[Obsessive Costuming Dude (Alex)]

Sounds like you have some good training under your belt!

I'm looking forward to seeing your progress.

As for the fabric color, the only thing that matters is whether or not you're happy with it. 🙂

[Captenaj]

I didn't want to go through the work and expense of making the jacket just to have a poor fit, so something I learned from the Craftsy classes was to take your time with the muslins. The first muslin I made was size small. Being 5'4″ tall and about 135 lbs, I figured it would be plenty big. It was not. I found it tight across the back and too short for my liking. The sleeves were too long as well. And I learned I need to be a bit more generous with the side elastic.

The second muslin I made was the medium. I liked the length much better and it wasn't tight across the back but it dropped off my shoulders too much. I had taken the Craftsy class “Fitting Solo: From Measurements to Muslin” with Linda Lee where she taught how to measure, what the proper ease is for different articles of clothing, and how to make modifications to the pattern so it fits better. With this knowledge I shortened the sleeves and took about an inch off of each shoulder seam (while maintaining the armscye size). Then I made a third muslin. Much better.

Next, cutting the fabric.

[Obsessive Costuming Dude (Alex)]

Proper fitting is sssoooo important. I'm glad you've taken the time to establish a good fit before tackling the actual uniform. 🙂

I'm sorry you had to start with a more generically-sized men's pattern. I do plan to do a numerically-sized women's (and men's) pattern ASAP after I finish these sewing courses.

[Captenaj]

Cutting the fabric always makes me a bit nervous. I just have to
remember that I have purchased extra and I can always buy more. Today's
lesson for myself was the grain line for the lining. That stuff is so
slippery that I found it impossible to double up the fabric and keep the
grain lines aligned on both halves. After cutting the sleeve linings a
bit wonky I discovered the trick of ripping the material to define the
grain line. Then I cut only a single layer of lining at a time. That
seemed to work better. Still the lining does not hold its shape like the
body fabric, or even the muslin does, so I learned to carefully mark
the orientation of each piece. But let's just say I'm glad I got extra
lining fabric when I made my purchases.

[Obsessive Costuming Dude (Alex)]

Lining can be difficult to cut properly. As you mentioned, it's typically not as dimensionally stable as the garment's outer fabric.

I generally don't like cutting two layers of fabric at once, but I usually don't mind with lining.

I prefer to use pattern weights and trace the pattern pieces onto the lining using tailor's chalk before cutting, and possibly even pin the two layers of lining together along the outer edges of the traced panels before cutting.

This helps “lock everything into place” while cutting. 🙂

[Captenaj]

Assembling the pieces was going smoothly, after all it's my fourth time
doing it, until I pinned the back yoke to the back body assembly. I
discovered my back yoke was about 1/2″ too short. It must have happened
when I had to make modifications to the action pleat after I took an
inch off the shoulder seam. It seemed to work OK on my muslin so I'm not
sure why it's too short here. I'm going to stretch the back yoke just a
little (not the full 1/2″) and then I'll make the sleeve seam allowance
just a little shy of 3/8″. Hopefully that will do it.

[Captenaj]

For all of your more experienced sewers out there, you'll be happy to know I didn't stretch the yoke to fit the body assembly. I cut two more back yoke pieces and attached the longer piece to the body assembly. That means I didn't have to skimp on the sleeve allowance seam and all was happy in the area of the armscye. The sleeve didn't meet the action pleat exactly but it was pretty close so I'm good with it.

Next up, sewing the lining.

[Captenaj]

This lining fabric is going to be the end of me. It is so slippery that I have trouble keeping the edges of the fabric lined up. But it's all hidden so it doesn't really matter. I opted for a pocket in the lining so I made good use of the pieces of lining I discarded earlier to practice this new skill. I relied heavily on the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?<wbr>v=on2kcoGPR3Q but there are many online tutorials available. After a bit of experimentation I decided on interfaced muslin for the pocket bag with fashion fabric for the welt and facing. It turned out pretty good I think!

Despite challenges working with lining fabric, it really wasn't too bad. I just kept it slow and steady and all was well.

[Captenaj]

I know it's not part of a screen replica uniform, but I couldn't see wearing this jacket and not being able to close it. Alex advised that if I wanted to install a zipper, it should be a separating invisible zipper. So I set out to learn yet another new skill. After fretting about it for weeks, and installing and ripping out the zipper from my various muslins, I found it is really quite simple to install. I'll spare you the detail of technique but I'm glad I went through the trouble of doing this.

[Captenaj]

Hand sewing the sleeve lining to the sleeve – the instructions said to sew raw edges together but I found the lining was way too long and almost peaked out past the edge of the sleeve when I did this. I ended up turning the sleeve lining up a full inch and sewing the fold line to the inside of the sleeve. It seemed to work much better for me.

All I have left is sewing the bottom hem up so I tried on the jacket and paraded around a bit. Unfortunately, the action pleats sagged open so it looked like I was wearing a backpack. It seemed the spandex was not pulling the pleats into place enough so I pinned a fold into the center of the spandex to tighten it up. That looked a lot better! If that hadn't worked, my next choice was to sew the action pleats closed which would have been OK but I'd rather they worked as designed.

[Captenaj]

Finished product!

• This reply was modified 2 years, 5 months ago by  Captenaj.

[Obsessive Costuming Dude (Alex)]

Congratulations on finishing the jacket! Nice job! 🙂