Dogtooth Kingston Jacket!

Dogtooth Kingston Jacket

Pattern - Kingston Jacket Ladies

Buy Pattern Here

Kingston Jacket Add On

Buy Add On Here

Thumbhole Tutorial

How To Add Thumbholes

Hey everyone, so I’m back again showing off a little something I’ve been busy working on, you may have already seen this on my Instagram or Twitter but here’s a complete write up... Now I can’t really remember how I found this pattern, but I do remember thinking “This... This is just SO me, I need to make it!!!” the pattern I’m talking about is the Kingston Jacket & Add-On from Rebecca Page.

The Kingston Jacket is like the ultimate pick ‘n mix pattern, you choose what sleeves and what kind of pockets you want and if you get the Add-On pattern you get even more to choose from, different pockets, another sleeve option, a hood and even a back frill... All in all, there are 6 sleeve options, 4 pocket options, a hood or a collar and an optional back frill so lots of choice! The minute I saw it I was picturing loads of combinations, then with a very sobering thought I quickly realised that I had made the grand total of ZERO dressmaking projects and maybe two or three things with my sewing machine at this point, so with that in mind I set out to gain the required skills to make it, or to give myself half a shot at the very least... I could have winged it and just went for it but it wasn’t something I wanted to rush into, I didn’t want to end up ruining the fabric by constantly unpicking it or doing it and hating it entirely, so I took my time and didn’t even buy the pattern until I felt comfortable going for it, which may seem a bit over the top but I know myself, I would have been too tempted. To prepare myself (more mentally than anything) I made two tops in cotton, a denim Hepworth Apron (pattern from Jenni Smith) and read A LOT of books, blogs and articles about working with denim and knit fabrics before I felt ready to attempt this jacket. While I was playing with the different patterns and fabrics I found that I really loved making my own clothes... It wasn’t something I set out to do when I first got my sewing machine but after one garment I was well and truly hooked, I loved the process, I loved the way it felt to wear the finished item, how proud I felt when someone commented on it... I just really loved the whole thing... In short? I was hooked!

Patternsy Delivery!

The only downside to the pattern (and bear in mind I use the word downside very loosely here) was that it was a PDF download only, meaning that I had to either print it out and stick it all together at home OR get it printed at a print shop, I didn’t really feel like printing it at home because it seems like such a mission so I set out to find a place to get it printed, and that’s how I found Patternsy. Patternsy are a brilliant pattern printing company, they print on thin tissue paper and they even have a few options so they can make the printing even cheaper for you, I looked at a few printing shops and the quotes to print this pattern cost a fair bit more, almost twice as much in some places and they have zero experience with sewing patterns, they can just print the A0 format. After I had uploaded my files I worked out that there were some sheets that I didn’t need printing because they were just some of the sleeve options that I’m never going to use, and the staff were fantastic, after a few emails everything was sorted, and my order was paid for and done! When it arrived, I was pretty impressed with the print job... the paper is super thin, so I wasn’t expecting it to be as clear as it was or for the paper to be as resilient as it is, I have unfolded and refolded these sheets a fair few times now and they are still as good as they were when they arrived. I had always wanted to make this jacket a few times in a few different sizes so for this reason I wanted to keep the master pattern intact, so I traced the pattern onto greaseproof paper in the size I wanted, and the greaseproof paper has worked a treat.

My fabric and thread choices

By the time I had the pattern printed I had made my decision on what combination of pockets, sleeves etc I wanted to use to make my jacket (I went for the knit sleeves, knit hood, internal pockets and welt pockets from the Add On and the chest pockets from the main pattern) but I didn’t know what fabrics or even what colours I wanted to do it in so I spent some time going through the different fabric sections on the Minerva Crafts website and that’s where I found this awesome dark teal dogtooth quilted jersey fabric, the moment I saw it I fell completely and utterly in love with it, and once I had stumbled across this gem it was easy to work out the rest. I chose a bright teal Gütermann top stitching thread and matching sew-all thread, 17mm silver star Prym Jeans buttons, a glitter silver 120cm flat shoelace for the hood drawstring and I pulled a Star Wars fat quarter out of my stash for the welt pockets and then it came time to choose the denim... I decided to do it in an 8oz denim, so I was looking through the colour options available and decided I wanted to go with a very light blue, so I placed my order and waited... When the fabric came everything was brilliant... until I noticed weird stains and splotches all over the fabric... Now here is where I can’t praise the staff at Minerva Crafts enough they were all so patient and helpful during the whole ordeal, the next day I rang them up and the lady I spoke to was absolutely brilliant, after a quick chat the return was arranged and another order was placed for the same fabric, she put a note on the order asking the warehouse staff to check the new piece for the same stains and then requested that they also send it up to the office so they could check it too. Unfortunately a little while later I got a phone call back from them saying that they’d checked the whole bolt of fabric and it was all damaged, so I decided rather than wait for more of it to come into stock that I would choose a different colour, this time I decided to go for the other end of the scale and went for black denim thinking that the thread would really pop against it, again they were going to check it over as it was from the same supplier, but alas it wasn’t meant to be, an hour or so later I got an email saying it was unexpectedly out of stock and as silly as it sounds I really didn’t want to wait the 7-10 days that it would have taken to come back in stock then be delivered to me, so third time lucky I rang them and we changed the colour again... this time going for the next blue up from the denim I initially ordered and I cannot even begin to tell you how happy I was when I got that dispatch email!

