The Jalie Cardigan - Don't you want one?

Owning an amazing fabric store sure has it's perks! It truly is a job that some folks dream about and I know why! My dream job is made so much sweeter with collaboration of all kinds. Laurel, of Laurel's Quill, along with my loving team at the store, all stay focused on what great new patterns, fabric and notions we can find for your next sewing inspirations. Lucky me, because I get to experiment and wear so many unique and expressive garments! Many of them are up around my store  and I hope you can come in soon to see them.

SAVE THE DATE!!! Come visit Laurel, Lauren, Liz and myself for a celebration of 

Stonemountain & Daughter  (36 years) and Indie Patterns! 

We will have a trunk show and lots of information on how to navigate all the new patterns available!

See you on March 20, 2017 at Noon!

Next we're trying out one of our new indie patterns from Jalie. Jalie is a mother-daughter duo who create "practical patterns for the whole family". It's just another reason why we love our Indie designers - women creating for other women. There's always a story behind each designer and how they got started in the industry.  Many of our indie designers give a little piece of themselves in each garment - you can feel their hard work, endlessly pattern testing, refitting, and modifying.  And we feel like we're part of the whole creative process when we "go indie". You can stop by my store, Stonemountain & Daughter Fabrics in Berkeley to see the whole catalog of patterns we now stock! We also have many of them up on our website and happy to mail them to you anywhere or hold them in our store for pick up!

So let's get started with Jalie! We love this Jalie Cocoon Cardigan - perfect for one of our new sweater knits (we have tons in stock right now!) and perfect for adding a touch of warmth in the store while working or just out and about!

The Cocoon Cardigan is a simple design - a drapey, loose-fitting cardigan with full length sleeve complete with a fitted cuff (stays put when you push them up).

 

The instructions are printed right on the pattern sheet itself, so be careful not to toss them out with the scraps. Laurel cut them out and taped them to a separate piece of paper.

  

Our sweater knit was a hair short of the 60" width requirement, requiring a slight shortening of the sleeve length. Laurel also made sure that the front and back pattern pieces were placed in the same direction on the knit (to ensure proper hanging on the body) which utilizes more fabric. We were left with a very skimpy strip in which to cut two of the very, very long bands.

Let's forget that I own a fabric store and could have easily cut another foot of fabric off the bolt. You are not likely to run back to the store, especially if you're 100 miles away like Laurel. Our second band is a little wonky, but do not fear - we can "patch it". Sweater knits with a pattern like this one are very forgiving and with a little magic zig zag stitch, it should work. 

 

 Laurel cut two swatches of the fabric, making sure that the knit ran in the same direction and carefully pinned the swatch to the holes in our band.

 

The machine is set on a zig-zag stitch with a moderate length and width, enough to catch both the edge of the hole and the swatch beneath it. Do sew slowly!!! Then trim the back of the swatch patch for less bulk.

 

The finished bands, one with patches in two places.  Can you tell the difference? When we sew the folded band onto the cardigan, we will be careful to have the two patches on the underneath side of the sweater. 

Magic! 

 Sew two shoulder seams, two side seams, attach the band and cuffs and voila! A new sweater! Instead of sewing the seams with a zig zag stitch, we used a serger, even to attach the band.

It was an easy make right up until Laurel tried it on - the sleeve cuffs looked skimpy and because she knows me (we've been making garments for almost four years!), they were sure to be too long, making the sweater look "baggy" on me. Granted, the Cocoon Cardigan is supposed to be full , but the sleeves just didn't look right.

 Solution: cut the sleeves off an inch and widen the cuff.

And instead of serging the cuff on, we opted to use a zig-zag stitch to attach it to the sleeve, then finish the raw edges off with our serger. Much Better!!

Now let's hear that voila!!

Can't wait to wrap myself up in this cocoon!

 For Laurel's Cocoon, she chose a double knit that she picked up a few visits ago from our upstairs designer sale fabrics.

Once we got the kinks worked out, this ardigan was easy and fast.

Don't you want one too?? Come check out our sweater knits - the lighter weight knits will be a great transition piece into Spring.

So now do you see why we picked this new pattern? Not only is it super easy to make up (now you know how!), it's adorable on! 

We hope to see you on March 20th at noon in the store!

So much love!

Suzan

Can't Get Enough of this Pilvi Coat! One Coat - Four Fabrics!

Pilvi Power!

The Pilvi Coat, Part II

We are mad about Lotta Jansdotter's Pilvi Coat.  Our original test coat (see our first blog on the Pilvi) was done in a lovely orchid boiled wool with rayon, and we loved it so much we thought we'd try it in other fabrics. And the fun of it is that Laurel is making all three at the same time!

We hope to inspire you to make one of your own. This coat for all seasons could be your next project! Join us in our sew-along coming up in March, or you can get a head start on making your own now!

 Sewing is good for our soul, heart, and personal growth. Strolling the aisles in my store, Stonemountain & Daughter Fabrics, is like visiting a fabric sanctuary. 2017 is off and running and we all need to sew more! I hope you will take the time to stop by or look through our website. We have all our independent patterns up on our virtual pattern table and it's easy to use. We mail all over the world, too!

Let's get started! Yes, sewing out of a book is different for all of us, but this works! For the price of the book, you get lots of inspiration and all the patterns within, including this Pilvi.

Book available in our store and on our website!

1) Yes! Another boiled wool/viscose for FabricLady (Moi), only black this time! It is my go to jacket for around the store and running around town. 

2)  A red boiled wool with lined sleeves for Laurel.

3) But first, a muslin tester for fit, out of an amazing sweater knit lace…
...ahhhh so fine and still available at Stonemountain & Daughter!

