Hi all,
I stumbled across Rory's series after I decided I'd like some careful tutorials on coat making... Perfect! Thanks for the videos. Very enjoyable, helpful, and therapeutic. I've learnt a lot and I know that when I go through the second time there'll be all sort of detail that my mind subconsciously (and naively) discarded the first time round...
I'm a complete amateur, inexperienced, and to be honest not even sure if this forum is meant for random members of the public like me or an exclusive circle of coat makers by invitation only. If it's the latter show me the door... In either case, allow me to make a fool of myself in front of all of you who are clearly far superior to me judging by the other posts!
But anyhow, I thought I may as well ask for some advice and see if it took me anywhere. I've followed the videos as well I could up to the fitting. I live with a flatmate who gets annoyed at the sewing so I have precious few photos but hopefully they get the point across enough.
On the first attempt I ended up with something like this. Note the coat is for me so I haven't worried too much about neatness of basting stitches (except where I got the sense it mattered more). That's probably a mistake...
The front looked good to me and my flatmate didn't take another pic I'm afraid.
A couple of things haven't worked too well. One is that the sleeve head is pleating a lot. That's partly because I just haven't managed to get all the fullness in without that happening, also it's gathering at the back of the armhole, not the front. I wondered if this could be fixed by moving the pitch back, but I'm a little ignorant there.
The other thing was that there was quite a lot of excess fabric in the lower back. I judged this to be too much back balance â not sure if this was right. However the waist actually needs letting out slightly and I also tried stooping and it seemed to really solve the problem on the back so I thought it must be too long.
Didn't really know how to actually adjust for this, so I decided to experiment (not exactly the precision tailors are known for, I realise...) and just lowered the top of the back 5/8" to the chest line. I guess I'd then add it back in at the hem but I didn't bother at this stage as I just wanted to see what happened at the top. (Again, I'm sure this is bad practice but I'm not really sure what is better to do so I just gave it a try!)
It's ended up like this:
It's quite hard to tell but a lot of this is improved quite a lot. There's a lot less fabric in the small of the back. Obviously not ideal though!
The crease across the shoulders seems to have got worse. Is this an indication the shoulder width is too narrow?
I was also wondering about the vertical creases down the side of the armhole. I thought that could be to do with the ad hoc alteration though, the pattern pulling up the sidebody in a way it's not meant to be pulled up.
I'd'd be interested to know if the first step I took was at all correct and also if anyone is kind enough to help me out now with what I could try... Thanks in advance, Robbie
Here's the front and side view by the way:
PS if more photos are needed I can try to persuade my flatmate...
Hi all,
This is very late but thanks for all the help!
I re-basted it together about ten times. After a while I came to the conclusion that the half-back width was just too large â I think I messed up the measurement. (I suppose I could blame my flatmate for that too... shouldn't have put the tape in his hands đ€) I didn't have nearly enough inlay on the sidebody to move the seam round.
I'm going to blame this too for the unusual pitch I ended up with. To get the sleeve to hang properly I had to move the front pitch all the way to the sidebody seam! Maybe gives me a slight thug posture... or is that just how I stand? Anyway, I think that the lack of width on the forepart and extra on the back nudged the sleeve right round.
Anyhow, after my ten bastes I decided that I had got the best I was going to get (it's a first attempt, after all), and my friends said it looked good and I figured their opinions were what mattered anyway. I did redraft the sleeves, they needed taking in about a half inch.
It's finished now. I really appreciated what you said, Rory, in the 'final press' video â about attitudes to getting the right fit and so on. Made me feel like even if I haven't achieved a great fit this time that doesn't mean I haven't achieved something! In the spirit of 'bespoke coats not looking good on hangers', I'll begin with the one picture I have of me wearing it so far! (For those wondering, It's a kir royale, but has nothing to do with coat completion â I did feel like cracking open the champagne though). I think it looks good at the front.
This is a tailoring forum so I'd better get some pics of the back too. Give me some time...
I may share some reflections on what didn't go so well in a separate post (by which I really mean get everyone's tips for my next project!). I've learnt a great deal so far!
But for now â just a question more pertinent to the original topic. How should the half back width be measured? That's assuming my assessment was correct. Is there any shirt seam that could be used as a guide? I'm determined not to get it wrong next time! I used 1/3 scale + 2 1/4" this time (about 8 1/2", scaling at 37"), but a crude measurement (i.e. giving the tape to the flatmate and seeing what happens) leads me to think the true measurement could actually be about 7". I think I did end up taking about that much off the back this time (it's a good thing I had used the 'fitting' sizing on the front edge!), so that would make sense.
Thanks again all!