Winter Coat

I wanted to try making a cloak or coat for next winter. I knew it would be an ambitious project, but also slightly more affordable than buying a new coat. I looked at Pyon Pyon and Killstar to get some inspiration. I was mostly inspired by Pyon Pyon's Doll coat: it looks very comfy and luxurious. 

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I had made a cloak previously, but unfortunatley I messed up the measurements. The cloak fasten around the next but I couldn't actually drape it around myself for warmth. There just wasn't enough material. I didn't want to waste the materials (including some beautiful faux fur that resembles crow's feathers) so I decided to take apart the cloak and reuse the wool and fake fur for my new coat.

I looked through Burdastyle magazines to find a base pattern for the coat. I settled on one from March 2011, and altered it to give the bodice princess seams and to make the skirts of the coat wider.  I used black wool for the outer fabric, as it's warm and drapes nicely. I was going to use the cotton from the cape to line the coat, but instead bought a beautiful fleecy material that should be a lot warmer. 

Once the body of the coat was sewn together, I added the pockets. The pockets are large enough to fit a Smart Phone and various necessities (keys, change, etc). They are lined, and I sewed a strip of faux fur to the top. I bought very little faux fur, as I only intended to use it as trim. I also pinned on the coat's facing to see how it would look. I used the feathery faux fur to line the hood and as facing. 

I then sewed on the coat's sleeves. I sewed on the fur cuffs before sewing the sleeve up and attaching it to the coat. Later I finished the cuffs by hand. I sewed the hood, using wool and the old faux fur hood lining, and sewed on a strip of fur for trim. I gathered the wool hood to size and sewed it to the coat. 

 I forgot to take progress photos for making the lining and buttonholes. The buttonholes are bound/welted. It's a fiddly technique but the end result looks much nicer than a normal buttonhole would. I made a drawstring for the hood, which will help keep it in place on windy days. I cut and sewed the lining, pinned it in place, and carefully sewed it in by hand. The hemming was also done by hand. 

The last step was to sew on the buttons. I picked slightly expensive buttons, but they do go well with this coat so I'm trying to look on them as an investment. 

The finished coat fits well and is comfy. I made the coat a size 40 rather than a 38 because I'll probably be wearing bulkier clothing in the winter and want some flexibility in fit. 

I had to learn a lot of new techniques while making  this coat, so it's not perfect, but I am still very happy with the final result. 

Chie Satonaka Jacket Walkthrough

So I recently fell in love with Persona 4 (the anime; I sadly don't have time to play the game. This is the price of vet school). Chie and Kanji are probably my favourite characters. I decided that it would be fun to make Chie's costume. A lot of my costumes are quite elaborate, and I wanted a simple, comfy costume in my collection. 

I also decided to try to use recycled materials where possible. 

To this end, I went to several thrift shops to look for ideal materials to make Chie's jacket.  I settled on a men's sweater, and these two t-shirts. The sweater forms the base of the jacket, and the t-shirts are for trim and other little details. 

I thought I'd share my process with you, so here we go!

The Jacket

1) Planning: Before you pick up your scissors, study the objects you've bought, and see how you can piece them together to make your costume. I had a plan in mind before I bought my materials, but it's good to adjust your plan once you actually buy your materials. The sweater I bought had a v-neck, and was very loose, so I knew that I'd need to take it in and remove the v-neck. I also knew that I would need to remove the sleeves to add the stripes and change the cuffs.

2) Deconstruction: Once you've had a good think and decided on your plan of action, you can start deconstructing your pieces as needed. I cut off the sleeves, and removed the cuffs. I put the sweater on a dress for (though if you have a friend to help you, you probably don't need a dress form), and took in the sweater, pinching and pinning the excess fabric. I measured and checked that my line was even, and I slowly cut away the extra material.  

3) I decided to use the extra material to make the collar. In hindsight, I should have waited until I had more extra material, because my collar was a little short. 

i. Take you excess material (cut from the front of the sweater in my case) and lay it out

ii. Cut out strips of material. I made mine 2.5cm wide (+seam allowance).

iii. Sew them together. I used a sewing machine and used a small zigzag stitch. Sew lots of these pieces together: it's better to have too many and to cut the collar to size later. 

iv. Once you've got a nice big piece, measure  and cut another piece of material that is the same width and length as your sewn-together strip. I used the green t-shirt material: it will be hidden when the jacket is done so it doesn't matter too much.

v. Turn your tube of material right side out: you now have the basic collar done. 

