Thw winter coat I made a couple of years ago is looking decidedly past it’s best, it’s one of those loose weave wools which I love, but they don’t wear well! I decided this year to make a coat using a gorgeous grey wool, it’s beautiful, like luxury men’s overcoating, it feels beautiful. I think I bought it a few years ago on Goldhawk Road in London and felt somewhat guilty as it was labelled Yorkshire Wool, it didn’t seem right to travel 200 miles to buy wool made on my doorstep! I seem to remember it was a bargain at around £10 a metre.

My original plan was to make the Papercut Sapora coat, but it takes over 3m of fabric and I only had just over 2m. Instead I used a pattern which has been in my stash for a while, Newlook 6074, that one also needed more fabric (2.5m)but I decided I could get it out with a bit of fudging. The design has a curved hemline and a single button fastening on a deep stand-up collar.

I could get all the main pieces out, though the collar had to have a centre back seam! My main fudge was that the front piece was faced with the main fabric, I had no where near enough fabric to cut four fronts out so I cut it out in lining instead. My original plan was to use a narrow facing to edge it however I decided in the end to just go with the lining as it would have made quite a bulky edge.

The lining is a very pretty Liberty tana lawn which I bought on Dewsbury market a couple of weeks ago for the grand sum of £7 per metre! It goes beautifully with the grey wool and they feel as soft as each other.

The coat went together really easily, it was pretty straight forward apart from the bagging out of the lining. Bagging out always makes me nervous, I usually try and avoid it, but with curved hems I decided it would probably look neatest. For those of you not familiar with the term, bagging out is when you stitch the main garment and the lining together right the way round, apart from a little gap for turning. If it works well you have beautiful edge to edge lining…however if the outer or inner fabric is slightly different length, it won’t hang right. The bagging of this coat went ok, not perfect but not bad. The issue I had was the instructions for stitching the sleeve to the lining as it was done through the gap, I couldn’t follow the instructions or the diagrams, so in the end I machine stitched the cuff and hand stitched the lining over it. I think it makes a bulkier cuff but it’s OK.

Once the construction of the coat was complete the instructions said to topstitch round, or ‘for a decorative touch’ hand-stitch with running stitch. Of course I couldn’t resist a bit of hand-stitching, but I must admit half way round I was beginning to regret it as it took forever!! I do like the finished effect though.

The design just has the one button on the stand up collar. I’ll see how I get on with it but I’m tempted to add another two buttons down the centre front as I’m not keen on garments that fastene firmly round my neck, I’d rather have it open and wear a scarf.

I’m pleased with the coat, it does feel lovely and snuggly to wear, though I’m not sure about the shape with this style of skirt, it may be better with a longer straight skirt or trousers. I think Lucy likes her new coat too, seen as she’s photo-bombed my picture!