Blue Chanel Jacket – Part 3: Sewing

This is the third part of my journey creating my Chanel Jacket. The first part outlined how I gathered all the supplies and created a well fitting toile (ie. test garment in calico). In the second part I cut out and prepared my fabric for sewing. In this post I’ll discuss the sewing and construction of the jacket, and my thoughts on the process.

At the start I’d like to apologise for the lack of photos at some stages of construction. I lost quite a few shots when my phone took a dive into the toilet and couldn’t be resuscitated. I then had to use my son’s phone which had awful battery power it was just about unusable. Oh, and the fact that I sometimes forgot to take photos.

Related Posts
Why I decided to make a Chanel Jacket
Blue Chanel Jacket – Part 1: Supplies and Toile
Blue Chanel Jacket – Part 2: Cutting Out

Quilting the Jacket

The Chanel jacket is constructed in a unique fashion. The outer fabric is quilted to the lining before all the parts of the jacket are sewn together. This provides extra stability to the boucle fabric which has a very loose weave.

When I looked at my boucle fabric closely I saw it had a noticeable raised grid with a thicker thread that created 3cm squares. I followed these lines during the quilting process.

The quilting had to be done away from seam lines and hems by 5cm so that they don’t interfere later on during the construction of the jacket. So the first step was to baste the boucle and lining pieces together along these quilting lines. Below is a rough guideline on my calico pattern pieces of where the quilting went, as marked with my dodgy red lines.

The under sleeve didn’t need to be quilted as it was only 8cm wide so would be too close to the seams. I just basted down the centre vertically to keep the boucle and lining together.

To do the quilting I used a walking foot on my Janome Memory Craft 3500. I used a Sharp 80 needle, and a stitch length of 3.5, with the boucle on top. As I had a light blue boucle and a navy lining I decided to use two different thread colours so any wobbly sewing lines would blend in to the fabric. The needle thread was Light Blue (Gutermann 75) and bobbin thread was Navy (Gutermann 310). Fortunately the thread was perfectly balanced with the default tension of 4.0 so there was no show through of the wrong colour.

Sewing the Bodice

The quilted pieces were then ready to sew together on the seamlines. During this stage only the boucle is sewn together and the lining kept out of the way. The side fronts were sewn to centre fronts, and the side backs sewn to the back. And finally the shoulder seams sewn together. (I’ll cover the sewing of sleeves shortly.)

As mentioned in Part 2 of this series, all seamlines were thread basted on each piece so I put in pins along these seamlines making sure the pin ran exactly on the seamline on both sides. Then I sewed the seam with a walking foot, Univeral 80 needle and straight stitch that was set to a stitch length of 3.0 and default tension of 4.0. In this case I had light blue thread in the needle and the bobbin. Each stitching line started and finished where two seams intersected or at the hem line. The seams were pressed flat on both sides and then pressed open.

The hem was basted into position and then it was time to try on the jacket to see how it fit. The centre fronts were carefully pinned together and the neckline tucked under. Putting it on was a bit of a challenge due to all the extra wide seam allowances so I did a little bit of clipping in the underarm.

There were a few tweaks required to get a really good fit and I found that constantly pinning the centre fronts together when trying it on was going to be time consuming. So, I decided to sew the hooks and eyes down the centre front that I had planned to put in later in the construction process. This saved time and was a lot more accurate than pinning, and as it happened they didn’t need moving so they were only sewn in once.

Over the course of two weeks I made some minor adjustments, and once it was fitting well I gave all the seams a good press, using a tailors ham on curved areas and pressed with a clapper to help hold in the shape. All seams were then trimmed to 2.5cm.

Hand Sewing Bodice Lining

The boucle seams were sewn by machine but the lining was left free. Of course the lining couldn’t be machine sewn so it was all hand sewn. There are a few ways this can be done but I chose the easiest method (to me anyway).

For the centre front and side front seam I laid the side front lining over the opened seam and the centre front piece. I pinned along the seam line and trimmed the side front lining seam allowance to 3cm. The lining for the centre front was then folded under along the line of pins and pressed in place, trimming excess lining where necessary. I then hand basted a line of stitches about 5mm from the lining fold on the centre front side to keep everything in place temporarily. This was repeated for the other centre front to side front, the side backs to the back, the side seams and the shoulder seams.

The lining hem was trimmed to 3cm past the edge of the jacket, and folded about 5mm from the edge of the boucle fold, and basted in position.

Finally, all these folded edges were hand sewn with a single navy thread with a fell stitch. This was done over a few days watching movies and listening to audio books.

Sewing on the Trim

I purposely choose a very flexible gimp braid from The Button Bar that was easily maneuvered around the neck curve, and a small fold at the centre front turn. I first basted it in place 5mm from the edge, before hand stitching with a double navy thread catching just a thread or two of the braid three times on one side of the braid then on the other side, as shown below.

Sewing Pockets

To trial placement and size of pockets I pinned the provided pattern pieces to the jacket to see how they looked but found they weren’t quite the right size so I cut out some larger ones in paper, pinned them in place until I was happy with the look. I found that four pockets definitely took on the “Chanel” look and suited my figure.

