Blue Cropped Jacket

For some unexplainable reason, I absolutely love coating fabric.

On a recent trip to my sort-of-local fabric store (Britex, in San Francisco), I found a small remnant of lovely light-blue cashmere. I bought it because it was so pretty and soft, but for a while I couldn’t think what to do with it- it definitely wasn’t big enough to make an actual coat.

Then a sewing friend and I got to chatting about cropped jackets and how much we love them, and it occurred to me that a cropped jacket would be the perfect way to use the fabric. The 1 & 1/8 yards that I had to work with was plenty for a tiny jacket, and even had enough room for little design flexibility.

I designed this using the pattern from my lace top as a sloper. I decided to go very cropped and short sleeved with the intention of wearing it over the long blouse. Because I didn’t want the button-line on the jacket front to match the button line on the blouse, I made it double-breasted. In the end I had quite a bit of fabric left over!

The outer shell is, of course, the cashmere coating, and the lining is a pretty silk charmeuse from Thai Silks in Los Altos, CA.

I had planned to make button holes (foolish girl!), but making button holes through two layers of coating doesn't really work. I moved on to covered snaps, but they looked messy ... in the end, I was thrilled to find gold snaps at Pacific Trimming- they look planned and just a little bit fancy. 

And can I just take a moment to say how much I love the Britex fourth-floor remnants department?  (and, BTW, they have a remnants contest going on now if you live nearby) Britex is chock-full of absolutely gorgeous fabrics, and their remnants are gorgeous too (of course). I always find something interesting when I go there, and it always inspires me to make a great project… in my future courtesy of Britex fourth floor- a black car coat made out of alpaca faux fur that reminds me of a Steiff teddy bear.