Chasing Coco

I happened to be in Toronto earlier this year for work and much to my very pleasant surprise Toronto has a large number of nice fabric shops! Apparently this is due to a booming film industry in the city. One of my coworkers had to practically drag me out of King Textiles , which was good as I had already had a pretty big fabric binge. King Textiles had a fantastic selection of wool, linen and above all, silk! I bought three different silks, two because I thought they might work for my jacket and one because it was on sale for 9.99 CAD/yard (even less USD!)! For silk dupioni! and it was an amazing color, though I did not have my wool with me, I did not anticipate it match my jacket's main fabric but low and behold, it's a fabulous combination - better than the other two choices I had bought in fact. No worries there, I will happily use them for other projects. Can you tell that I am absolutely in love with my lining? I'm actually having a bit of a silk love affair right...

After sewing my jacket together I ironed and shaped the seams over a tailors ham. E said I should pound the wool seam down and I was like "what the what?" I have to say I was absolutely certain this would do nothing at all but I swear that it did look different have it was beaten! It was like tenderizing a steak. It looks like a mid-evil torture device...  Jacket fronts, it's coming together slowly. There was also a lengthy discussion of pockets. I was very annoyed to realize that the welt pocket in my pattern ( vogue 7975 ) is not an actual pocket! It is just a fake sewed on embellishment, I'm very disappointed in you vogue! Pieces for an applied pocket are included but I was really feeling it design-wise. I think I've was using a plaid pattern boucle I would have liked an applied pocket, it is after a very Channel look. Maybe on my next jacket. E launched into a very lengthy explanation of how to make a welt pocket, draft a pattern for the needed...

So, I got at little derailed with my French jacket because last fall I happily got a wedding invitation from my best grad school friend, who I never get to see since she lives in Europe. On the plus side, she got married in Portugal and I had a very, very good reason to visit beautiful Portugal! This happy occasion really derailed my jacket because I decided in January to make her a quilt, which was a rather large undertaking, especially since I hadn't really ever made one before. It consumed my sewing time for the better part of 3 months and I still only finished the binding the night before I left and had to get it washed (puff! puff!) before packing it. Didn't it turn out fabulously though? I'm so glad I decided to make it for her! After that, I also decided to make linen pants this summer. I thought I had to have linen pants and couldn't find any that were remotely suitable in a store so I made those...that one is on me. But back to my jacket, I have big, b...