The top pockets wer 11cm high and 12.5cm wide, and the bottom pockets were 12cm high and 15cm wide. The placement lines were thread traced on to the jacket so that they were 5.5cm from centre front, the bottom pocket was 3.5cm from the jacket hem, and there was a gap of 1.5cm between the top and bottom pocket.

Each pocket had a layer of organza to give it a bit more support as the boucle is a bit floppy. The seam allowances were folded to the wrong side and the corners mitered. These edges were basted. The lining was then laid on the back of the pocket with 2cm extra around each pocket, the edges folded in leaving a 5mm gap between the boucle pocket edge and the lining. The pocket lining was basted to the back of each pocket, and finally hand sewn with a single navy thread with a fell stitch.

The braid was hand sewn 5mm from the top of each pocket, with the braid folded under itself at each end for the least amount of bulk. The pockets were then basted on the placement lines on the jacket. More hand sewing with a double light blue thread using a fell stitch.

As an added detail I added a non-functional button to the centre of each button, that was sewed just to the pocket. I don’t think I’ll use the pockets (that’s what pant pockets are for) so I’ll see how it wears and if the pockets keep gapping open I’ll stitch the buttons through all layers.

Sewing and Attaching Sleeves

The sleeves were quilted, boucle seams sewn and linings finished in the same fashion as the bodice. The only difference was the sleeve vent had a 5cm square piece of organza tacked at the top of the sleeve vent as it had to be clipped to create a vent with right angle.

I didn’t have enough trim to go around the entire sleeve hem so I had to settle for just a short strip on the sleeve vent. I also didn’t want to attempt buttonholes on the sleeves so the buttons were just sewn through all layers. The sleeve vent was sewn down with single light blue thread with a catch stitch to ensure it stayed put.

Then it came to the hardest task of making the jacket – hanging the sleeves! From my research online and talking to others, sleeves were definitely going to be tricky. I tried putting them in myself, but after pinning them, trying it on, noting adjustments, taking it off again, I knew it wouldn’t work. I asked my husband to give it a go and he just didn’t know how to handle all the layers of thick fabric and was afraid of poking me. So this is when I had my “Phone a friend” moment. I organised to visit to my sewing friend to pin them in for me. And what a life saver she was.

I hand sewed the sleeves with double light blue thread and a fell stitch, including a hand sewing session waiting for my car to be serviced (not the yellow one in the photo). So with a chai from the coffee machine, my headphones on with an audio book playing I stitched for a few hours.

The right sleeve went in like a charm and looked really good. I did have to add 2 layers of boucle as a makeshift shoulder pad that were 7cm wide and the length of the shoulder seam plus 5cm to give it a little lift and act as a sleeve head, but all in all it looked perfect. But the left sleeve was a bane in my side for quite a while. It just didn’t want to sit properly and I must have re-stitched it six times to get it to look reasonably good. It too needed the 2 layers of boucle for a shoulder pad, to cope with my sloping shoulders.

Then the lining was hand stitched closed, like the other lining seams with single navy thread and fell stitch.

Sewing on the Chain

The last task for the jacket is to handsew the chain to the inside of jacket hem. This is to provide weight so that the jacket hangs nicely. The jacket at this stage was quite heavy so I found it was easiest to sew with the jacket on a table. Working from right to left I used a double navy thread with a few stitches in the top chain loop right against the centre front edge, then another two stitches in the next loop on the bottom of the chain. I only used thread that was 30cm long when folded in half so that if the thread did come undone only a short length of chain would be affected. This of course meant there was lots of threading of my needle and the need for my reading glasses.

Jacket is Complete!

I started working on this jacket in February 2020 with the Australian Sewing Guild’s – Couture Chanel Cardigan Sew-along, but as it spanned 12 weeks, I took 44 weeks (12the February 2020 to 18th December 2020), including many breaks when it seemed all too hard. Now that I’ve finished the jacket I’m so glad that I persevered, even if it’s just to prove to myself that I can do the hard stuff.

It involved a lot of hand sewing, but I did come to enjoy the process as I made use of this time by listening to music on Spotify and audio books, and half watching movies. I’m so happy with how the jacket has turned out. But, I was very surprised how heavy it was so thought I’d weigh it – 1402g (3lbs) – that has to be the heaviest thing I’ve made. This means I will only wear when it when it’s quite cool, and as its Summer in Australia at present it’ll be a while before I get to wear it.

What I Learnt

1. Fitting is hard (actually I already knew that)
2. When buying fabric take into account extra wide seams and hems
3. Boucle has a very open weave so lining may be visible through those little gaps
4. Use pins with a large head, like flower head ones with boucle fabric, especially when putting in the sleeves
5. Hand sewing is time consuming so enjoy it by watching a movie, listening to music, take it to appointments like having a car serviced

Supply List

• Susan Khalje – Classic French Jacket Pattern
• Blue Chanel boucle fabric and silk organza from Tatiana Light in Unley, South Australia
• Navy Nightlife Stretch Polyester Satin Lining from Ferrier Fashion in Fullarton, South Australia
• Buttons and Trim from The Button Bar in Adelaide. South Australia
• Silver Chain from Craft Cubs Supplies on Etsy
• Gutermann Basting and Polyester Threads and Coat Hooks and Eyes from Spotlight
• Armosoft Underlining was in my stash (Used on all pieces as the navy lining could be seen through the open weave of the boucle)

Machine Settings