4) Before I attached the collar, I decided to create the light green design on the front of the jacket. I used masking tape and chalk to map out the position of the patch. Once it looked right, I carefully peeled off the masking tape and stuck it to some paper to make a template. I added seam allowance and copied it on to my fabric. I also drew the template on to the jacket and cut out that material (leave seam allowances!). I used my overlock machine to sew on the light green fabric, but a sewing machine would work just as well. 

5) The Collar: I pinned on the collar and sewed it on. You can use a zigzag stitch or an overlock for this part. 

6) Time for bias tape. To make this, I drew lines at 45 degree on the yellow t-shirt fabric. I cut long strips. Make them a little bit wide, just in case. Then I fold over the edges and ironed them over. Ta da, bias tape!

7) Now let's sew on the bias tape. It will be used as trim for the front of the jacket and on the sleeves. Open up the bias tape, and face it right sides together with the jacket along the front edges. Pin it down and sew it on. Then I folded the bias tape over the edges, and hand stitched it down using a slip stitch. Sew up the sleeve and turn it right sides out. Once I was done, I ironed the edges to make it look crisp and neat. 

8) Sewing the bias tape on to the sleeves was a little more difficult. If I had to do this again, I would get hold of some hem tape or good fabric glue and stick the tape down first to stop it from sliding about. Firstly, I found the centre of the sleeves, and marked out where I wanted to put the yellow stripes, using chalk and a long rules. I then pinned the stripes in places and carefully sewed along the edges of each stripe. Once the stripes were sewn on, I sewed on the cuffs.

 9) The stripes on Chie's jacket also extend to the shoulders. To help measure out their position, I pinned the sleeve to the arm-scye, then pinned the bias tape on to the shoulder. You can get an idea of how well the stripes match up by pinning the rest of the sleeves in place. Once you are happy with how it looks, you can pin on the sleeve properly and sew it on. The seams may be a bit bulky, so go slowly as you sew.

10) The jacket is almost done. The only thing left is to add the zip. This took some time for me, as I had difficulty getting both sides to match perfectly. Take your time with this. Baste or pin the zip in place. Once everything looks good, carefully sew on the zip. I had to seam rip one section of the zip because the alignment was off. The zip was also a little too short, so I added a velcro closure to the collar. 

Congrats, you've finished your jacket. 

Suicide Squad: Harley Quinn: Jacket

 So this costume is almost done! Just need to finish styling the wig and make the glove and holster. So let's talk about the jacket

I looked at what other cosplayers had used to make the jacket, as well as looking at stills from Suicide Squad and the Harley Quinn action figure. I decided to use satin for the jacket, gold spandex for the applique and trim, and red jersey with painted stripes for the collars and cuffs.

The first step was the cut out all of the pattern piece. I used a Burda style pattern for a bomber jacket, with a few alterations, such as removing the back yoke and back pleat, and combining the two sleeve pieces into one.

Once the two back pieces were sewn together, it was time for the applique. This was very tedious. I had to print out an image of the design on Harley's jacket, and trace it on to a piece of gold spandex that I had previously ironed heat and bond (or some similar product) to. Then I had to cut out the letters. This wasn't too difficult with the large letters, but I had to use a scalpel for all the smaller letters.

I ironed on the letters and stitched the larger letters in place with a satin stitch, and secured the other letters with fabric glue, as the heat and bond that I used wasn't sticky enough. 

 The next step was the trim for the sleeves. This is made from interfaced gold spandex, sewn into a tube and then ironed flat. Treating this like a huge piece of bias tape could also work. Once the trim was ready, I pinned and sewed it onto the sleeves-make sure your sleeves are already sewn to the jacket body for accuracy. 

I decided to line the jacket with cotton to make the jacket more comfortable. I also added some pockets to the lining for my phone and keys. Once the lining was sewn together I place it inside the outer layer of fabric and pinned everything in place. I hand-sewed the facing to the lining, and basted the neck and sleeve openings in place.

To make the collar, waistband, and cuffs, I dyed a cotton/elastane vest red, and cut out long strips. I used masking tape to mark out the stripes, and painted those using acrylic and fabric medium.

 I sewed on the cuffs, then added a zip (spray painted gold). NExt I sewed on the collar and waistband.