this week, I could wear it next week. I found that if I didn't try to finish by a certain date, I slowed down and the quality of what I made was exponentially better.

While my sewing's gotten much better, I've also become slower than I should be - strangely, I started enjoying the creation process so much that reaching the end of a project wasn't my primary goal. This project is forcing me to pay more attention to the calendar, but I'm worried that I'll rush and become sloppy and cut corners, especially since so much of this is new for me. (yes, I have been called a perfectionist once or twice...)

This was already weighing on me, and then we just decided to put our house up for sale next week. (We've been wanting to relocate to be closer to Chris's job for a while, and we decided to stop putting it off and try to make it happen.) One more ball to juggle!

In order to keep on schedule, I've decided to eliminate as much handsewing as possible, even if the machine stitching shows (buttonholes, etc). I'm just not fast enough at it yet, and it's been one more new skill to learn that's been slowing me down. I also might not finish his complete outfit by January 22, but I want to have at least a couple pieces for Chris, and hopefully a new dress for myself.

Any tips for dealing with these large costume projects? Lists? Elves? Valium? :)

Cute kitty picture to lighten things up! :)

Bling

Formal Dress Suit - German, 1805

One of the pieces I was taken with at the LACMA exhibit was this formal dress suit with detachable buttons. Instead of being stitched on, the buttons are attached to the coat and waistcoat through eyelets - this way the same set of buttons could be used for multiple suits. So clever!

Case with 2 sizes of buttons

Detail of Eyelet Holes

Here are some men's shoe buckles from 1770-1790. Not very Beau Brummell-y, but well within the accepted timeframe for the Jane Austen Evening!

Fashioning Fashion At LACMA

Men's Timeline

Women's Timeline

Last weekend a friend and I went to see the exhibit Fashioning Fashion: European Dress in Detail, 1700-1915 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. They acquired an extensive private collection a few years ago, and this is the first time these pieces have been on display. We took a gallery tour of the exhibit, and the docent promised that more exhibits are being planned for the collection. I hope so!


Here's a few shots of the exhibit - I was surprised at how it was designed to look so temporary, with every piece in its own "packing crate", but I enjoyed that most items weren't behind glass. The lighting was low and photography was only allowed without a flash, so most of the pictures are a little wonky. But that's typical for my blog! ;)

We were surprised
to see several garments
that didn't match
plaids or stripes!

If you can't make it to the exhibit, check out the gallery catalog - it's got wonderful detail images, and even more info on the items than the exhibit had. The quality of the photography is equal to the V&A Fashion in Detail series, although the V&A books have more photos and Fashioning Fashion has more commentary. Plus the catalog has an inside view photo of an 1825 tailcoat - the construction is slightly different from mine, because it has a waist seam, but I'm thrilled to have a reference image finally!

This waistcoat is
long-sleeved - see it poking
out under the jacket cuff?

I snagged a 1/2 price museum membership on Groupon a couple weeks ago, so I'm planning to go back a couple more times before the exhibit closes in March. Who's in for a trip? :)