Snow Sew Day
February 21, 2025 Snow Sew Day, because the weather is like....
Now I know you folks in the north consider this part of the season of winter. But down here in the south, this is just illegally cold. We've got more water running than Niagra Falls!
But it does make for very nice "sew days." Lately I've
been dreaming of the Beth Dutton Coat.
And although this is really great as it is, it's the collar that's really drawn me in. One thing you must be careful about on movie sets, catalog shoots, and TV series is that if the coat looks too bulky, doesn't fit right, or is somehow wonky, a quick clip in the back makes all the difference in the world. For those of us in the real world, that's not an option, so we must be careful when
trying to replicate an iconic garment from a TV Show. Beth Dutton is the headstrong daughter of the owner of the Yellowstone Ranch near/on Yellowstone National Park. As such, she wears pretty strong clothes, and as an actress, the clothes make the character. But when I'm working with an Indian Blanket print.
It begs to be matched even though it's rare when it occurs in most ready-to-wear.
Most consumers wouldn't see the mismatch here, but it drives us sewists mad. On the other hand, this garment retails for $145, which isn't a bad price, but they are able to do that because they save fabric by not matching. So when I sit down to match this...
...yeah my eyes go a little wonky. Sometimes, it's good to evaluate the artistic idea in our head with the practicality of the garment construction. And there are lots of designers who can't make this decision because they don't sew. We can, and my best helper ever on this is sketching out the design. It is truly amazing how many problems are solved. More importantly, how
many issues it brings up that you must solve to make the design work.
This looks like a hodge-podge and may be okay for a "look," but that's about it. I can't do this. It's too messy and looks very troublesome. And I'm not sure I have enough of the Indian Blanket fabric to even get to a matching point. The
repeat is about 1/2 yard, a potential 1/2 yard extra for each piece I cut. Since the front is a left side and a right side, then the back, then the sleeve, that's at least 2 yards extra (left one length, right one length, back one length and sleeve, another length). I might be able to get the sleeve off to the side of the front and/or back, but it's got to, at the very least, match horizontally, which could cause me to need another length. Then I want this coat longer, so I
would extend that lower seam. Whereas the camo is purposely scattered and chaotic. That's the purpose: to mask in a supposedly chaotic
background - get lost in the background.
The little bit of matching really doesn't look good here. Look at the back with the dark camo shape in the same place on both sides of the shoulders. It would look much better if it is more scattered.
Taking a closer look at this jacket,
there's lots of pluses to it that make it worth all the effort. First, I've always been enormously impressed with how StyleArc preserves the line of a garment. The line on this is absolutely fabulous.
For me, it begs a pad-stitched collar, only because I want that collar to remain on a certain folded line, which might not work if it was simply interfaced. Once you have a pad-stitched collar, which preserves the soft, yet stable fold line, you won't want
anything else. You can literally wad the coat up and shake it out and it will fold right where you want. For me that means I casually put the coat on and like the wand of a fairy, the coat lays perfectly around my shoulders and neck. The Genevieve offers a facing piece just for this. This makes doing pad stitching on the collar easy peasy.
The whole idea here is when we are out hiking or just camping (ok it's really glamping), I wanted some jacket that was longer to put on to flow more like a cowboy's duster coat.
It's made to be long and protect the legs from either brush and/or the cold. It has a large vent/slit in back so that the coat doesn't bunch up on the horse and falls over the majority of the legs for protection. What I love about it is that it
moves and swings like a dream, and that's what I'm really after with the camo coat. Since we're not really riding horses when we're out glamping, I'm most interested in how it moves, than if I can wear it on a horse, but I'm also interested in being authentic. The camo is going to be enough of a design variance, that I don't need to be doing funny stuff with the design.
And the camo with a cowboy duster look, is enough "western" that both look really great
together, sort of reminding me of something Ralph Lauren would do. And speaking of Ralph Lauren - it's always good to check in with those classic designers to see how they solved the big design problem.
And they all match, and probably have the price to reflect the matching, probably in the $2,000 line. Which shows you the real value of matching. The crazy thing is that not many will notice. The "notice" comes when it's wrong, but even
not-matching has gotten to the point where that's not an eye-sore. It's not like I haven't done this before....
I had a blast doing this jacket, I'm just into a longer look right now. And I have five green coats. They are gorgeous, but I need another color.
But this settles the dilemma of that beautiful Genevieve Coat from Style arc - I'll do that in the camo and do another pattern in the "duster/cowboy/Indian blanket" look.
Isn't the artistic process fun? Especially when you have a
couple of snow sew days to play around with. It's like a vacation from all the other things that are vying for your attention, and you can simply say - "fiddle-dee-dee, I'll think about that tomorrow!!!!" And then -
I get to sew today!
The SewingArtistry Resource Library is designed to contain information to not only make your sewing better, but to aid in you fitting and flattering your shape, size and style. Check it out.
Look for future classes coming in 2024
The Core Pattern Shirt, (one of my favorites for woven core pattern that you can make into a myriad of different
garments),
Basic Knit Top (core pattern class for knit basic tops, shells, tees, dresses, and tunics)
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