I have been on a jacket making kick the past couple months and when the Hampton Jean Jacket from Alina Sewing and Design Co came out in April, I was so drawn to it! I loved jean jackets in high school – they were the perfect layering piece for those cooler summer nights or the chilly AC inside of buildings. I’m headed to Disney World at the end of the week and thought a jean jacket would be perfect for the trip!
The Hampton Jean Jacket is a modern take on the classic jean jacket. It features all the classics of a jean jacket – welt pockets, in-panel top pockets, two piece sleeves and all that top stitching!
I am also a huge fan of the Indiesew seasonal collections – this was no exception. This is the first pattern I’ve made in the Indiesew Spring/Summer collection this year, and I plan on making all 5 patterns. I’ve made the Ogden and the Charleston Dress before, but I think I’ll make another set this summer.
I wanted to make a Hampton Jeans Jacket in white denim because I am a sucker for just about anything white denim. Also, I was afraid of the whole distressing of denim and thought white denim would be the easier way out. Finding white stretch or non-stretch denim is way harder than I would have ever expected. I was searching for white stretch denim to make Gingers (which I found and the denim was TERRIBLE – it has no recovery at all, super sad unwearable pair of Gingers) and thought since I couldn’t find stretch white denim, finding non-stretch would be easy. That was wrong also – I ended up getting some White Robert Kaufman Zuma PDF denim. I’m pretty sure this is “ready to dye” denim, but it worked just fine for my needs – as white denim.
Similar to my Ginger Jeans, I used a double jeans needle for all of the top stitching. I used white thread for both the stitching and the top stitching to make it neutral. The pattern suggests a combo of flat fell seams and faux flat fell seams. I decided to just use all faux flat felled seams.
Alina’s instructions are amazing – I made my jean jacket in a few days and it was due to the clear instructions I was able to keep plugging along with out issue. I really like how her instructions are laid out, in sections, to keep you focused on the current task and then you complete it and move on to the next part. Welt pockets? No problem – by the time you’ve gotten to the end of the section you’ve barely realized that you just made a welt pocket!
A couple weeks ago I ordered a variety pack of jeans hardware from Wawak and settled on the solid plain nickel buttons for the jacket. The jean jacket uses SO many buttons – 14 in total. Fortunately, I ran out of the solid plain nickel ones as I hammered in the last button on the button band! Phew! Installing the hardware is always tough – I didn’t have a super sharp object to help me poke through the thick denim, which would have helped – but I was able to get them all installed.
The hardest part was the button holes on the button band. I’m not sure what my machine was doing, but it made a mess. I decided to put the button holes away for a while and come back to them at a later time. As I don’t plan on buttoning it up, it’s not a huge loss that 3 of the front button holes are non-functioning right?
Now I’m finding myself looking at denim online to make another one….jacket making is so addicting.
Hampton Jean Jacket Summary:
Size Made: 8
View: Only one view
Fabric Used: Robert Kaufman Zuma Denim PFD White
Notions Used: Jeans Double Needle, 14 Jeans Buttons, Hammer, Buttonhole Foot
Ease of Construction: It was a lot of steps, but the instructions and the sewalong make it very systematic and straight forward
Fit: Perfect!
Repeatable? Yes – if I can find a denim that looks “distressed” enough!
this turned out so great!!
Thank you!!
Congratulations on another me-made Lara! Love your jacket on you – people will be astonished when they hear you made this jacket honestly – so professional! And what a brilliant idea to make it out of white denim and how you found what you wanted – that was a VERY helpful tip!
Thanks so much! I really love how it turned out – white denim is so much harder to find than I expected it to be!
This looks so good! I’m nervous about distressing denim, too, which I think is key for a great denim-colored jean jacket. Maybe white is a better entry point! Although it’s so disappointing that your Gingers are unwearable… 🙁
I think the white denim is a nice no stakes choice – plus I really love the way white denim looks! I am super bummed about my Gingers – this is the second pair I’ve made recently that I’ve had fabric issues with. Which is just such a bummer because they are really time intensive.