Kantha Quilt Jacket

TOC

• Kantha Jacket
• Self Made Earrings!
• Get Your Motor's Running Contest - the Results

Kantha Jacket

I first became aware of coats made from Kantha quilts two years ago, when someone posted a picture of Heidi Klum wearing a Meiko Mintz coat (made from a Kantha quilt) on Stitcher's Guild.

I was smitten. I quickly started researching Mieko Mintz and her amazing work. I even found a boutique that sells her pieces locally and tried some on.

I then started shopping for Kantha quilts on Etsy and Ebay. I didn't buy one, however, and I moved on to other things.

Then, recently, Ann Smith, a local sewing buddy (who is well known on Pattern Review), made a Kantha quilt jacket, inspired by Meiko Mintz. It was fabulous.

(Ann is not posting these days, so I can't point you to any photos of her jacket, but it was great! She used Vogue 2949 - an OOP Sandra Betzina pattern that I made long ago.)

Anyway, Ann got me all fired up about kantha quilts again. This time I went shopping, and bought, a Kantha quilt on Etsy. It came from India but arrived quite quickly.

So...what style should I use for my jacket? The standard Meiko style, with its a-line shape, and giant collar, isn't flattering on me. (Trust me on this.)

So I decided to use a silhouette that works better on my uber busty, inverted-triangle-shaped form. Inspired by another RTW designer, I started looking for a pattern that featured shoulder front and back princess seams and a pointed shawl collar.

There was nothing like this available in any current pattern offerings. This is too bad as this is a great silhouette and very popular in current RTW.

I started searching OOP patterns on Ebay and I found one that had the right bones, but would need substantial altering: Vogue 1042.

The pattern and the quilt arrived in November, but I set them aside as I was working on other things.

During my 2-week break over Christmas and New Years, I decided I wanted to tackle this project. I pulled out the pattern, traced it off in my size, did an FBA, lengthened it, and changed the style lines a bit. I quickly ran up a muslin, because I was going to be seeing Ronda Chaney, head of the Fashion department at Cañada College the next day, and I wanted her to be able to take a quick look at the fit. I finished the muslin late the night before, so I had no time to finesse it.

When I modeled it for Ronda the next day, it was in fairly rough shape. She made quite a few suggested alterations.

I went home and incorporated her changes, creating muslin #2. The second muslin was better, but it needed further tweaking. (The first version was so off that it required more than one round.) I was going to be seeing my pattern drafting friend, Georgene, only a few days after seeing Ronda, so I brought muslin #2 along.

Georgene made quite a few further alterations. By the time I was finished with these two rounds of edits, the finished pattern barely resembled the original and, most importantly, it fit me to perfection!

I was planning on making muslin #3, but Georgene convinced me to "go for it", so I grabbed the kantha quilt and started cutting. I'm not sure if you can tell, but I cut the quilt with careful thought as to how the design would flow around the body. I wanted the printed design and colors to flow in a particular way. The twin size quilt was just large enough to create the jacket—I had very little left over. I also did my best at cutting around the holes and imperfections, but I couldn't avoid all of them. (This quilt is quite authentic in its use of worn saris.)

One of the hallmarks of Meiko Mintz's jackets is that they are unlined and reversible. She finishes the internal raw edges with a purl marrow stitch, which is similar to a serged edge, in a contrasting color. She generally doesn't use closures, and the external edges are sometimes finished with the same purl marrow stitch, and sometimes she just turns both outer edges towards the inside and slip stitches them together—finishing them in a similar manner to a double-cloth coat. This results in garments with no extraneous fabric that are as light as air.

I didn't own a serger that I felt was good enough to use in this way, so I sewed my coat with normal 5/8" seams. (I have since bought a new serger...) On the wrong side, I turned under the raw edge under of each seam, and stitched it down by hand. (I really didn't feel the need for this jacket to be reversible, but I did want to finish it neatly.)

8 yards of self-made bias binding using a batik purchased from Stone Mountain & Daughter

I finished the outer edges with self made bias binding made by using the 18mm bias tool from Clover. Finally, I added a dark brown toggle closure purchased at Britex.

