The Peacoat
Last weekend, Rob and I went to the wonderful county of Dorset to visit my parents who are renting a cottage there for a few months. It was beautiful. Cold and a bit wet but beautiful. I love visiting Dorset, it's such a picturesque part of England it's hard to believe it's part of England at all! "A merely realistic dream country" as Thomas Hardy put it.
We were graced with a rare sunny morning and went for a walk with my dad and his dogs to see the country side in all its muddy glory (I was at one pint ankle deep in mud - I sank right to the top of boot but luckily not enough for it to pour inside!) Still it's always nice to have a bit of a reconnection with the country side and freshen up the lungs a bit after city life.
My trusty Mallard pattern weight!
After we got back I got back to work on the peacoat. First step - cutting out the fabric. (Ok, so technically this isn't the first step. Making the toile was the first step, which I have already done.) I decided to trace around all of the pattern pieces with tailors chalk before cutting. Normally I just cut around the tissue paper. I'm not going to lie this step took me pretty much all afternoon. There's a lot of pieces to this coat! I do like the fact that it kinda looks like a blue print like this. But then, I guess it kind of is!
My Peacoat blue print!
Next up, I tailor tacked my marks. I've never used tailors tacks before but I decided as this is a tailored coat I'd do as the tailors do! I used basting thread for my tacks as it's quite chunky and show up well - not that normal thread wouldn't have on this fabric.
Seam lines drawn
Third and final step for this part was marking out the seam lines which was actually quite a therapeutic exercise. I guess it's the monotony of the task. I did strangely enjoy though, but that could have been the film I was also watching on Netflix at the time...
And hey presto, almost ready to go to the machine!