La Fred - Olympia Coat

This is the second of two LaFred patterns I purchased at Artistry in Fashion last month. I had some striped novelty corduroy fabric that, once washed, "puckered" up along those stripes. Yep, a novelty corduroy seersucker. Fabrics are so interesting these days.

The corduroy sat around while I contemplated what to do with it. I am not a huge corduroy fan in general, but this one was so interesting. I knew I wanted a jacket with it, but nothing was grabbing me. I finally decided to use it to sew up the car length coat from this LaFred pattern. Because I was matching stripes and observing the nap, and this has some pretty large pattern pieces, I was grateful to have enough fabric. While this pattern may look pretty traditional, it has some interesting features:

• The body of the jacket and the sleeve are cut in one piece. This means that the sleeves are on the bias. Because I was using a stripe, this caused the chevron pattern along the top of the sleeve.
  
• There is another under sleeve piece cut on the straight of grain. This is attached to a triangular gusset. I found this to be a pretty easy gusset experience and is designed to give a wider range of movement to the shoulders/arms.
  
• The pattern features two pocket styles. I opted for the interesting "window pane" pocket which is very easy to make, but looks very "high end." To reduce bulk, I lined the pocket with the lining fabric, but you could also use the fashion fabric.
  
• There are two neck styles available - a round neckline and a petal collar. I opted for the round neckline which I wear folded back.
  

This straight jacket doesn't have a lot of shaping. Based on my high bust measurement, I cut an XL, which had enough ease so I didn't need an FBA. Once I had the outer shell constructed, I decided to remove about 3" from the CB at the hem, tapered to nothing – if I hadn't already constructed the pockets, I would have probably removed it from the side seams. I also shortened the sleeves about 1.5" and I inserted some smallish petal shoulder pads.

(The chevron design is caused by the stripes and bias cut sleeves.)

(I love these chunky black buttons, which I bought at Artistry in Fashion and intended them for another project. The lining is optional, but I lined it with a dark brown crinkled polka dot polyester.)

DD1 feels that this coat is a little oversized and underfitted. It might seem so, given the current more fitted styles, but it's a good use of this interesting fabric and I expect to get a lot of wear from this coat in my chilly, foggy climate.

I think I have now used everything I bought at Artistry in Fashion -- two LaFred patterns and 6 chunky black buttons. This might be a first! :)