Happy 2016! One of many New Year's resolutions that I made this year was to start blogging regularly, so here goes!
I am a bit of a Marilla Walker fan-girl at this point and here is a yummy coatigan I made using her Freemantle Coat pattern. This is my second time making the pattern and so far I have not used it to make a wintery coat. I think the shape is wonderful and lends itself to all sorts of interpretations. For this incarnation, I used a thick wool-blend sweater knit in a very muted mauvey pink that I got in Portland while there visiting my sister last Spring. For fabric shopping, it's good to have a sister who lives in Portland!
I skipped the underarm gussets this time due to fabric limitation and luckily got away with it since the fit is so oversized and the fabric has a bit of stretch. It's shortened by a few inches as well, also so I could squeeze the sweater out of my yardage. You can see I love the pockets, they are wonderful with the shorter sleeves. I also got a fancy bracelet from a good friend for my birthday and the sleeve length is perfect for showing that off too.
I mixed it up a bit construction-wise. I just plain serged the seams, and without the gusset, main construction could not have been easier. For the facings I went with some handdyed silk scraps, of which I always have many, and this neat-o silk bias tape also purchased in Portland at their legendary Pendleton store. My visit just happened to coincide with one of their twice yearly sales! Anyway, I got a whole roll of this bias tape. I think it's a necktie material, marked as silk, and it just makes such a nice contrast to most of the girly, watercolory stuff I sew. So once the silk got involved, everything got a bit more tricky and time consuming, but in a very satisfying way. I hand-stitched the facings and pocket linings down, which was super simple to do invisibly since the sweater knit is so thick. If I were to do it over, I would interface the back side of the welt opening. The welt pockets in this combination of fabrics was pretty tricky and not my finest, but they are in and I did some hand-stitched bar tacks to reinforce where things got wonky.
I love how it looks from the back, so swingy! I've worn this a ton. It's super warm and snuggly but looks a bit posh too. I know Marilla considered removing this pattern from her catalog since it can be a bit involved with all the lovely finishing ideas she included. I'm so glad she reconsidered since it can really be made as simply or as complicated(ly) as desired. And someday, I do want to try the "real" version with all the fancy underlining and binding!
Well, that wasn't so bad. I hope we'll be seeing a bit more of each other this year :)