Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Striped Caraco Jacket

I ended up with about 1.5 yards of a beautiful silk striped taffeta from searching for fabrics for a client.  I pondered it for a while, not knowing what I could possibly make out of such a small amount.  Then I came across this jacket.  I had to try.  Turns out, it was practically made for it.  The first thing I did was figure the width based on the stripes.  I used the measurements from my own stripes rather than trying to figure out the originals, since I would optimally like the stripes to line up in a similar way.  I used some old shapes from other garments to work out length measures.  I threw together a mock-up on Saturday night, which fit almost perfectly!  I worked all of Sunday and most of Monday, and got to the point of trimming and inserting the sleeves.  It was a very quick and easy garment to make, thankfully.

The stomacher is a separate piece, pinned in for wear.  There are tucks which run the entire length of the front, only tacked down from the bottom of the armscye to the waist.  The front trim tapers as it goes up.

The fronts and backs are actually one piece connected through the skirt, the only full length seam being center back.  I treated the construction similar to the Polonaise gown, with backstitched side seams.

The lining is only to the waist, attached to the pleats so it doesn't show on the waistline.  You can also see where I did a short cut by cutting the fronts on the selvedge, so I only had to fold it back once and stitch the trim over it rather than roll it.

For the trim, I folded back the edges to finish.  The bodice trim was gathered using a whip stitch a varying distance from the edge to create a little ruffle.  The inside edge was tacked down with small tucks sticking up.  The cuff was done similarly, but with an extra gathering line near the top.

The front tuck is left loose over the shoulder.




6 comments:

Olympe de la Tour D'Auvergne said...

Lovely and well-done, especially for such a short construction timeframe.

Isis said...

Very, very pretty and it suits you!

Anonymous said...

Simply love the way you
recreated this jacket. Con-
sidering the time constraints, it is a credit
to your exacting approach.
Felicity

Claire said...

Hi !

My name is Claire and I follow your blog for few months :3
I love what you do and I'm a fan of the eighteenth century.
This caraco is exactly what I'm dreaming to sew but I really don't know how to begin ><
I was wondering if you'd agree to explain some points to me ?
I don't know the special techniques and other important things ><
Have a good day/night !

(ps: I'm french so I hope my english is understandable)

ColeV said...

Salut Claire!
Bien sûr! I'll put up a post with pictures of the pattern I made and specifics on what stitches to use. I didn't take any pictures of the process, since I was working so fast. And your English is very good (better than my French, I'm sure!).

Claire said...

You're very nice ! Thank you so much ! :)
And your French is good, I think it's great when people from different countries manage to understand each other :3