4) And a lightweight Italian wool for Laurel's friend Katie.

Four different fabrics, each with its own unique characteristics, feel and look, so naturally we will use different techniques for constructing and finishing suitable for each fabric. The coat is designed to be unlined but in our trio, we will be lining the sleeves in Katie's Italian wool, just to make sure they slide easily over blouse and dress sleeves. Laurel eventually plans to line her sleeves in the Red boiled wool after the lacy sweater knit "muslin."

The Pilvi has basically eight seams (six really, if you sew the entire length of the sleeve and side seams in one step as the directions specify).  Deciding how to finish the seams is based on the fabric's propensity to ravel and fray.  For instance, knits never fray, so no finishing is really needed.  Since our boiled wool is a knitted fabric, we are not finishing the seams at all. But the fabric is bulky so we are top stitching both sides of each seam.

                          Inside of Sleeve Seam                                                     Outside 

Laurel's sweater knit has a lace overlay and since she's hoping to wear it as a quasi sweater coat, she is serging the seams together for a finished inside.

The Pilvi coat's easy construction consists of sewing the sleeve armhole seams to the front and back pieces first. We followed those steps with both the boiled wool and the sweater knit coats.

Katie's Italian wool is a loosely woven fabric and will naturally fray until it falls apart. Her coat will be basically unlined, so we want the insides to be pretty and polished, so we will be using seam tape to finish off the edges. As we discuss later, we are attaching the sleeves in the traditional way, so once the side seams were "Hong Kong" finished, we sewed them together. (We sewed our seams together first, then applied the seam tape, so as not to stretch the fabric.)

For Katie's woven wool, we will follow a more traditional sleeve application, because we are lining the sleeve.  We sewed the sleeve lining together, as well as the woven wool. Each sleeve piece (lining and wool) were then sewn together at the armholes, wrong sided together. The result is a smooth finished sleeve on the inside as well as the outside of the garment.

Lined sleeve, to be attached to body of coat along the arm hole/shoulder seams:

The neck facing for the Pilvi is a simple piecing together of a sleeve facing and the back facing, then attaching it to the front neckline facing which is a part of the coat front...an easy four seams! The facing is then stitched down to the body of the coat. We trimmed (AKA graded) and clipped our neckline seams on all three fabrics, but it is especially necessary on the boiled wool because of its bulk. The clipping helps the curve lay smoothly.

After turning and pressing the facing down, we are top stitching the boiled wool and sweater lace down, as the the pattern suggests.  The facing edge is serged on the boiled wool and trimmed right along the top stitching on the sweater lace.

Katie's woven wool facing will be applied in the same way as the other two coats, serging along the facing edge.  We could also trim the edge with seam tape, but Laurel was concerned that the added bulk (albeit small) might cause a slight ridge in the front of the coat, given the fabric's lightweight hand.  We also added a lightweight interfacing to the facing before serging the edge.

The Pilvi design features inseam pockets on the sides of the coat, but we thought we'd do a tiny pattern hack and add large patch pockets on the coat front. We love inseam pockets, but with the bulk of the boiled wool and lace, we don't really need any "extra" hippiness at this stage of the game. We could attach the pockets without lining ( just turn the edges and stitch down) for both the boiled wool and the sweater lace, but we opted to line the pockets for the lace. The woven wool is too lightweight not to line the pockets.

Patch pockets are a snap - just decide on a size if you have no pattern.  Cut two pockets in your fabric and two in a lining fabric.  We folded it over and stitched down the edge before placing it on the coat front.

Try the coat on and decide where you want the patch pockets to be, then measure the distance from the center front and the hemline to make sure the are evenly placed. Do you notice that Laurel rotated the lace on the pockets so they would show up a little more with this busy pattern?

And just one more pattern hack, but on Katie's Italian Pilvi - we are adding cuffs! Much like patch pockets, cuffs are nothing more than tracing the bottom edge of the sleeve, deciding how deep you want the cuff, and cutting a rectangle shape.  Just make sure you add width at the top of the rectangle so that when you turn it, it lays smoothly on the tapered nature of the sleeve.

Why do we know that? Ask Laurel how she had to rip off one whole cuff because it bunched up around the sleeve. It's best to work up a "muslin" cuff and baste it on the sleeve to make sure of the fit.

Katie's Italian wool (picked from our fabulous new designer collection upstairs at Stonemountain & Daughter) finished off great.  Working with a fine wool woven is a little trickier in that everything shows and there is no "give" in the fabrics, so a perfect fit is important as you sew.  You also have to take extra care during the pressing sections, so you don't want to leave shine marks on the fabric.

Since this unlined coat is so simple, we added a little design feature on the patch pockets and the cuffs : covered buttons! Laurel took a small tuck in the patch pockets then added the buttons. Making the Pilvi your own is what this simple pattern is all about, whether you change the pockets, alter the length, add cuffs, whatever.

Four Pilvi's, four fabrics, multiple techniques. If you are a beginner, we might suggest trying the lightweight boiled wool/viscose or a cotton or denim or even the sweater fabric such as the one Laurel used for her wearable muslin. The design and pattern are very forgiving.  If you're an expert, go for a beautiful wool and even creating a lining for a luxurious winter coat.

The Pilvi Rules!!

Can we see your Pilvi's? Send us your makes so that we can inspire others to sew a Pilvi! If you are out of town, we can even put together a kit for you! Book (pattern), fabric, and thread!

Cheers to more Creatively & Fun in 2017!

SuZan
Owner, Stonemountain & Daughter Fabrics
2518 Shattuck Avenue Berkeley, CA