I can’t believe a week ago I was still up at Camp Workroom Social (CWRS)! This weekend I had some time to finish up my Ellsworth Coat – I had such little left to finish it was silly to keep pushing off! My perpetual fear of buttonholes can always deter me, but not this time!
Before I jump in to talking about the coat, if you missed my recaps of CWRS make sure to check them out here and here! I talked a lot about the experience of camp along with what being in the intensive was like where here I’ll talk about the coat and the pattern that I sewed up that weekend.
The Pattern
The Ellsworth Coat is a fully lined double breasted coat. It features a notched collar, top stitching for a finished look and patch pockets. The coat is intended to sit at mid-thigh and has a more relaxed fit.
When talking to Christine at CWRS, she explained that this coat is meant to be a great first coat – it has very traditional coat details but includes things like a patch pocket to make assembly easier than a more traditional welt pocket. It also allows for this pattern to be a good candidate for different hacks depending on what you want the finished product to look like!
The Coat
The main reason I signed up for Jacketmaking at CWRS was to improve my jacket making skills and learn tips and tricks. While I really have loved the Ellsworth Coat on others, I was nervous about the shaping on it on me as I normally go for a more fitted coat. But trying to keep my goal of the class in mind, I picked a fabric I loved and sewed up the coat – and I think it turned out pretty nice!
My favorite feature of the jacket is it’s length and the fact it’s fully lined. Having a jacket be fully lined takes out the annoying hemming step on both the sleeve cuffs and the hem.
In a future version, I would definitely want to size down for a more fitted look. Also, I think I would want to eliminate the patch pocket for either a welt pocket or a side seam pocket (which would be a bit more difficult due to the lining).
The Fabric
Guys, this fabric was amazing. One of the many reasons I love Stitch Sew Shop is her ability to source such amazing fabrics. When I saw this fabric there, I couldn’t get it out of my head! I had wanted to make a hot pink jacket (because one hot pink winter jacket isn’t enough…right?) but didn’t want to make it out of a solid twill (because that seemed boring!).
This fabric definitely brought it’s challenges though. It frayed like crazy – like I was convinced that it might have turned out to be a smaller size than I originally cut it was fraying so much. (It also won me the Muppet Wrangler award because of that!). I think I will forever be finding pink threads in my sewing room and in the suitcase I brought to Camp!
The fabric also had an extremely loose weave which had its benefits and it’s negatives as well. Fortunately I managed the whole project without having to use the seam ripper (how did that happen???) because if I had had to use a seam ripper, I had no idea how it was going to work because of how loose the weave was. But because it was so loose it was really easy to set in the sleeve and get the fabric to do what you needed it to because it was very malleable.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a Handmade by Lara Liz coat without some beautiful Liberty lining. Surprisingly that did not like to cooperate for sleeve setting purposes, but ti was on the inside so I didn’t worry too much.
The Ellsworth Coat was a great learning coat that I would recommend to anyone new to coat making. While it wasn’t 100% my style, it taught me so much and I still like the way it turned out. A size down I think would go a long way on making the coat a little bit more fitted.
Ellsworth Coat SUMMARY
Size Made: 8
View: Only 1 view
Fabric Used: Rayon Wool Blend from Stitch Sew Shop
Notions Used: Nothing special – mainly because I stunk at packing for camp!
Ease of Construction: This is a great first coat for sewists! Christine’s instructions are really well done and this is a great skill builder coat.
Fit: Good – I think to make it more “me” I would make some fit adjustments mentioned above.
Repeatable? With fit adjustments – probably. But there are so many other coats on my to-sew list I might sew some of those first!
It looks lovely, Lara! Good for you for finishing it up and not letting it languish 😉
Thank you!! It was so nice to meet you at Camp!