My Dressmaking Project Bible

In between all this happening I was talking to another company who make some of the best stationery products I’ve come across, Stationery Geek, a few months before they had posted a photo of their calendar with all their upcoming events on their Instagram and I spotted an upcoming release for a Dressmaking Project Bible. I was anxiously awaiting the release of this item because I already have the Crochet Project Bible and I can’t even begin to tell you how helpful it’s been to keep all my projects in line, so I was desperate for the dressmaking one, anyway I was talking to them about another one of their products and just inquired about the dressmaking bible and they asked me for some help/advice on the terminology etc for the book and I was more than happy to help out. The reason I’m writing about this here is because my Dressmaking Bible was absolutely invaluable while making my Kingston jacket, I was able to write down all the different tension settings, stitch lengths, stitch types and I was able to keep track of the differential settings for my overlocker too, because of the two different fabric types, the different threads and the two different machines it was just too much to keep track of mentally so I drew up a small chart to keep track of everything. I will be writing a separate blog post to review the dressmaking bible soon (probably next) so if you want to see more of that then definitely keep your eyes peeled!

Welt pocket

So, after pre-washing all the fabric and cutting out all the pieces I needed I sat down with some scraps and worked out all the settings I needed to use for each fabric, I tried out the buttonholes and the different stitch and fabric combinations I’d be working with and wrote down all my findings in my Dressmaking Bible. I had never done flat fell seams or worked with knit fabric before, so I managed to combine a lot of the testing with a bit of practising too, the instructions are so detailed and easy to follow I really can’t fault them at all, I didn’t get lost or confused once. The instructions are comprehensive, so I got them printed and went through them with a highlighter to highlight all crucial pieces of information, mainly for the flat fell seams, I didn’t want to start sewing with the wrong piece on top!

Starting to look like a jacket!

When I finally sat down to sew I slowly worked my way through the instructions and at the end of each step I was that much closer to having something that resembled a jacket, watching it grow from a few pieces of fabric into something that was so recognisable was so gratifying, I’m not going to lie and tell you that it all went perfectly the first time because it didn’t, don’t get me wrong there were no major mistakes or issues, it was mainly due to me being a bit of a perfectionist, basically I unpicked any part that I wasn’t 100% happy with, even if it was just one stitch that I wasn’t happy with. I had to redo the hood completely because somehow it managed to completely move and was a good inch or so out on one side (actually thinking about it now it might have stretched while I was sewing it), but honestly that was something I should have double checked before attaching it anyway, it was also the last bit of sewing that day so I was probably tired too, but either way I had more than enough fabric left to cut another hood and I didn’t even want to attempt to salvage it once I’d unpicked it because it had also got a weird chunk out of it so I’m guessing something went seriously weird while I was overlocking… Don’t sew/overlock when you are tired folks!! One part that kind of irritated me was the way my buttonholes came out... They looked really messy around the raw edges so I just got my needle and thread out and whipped around the edges of them so they looked neater and were more secure, they just looked more finished now and I'm much happier with them.

The buttonhole on the left is "finished" and the one on the right is "unfinished"

Internal pocket

I had also decided while I was looking through the pattern that I wanted to do thumb holes in the cuffs... I am a HUGE fan of thumb holes and all my favourite jackets have them, so I knew this one had to have them too. I’ve got quite long arms so I had to not only lengthen the cuffs to accommodate the thumb holes I also needed to lengthen the sleeves, this is the first pattern that I’ve done any kind of pattern adjustments to and I’m quite pleased with the method I came up with, the pattern pieces for the knit sleeves and cuffs don’t have lengthen/shorten lines so I made my own.

Only missing the waistband!

I used the grid on my cutting mat to line up the grainline so I could add the lengthen line about half way down the sleeve (just below where the elbow would be) and the same with the pattern piece for the cuff, although with the cuff you have to take into account the fact that the pattern piece for the cuff is going to be folded in half so you have to lengthen each side of the fold line the same amount. I did contact the Rebecca Page customer service about this because being a newbie I didn’t want to do it wrong, especially if there was a specific point where I should be adding the length but I was impatient and thought “If they say to do it a different way then I’ll just retrace the pattern piece and redo it!”, turns out I had done it right. I also told them why I wanted to lengthen them, and they pointed me in the direction of one of their videos on their YouTube page showing you how to do thumb holes. It’s a truly fantastic tutorial and it worked first time, now I’m not going to lie and say it’s so easy because it isn’t... Well it is, it’s just a bit fiddly because you’re basically doing origami with the fabric, which in hindsight would have probably been a lot easier if I wasn’t using a quilted fabric... Nonetheless I pulled it off and now I have a seriously awesome jacket with the thumb holes of dreams!!!!!

I LOVE IT!!!

I definitely wouldn’t hesitate to buy another pattern from Rebecca Page, I’ve actually already got my eye on a few ;) and I also have another 2 versions of this jacket in mind, one of which me and my sister have been toying with for a few months now, it was actually an idea that was being developed even before I had bought the pattern, and we’ve just started gathering up the materials needed to make them... I am really bursting at the seams to spill the beans on the plans for this jacket, but I really want the surprise unveiling so much more so you’re going to have to wait for the blog post or the Instagram photos to drop! I will be back soon with another post, and I’m hoping to film some more YouTube videos this week!