Punching holes into the toggle

There is quite a bit of handwork in this coat, so it took me awhile to finish. For example, I made 8 yards of bias binding to finish the outer edges. I also made two patch pockets, also finished with bias binding, but I haven't attached them to the jacket. I may attach them still. Or I may put them on the inside. Or I may not use them.

Completed, but unused, pockets

I have't decided.

How do I feel about the finished jacket?

To be honest, I'm not sure. I'm not sure that it's "me." I love the fit. I looove the fit, the shape, and the silhouette, but I'm not so sure about the colors and the print.

I also think that, when I use this pattern again (and I will), that I will make the collar a bit larger. This will quickly become a TNT pattern for me and you can expect to see it in many incarnations. In fact, I have already started another version using a beautiful fabric from Marcy Tilton.

What do you think... Is this quilted, brightly colored, jacket "me"?

Time will tell.

I also decided to model it for some of the photos inside-out, because I can wear it that way if I want to.

Inside out - front
Inside out - back

I may bring it to Puyallup to wear.

Maybe.

Thanks, Ronda and Georgene for your fitting expertise!
Thanks, mem for taking these pics!

I'm enjoying my new purchased-on-sale Trippen boots! Or I was, until I walked out of a conference room this morning, looked down, and saw this:
Ha!

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Self Made Earrings!

I decided over the holidays that I wanted to try my hand at jewelry making. And by that, I mean working with metal. The very next day, on January 3rd, an email dropped into my inbox offering a discount on a beginning jewelry making class at a studio in downtown San Francisco.

I jumped on it. I attended the class on the weekend before last. This 3.5 hour workshop offered a hands-on experience in metal folding, resulting in a pair of leaf-shaped sterling silver earrings.

I had never even heard of the metal folding technique before, so there was lots to learn. I find this sort of artistic expression difficult. Before you completely fold the metal, you paint the inside with ochre. Then you fold the metal completely in half and start hammering. This shapes the metal and imparts surface texture. But hammering the silver also makes it brittle so you periodically have to anneal it, which means you fire it. (Or, in this case, the teacher applies the fire.) After it's been fired, it returns to a soft and malleable state so that you can hammer it further without risk of breaking it.

Both pieces of metal are folded (one for each earring) and the hammering has begun

You repeat this cycle over and over until you achieve the shape that you want. The ochre prevents the two sides from fusing together during the annealing process.

Then you cut the folded metal into a leaf shape, using your own self drawn template.

(I hope you are still with me, because I'm going somewhere with this blow-by-blow recap.)

Now it's time to open up the folded metal to reveal the leaf shape.

I should mention that the heat from the annealing process changes the ochre from it's characteristic mustard color to red.

Except, once opened, my pieces of metal didn't look so much like leaves as... something else.

I seemed to be the only student in the room wondering aloud why my pieces of metal looked like they needed underwear.

After opening up the folded metal "leaves"

I took my pieces to the assistant and asked her what I could do to make my "leaves" look less...

"Georgia O'Keefe?" she offered helpfully.

"Yes."

I spent quite a bit of time re-cutting the leaves, bending and shaping them as best as I could, and scrubbing out the red ochre (which is very difficult to remove from deep in the fold - I had to use two different brushes and the magnetic cleaner machine).

My friends tell me that the resulting earrings are quite leaf shaped and not particularly "Georgia O'Keefe."

I hope so. Though they still remind me of my very favorite Everybody Loves Raymond episode, Marie's Sculpture.

I'm thinking that my silver-smithing career might be over. I didn't really enjoy the process that much.

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Get Your Motor's Running Contest - the Results

Thanks so much for your votes in Rhonda's contest! The lovely Cennetta won with her beautiful rendition of a color-and-print-blocked sheath dress. Congrats, Cennetta!

On Sunday, I could see that I would not have the votes to win first prize, so I took advantage of the announced sale last weekend and I purchased Janet Pray's class—which comes with the moto jacket pattern—for half off. It's a win-win!

Voting is up!

Rhonda had some technical difficulties yesterday (and it didn't help that she was caught in a snow storm trying to get back home), but the voting is now up!

The entries are all so different! It's fascinating and inspiring to see them!

