Tag: pendleton

Tamarak Jacket

emilyWools2 Comments

I finished a new coat and I’m pretty pleased with how it turned out.

me, pleased with how this coat turned out.

Choosing a quilted jacket pattern

I have been scheming to turn some stashed Pendleton into a quilted jacket for quite awhile, but was pretty nervous to cut into it. I was torn about what pattern to choose and almost went with Hovea from Megan Nielsen, but I didn’t quite like the neckline options. My biggest hesitation of the Tamarak from Grainline Studio was the lack of a collar.

Last year though, Grainline released an expansion pack that includes a collar, and even though I probably could have figured it out on my own, I bought it for the instructions (they are great!).

Materials

I’ve had this Pendelton wool in my stash since 2019. I fell in love with it at the Pendleton Factory Store in Portland (Oregon!). I also had some red silk charmeuse discards from a friend-of-a-friend, a talented seamstress in NYC. I was really inspired by this Tamarak, and planned on copying their idea to bind the seams with the charmeuse. It turned out too be incredibly fiddly, and I didn’t have enough of the charmeuse for bias binding anyway, so I went with pre-made black bias tape. I think it looks good!

The snaps were installed by Star Snaps. I do not have any snap tools, and decided to lean on the professionals since they are so closeby.

thanks to Meghan Babin for letting me borrow this Oisin hat sample!

Construction Notes

Before I started cutting, I watched the entire YouTube sewalong which was very helpful. I especially liked all of the quilting tips!

I lengthened the jacket by 2″ and I wanted to adjust the pocket placement to be on an angle, but I ended up sticking with the pattern’s placement because I was nervous that I’d get the welts wrong.

This fabric was challenging to sew with my machine. Because the charmeuse is so slippery and the wool is so toothy, it was a nightmare to keep them aligned while I quilted (YES I used a walking foot). The back piece was so big and the lining shifted so much that I had to patch it in parts. Just before I quilted the last pattern piece, my extremely talented friend suggested that I cut the lining bigger than the pattern piece to add some wiggle room in case of slipping. This proved to be a very great idea, please take this advice if you are making one for yourself!

Putting these struggles aside, this jacket rules. I lined it with wool batting from Purl Soho. I was a bit concerned with how to tackle the binding, because with something this thick I was really worried about sewing the second side of the binding and making it look professional. The solution was to hand sew all of the binding. The fronts and collar took an extremely long time to hand sew, but the result was absolutely worth it.

Now excuse my while I go run around outside!

Thanks for the photos, Alexis and Shannon!

A Pendleton Wool Jacket

emilyWools2 Comments
a woman stands, showing off her Pendleton wool jacket.

Here’s what I made with the Pendleton fabric I bought in Portland last year. This pricey wool was intimidating to cut into. After mulling it over for a year, I went for it with the Tessuti Tokyo Jacket. I did not have a lot of wiggle room with yardage, so I had to be picky about where I pattern-matched.

I added some length to the jacket so I could add a more generous hem (2″), and omitted the pockets. I hand-sewed the hem and the inner neckband. Because the fabric is so thick and dense, it was easy to hide the stitches on the right side–I can’t see them at all!

a woman shows the inside of a handmade wool jacket.

I used a bit of this fabric to make my belt bag last year. While sewing it, I noticed this material is prone to unraveling. To ensure the integrity of these jacket seams, I used a combination of french seams and Hong Kong seams. When I sewed this pattern in the past, it was very challenging to sew the french underarm seam’s sharp curve. Knowing this fabric is much thicker than silk, I used Hong Kong seams instead. I thought it would be a fun color pop to use the same finish on the center back seam. I went Bold with the bias tape, because 1. that’s what I had and 2. I think the unexpected pop of sea foam green brightens up the dark print.

the back view of a woman wearing a Pendleton wool jacket.

Belt Bag

emilyWools1 Comment

Here’s something a little different: A belt bag (or by its pattern name, the Fennel Fanny Pack). I spotted this pattern at Rhinbeck on my friend Kiyomi. It looked so good on her that she inspired me to make my own version. I used a little bit of the Pendleton wool I bought in Portland (and still have enough to make something else!!), and lined it with some yellow linen scraps. I spent around $20 on notions at Pacific Trimming, since I was picky about the zippers and buckle.

a woman models a handmade fanny pack.

I must say the pattern is pretty steep at $14. I appreciated how the DIY pattern pieces saved paper, but I wish I had a visual reference for how to orient the zippers once the pieces were ready to be sewn together. My front zipper doesn’t close at the same side as the main one. I had to seam rip this more times than I’d like to admit, and by the time I realized the front zipper was backwards I was not willing to do more surgery. The pattern does mention that you have to be mindful of the zipper placement, but I think an illustration would help reinforce this.

Finishing the interior seams with such thick fabric was beastly until I remembered that double-wide bias tape is accurately named—switching to it helped things tremendously. Despite my complaints about its construction, I really like this bag. I’m not quite sure I can pull it off, but I am trying!

a closeup of a pendleton wool fanny pack.

Bonus: here’s a cute lil’ gif of me unzipping the fanny pack:

a gif of a woman unzipping a handmade fanny pack.