Made By A Fabricista: A Designer-Inspired Jacket in an Embroidered Silk Suiting

Hello my sewing friends!

When September rolls around many of us look forward to wearing cozy sweaters while sipping pumpkin spice lattes. However, I live in a warm ­weather state – umm, scratch that – I live in a hot weather state, and I wear layering pieces rather than cozy sweaters. Like this jacket!

Vogue 1831 is a Gucci-inspired jacket pattern that was released a few months ago. The fully lined jacket looks like a basic jacket from the front, but turn around and you’ll find an inverted pleat with an adorable bow detail!

I wanted to sew this jacket to wear with jeans and when I saw this embroidered silk suiting, I knew I’d found my fabric.

There is a gold metallic swirl embroidered into the fabric that glitters slightly when the light hits those threads. Trust me, the photos don’t capture the beauty of this fabric.

Although this fabric was listed as dry-clean, I preshrunk it in the machine using a gentle cycle with a cold wash and cold rinse. I placed it in the dryer on low heat. Just a reminder, it’s always a good idea to test a sample of your dry-clean fabric first as not all of them will be okay after being machine washed.

To sew the jacket, I used a size 12 universal Schmetz needle and black all-purpose thread. Inside I used Palmer/Pletsch Perfect Fuse medium interfacing, and a surprise pop of color! The lining is a NY designer rayon lining with purple, raspberry, red, and gold stripes. I used a remnant of faux leather I had in my stash for the contrast collar.

Both the original designer jacket and the Vogue sewing pattern included patch pockets on the front of the jacket at the bust. I eliminated those as I thought they looked odd, and they certainly weren’t functional due to the location. I also did a full bust adjustment using a pivot and slide method so there would not be a dart at the side seam.

Now those metallic threads are gorgeous, but they did present a few challenges. I discovered the threads were difficult to cut so I ended up cutting all my pattern pieces single layer. The threads were a bit scratchy against my skin, but the lining took care of that.

I also found the threads made the fabric too stiff for the back bow detail, which is actually two pieces. There is a small loop sewn into at the bottom of the back yoke and the bow piece is inserted into the loop. I cut both of those pattern pieces in half and used a lightweight fabric on the inside of the loop and on the underside of the bow.

Because the jacket is fully lined, I did not finish the seams. Due to the inverted pleat at the center back of this jacket, the lining hangs free at the hem line, so I finish the jacket hem with a Hong Kong finish using bias strips of the lining. That way if the lining flips up that hem edge looks quite nice.

After a summer of quick sewing projects, it was nice to slow down and enjoy the process of creating this jacket.

This is a versatile layering piece! I plan to wear it most often with jeans, but it can easily be paired with trousers or even a short pencil skirt. I know I’ll be wearing this one a lot this season.

SHARON | @thesharonsews