To vote, scroll to the bottom of Rhonda's post and click the tiny heart in the upper right to select your favorite.

CLICK HERE TO VOTE!

Voting ends February 9th.

Thanks!

Challenge Accepted!

On November 19th, Rhonda Buss, a blogging pal (and we will meet in person some day, mark my words), asked if I would like to participate in a challenge/competition. In fact, here is a snippet from her email, which explains the situation more fully:

Janet Prey who owns the American Sewing Expo and Islander Patterns gave me a lovely bolt of fabric. It's a shirt weight barkcloth. The fabric is printed in panels. It's white with a black floral print running the length of the panel. It's really quite lovely. So, here's the challenge....you may do anything you wish with the fabric, combine it with whatever you like. Whatever you choose to do must be finished no later than February 1st. I have 10 panels so there will be 10 entries. Each entry along with links back to your blog, will go up on my blog for voting. The winner will receive Islander's brand new pattern, The Motor City Motorcycle Jacket, along with the accompanying Craftsy class. Let me know if you would like to participate.

Rhonda is calling her challenge, "Get Your Motors Running."

I am really over competitions, but she seduced me by the challenge aspect of it. I love challenging myself. Let's hear it for frequent challenges, where we push ourselves creatively!

I agreed in fairly short order, and she mailed me a very interesting fabric panel. Roughly 24" by 60" (I forgot to measure it), it looked like this:

Since I received the fabric in November and the project wasn't due until February, I let the ideas start to percolate in the back of my mind while I put the fabric away.

When I revisited the project several weeks ago, I had developed some comments/observations/ideas. Here's a peek into my thought process:

• I don't sew much with white, so I considered dying the fabric so that it would be, say red and black, or green and black. In the end, I decided not to bother with that, though I do think that it would have been a pretty effect.
• There was not really enough yardage, by itself, for me to use *only* that fabric, so I immediately knew that I would mix it with a black fabric.
• This woven fabric is *very* drapey and very ravelly. I should have serged the edges before throwing the fabric into the washing machine/dryer but I didn't, so I learned just how ravelly it was. I lost several inches along both (long) cut edges.
• This fabric would be a natural for a top or blouse of some kind, particularly with its drapey quality. But, with my reverse-pear shape, I am more of a "bottoms" girl than a "tops" girl.
• If I had had two of these panels, I would have made swishy pants with the motifs running down the outside leg.

I decided to use an idea that's I've been wanting to try for awhile: to use the panel as a "peekaboo" element in a faux wrap skirt.

There is no pattern for this. I used three fabric rectangles:

• A rectangle for the main skirt. For this I used a black, drapey woven fabric that was a gift from Margy. (The black fabric has a bit of a greenish cast, which is why she didn't use it herself.)
• A rectangle of the panel print. I needed this to be about 23" by the length of the skirt, plus a hem. I cut the panel print in half, lengthwise, placed the largest part of the prints so they were at the hem, and flat felled them together to get the width I needed. (Also remember that I lost some of the width of the original panel when it frayed mightily in the washer/dryer.)
• A third rectangle of the black created a waistband casing for the elastic. Like I said, this was a faux wrap. ;)

(Note: If you were to make this for someone with a much smaller waist than hips, I would not use rectangles. In that case, I'd start with a basic fitted pencil skirt and alter from there. In that case, the wrapping feature might need to be functional so that you can put it on and take it off so I would eliminate the waistband/elastic. My waist and hips are virtually the same measurement, so rectangles and an elastic waist work fine.)

The skirt is constructed as a giant tube. It's as simple as that. Then it is folded. I folded it to expose the white panel to create a pleasing vertical line. I also realized, during construction (I love these happy accidents), that one edge of the fabric, with the attractive selvedge, could be used along the front as a further decorative element.

At Stone Mountain and Daughter, I purchased two sets of 3/4" D-rings and 2 yards of black cotton strapping, or ribbon - I'm not sure what it is called. I offset the faux wrap to expose about an inch of the white, and I used the ribbon and D-rings to create a decorative element. Note that these are more decorative than functional, as the skirt stays on thanks to the elastic waistband. Note that the cotton strapping tends to ravel, so I finished the raw edge with Fray Block, which I prefer over Fray Check. (I once did extensive experiments with both.)

Voilá.
(I admit it, not much hangar appeal...)
That's better!
And better still!

Thanks so much for inviting me to participate, Rhonda! It was a lot of fun. Rhonda plans to post a summary post Monday, Feb 2nd, with all ten entries and a poll for voting. As much as I shrink from the competitive aspect, I admit that I would really like Janet Pray's pattern and class so, what the heck. Please go vote for whomever you want to vote for!

And thanks to mem for the pictures!

And, yes, I was woefully overdue for a haircut, but I finally made it over to the hair college.

I predict that this student will go far!

Paris Pants a la Marcy Tilton

This is so weird for me! I am having to force myself to blog lately. This is a first in my 5+ years of blogging. This is not related to my sewing mojo, by the way. I am feeling a LOT of enthusiasm for sewing!

Last weekend I whipped up a pair of jeans!

But let's back up a moment.

My absolutely favorite jeans to wear are my black stretch jeans with the internal seams outlined with white topstitching. I've counted three pair that I have made, but there may be more that I've forgotten about. All of these are in frequent rotation.

You can click on any image to learn more.

Last year, Marcy Tilton was inspired by a pair of jeans she saw in a Paris shop window. She later posted instructions on how to modify her skinny pant, Vogue 8859, to replicate those pants.

Last weekend, I used her instructions to make my own pair of these great pants. I had made Vogue 8859 before, so I had a solid starting point.

I refer you to Marcy's post for specifics on how to do these alterations. In addition to her alterations, I created a slanted front pocket, since I really need pockets in my pants!

Lining of slant pocket
It's so handy to use my backup machine for the heavy duty, contrasting, topstitching thread.

I've worn these pants three times this week, so they will definitely be a wardrobe workhorse!

Thanks, Marcy!

Reversible New York Cape

I finally finished my cape!

When I wrote a post about different types of capes last October, I was already working on this one. I had to put it aside for awhile, and then it sat and sat, decorating my dress form. All it lacked was buttons.

But let's back up a bit.

This is a downloadable pattern from Tessuti. It comes only in one size. I didn't muslin this pattern, but I did tissue fit the paper pattern. I was with Georgene at the time, and she recommended a rather novel approach to the FBA. She suggested that I raise the shoulder seam on the front only, as shown in the following pic:

It's a rather unconventional approach, but Georgene got the idea by reading the wrinkles on the paper pattern as I was modeling it, and it gave me more room in the front. I didn't make any other changes to the pattern.

Georgene also suggested that I make the cape to be reversible.

I liked her suggestion but, grumble grumble, it meant more work for me, and more fabric to acquire. The main fabric is an incredibly soft wool knit from Emma One Sock. The other side is a charcoal-colored, water repellant fabric from Fabrics R Us, purchased the same day I went to PIQF.

The pattern has no pockets, but I wanted pockets on each side, so I spent time dithering over what sort of pockets to use. Have you noticed that these sorts of details require much cogitation? At least they do for me.

For the wool side, I made zipper pockets.

For the solid side I made patch pockets with a "window" opening. (I think I first saw this pocket on Pinterest long ago.)

Patch pockets ready to sew on
Completed pocket

This cape is mostly "open", like a poncho, but a button at each side creates some shaping, as shown in the following technical drawing:

Since I wanted the cape to be reversible, I had to get creative. I decided to put a buttonhole on the front and the back at each side seam. I then created button "cuff links" to go through the buttonholes on each side. Since this fabric has some loft, I used a piece of foam, with a slit cut out, to sew the button cuff links so that there would be about 1/4" of thread between them:

The shiny buttons are for the waterproof side. The artsy buttons are for the wool side.
I purchased the buttons at Britex.
A completed button cuff link

The buttons at CF are sewn on normally. This means that when I wear the cape with the waterproof side out, the left side buttons over the right. C'est la vie.

The cape is finished with a beautiful wrap-around binding that I purchased at Britex. I sewed it on by hand—it took me two days to complete.

Yes, those are polka dot socks
mem wanted me to twirl, so I removed the side buttons and let it fly!
Thanks to mem for these pics!