Wool Bomber

While visiting Dunedin's Fabric store last month, I bought a lovely piece of wool coating with a lovely mohair feel to it which I earmarked for a casual jacket.  My black boiled wool Jalie Jacket is in heavy rotation at the weekends so I wanted  another semi casual weekend jacket.

I had seen a lot of Rigel Bombers popping up in my news feed of late and had also noticed a few versions in Burda Style.  Not wanting to purchase a new pattern though, my initial plan was to make a Burda Style jacket.  That was until my 'if it aint broke' mentality kicked in.  Jalie 2795 has been used for everything from it's intended purpose as a hoodie to a full wet weather raincoat and it seems everything in between.  It was Courteney's versions of the college jacket that really interested me though.  The detail I really like about the Jalie pattern as opposed to the Burda, is the raglan sleeves.

Despite the very different look of my new jacket, I actually changed very little about the pattern.  I pinned all of my panelled pieces together to reduce the seam lines and added both a facing and an extra red wool panel to the waistband.  All of my ribbing is actually wool ribbing which I found at the op shop.  The zip was rescued from a no longer wanted jacket.  Because the wool is non stretch, I added 1.5cm to each side seam on the front, back and sleeves.  I did add welt pockets however, as the actual pockets on the Jalie jacket are built into the seamlines.  Using a You Tube tutorial I created a single welt pocket which turned out to be a lot simpler that I was used to....yay for You Tube!

I lined the jacket with grey satin from Spotlight which was quite unexpectedly on sale for half price.  I did make one small mistake and that was to cut the satin lining the same length as the jacket outer.....grrr!  I fixed the problem by adding a 5cm strip to the bottom.  It isn't a perfect solution but because it is the lining it won't be seen anyway.

The jacket came together pretty quickly and relatively without incident.  It certainly helps that I used a tnt pattern.  I am really thrilled with the result.  With it's satin lining and quality soft wool outer it is deliciously cozy to wear.

These photos were taken today at The Tannery, a boutique shopping mall created out of a historic Victorian red brick factory that was originally just that...a tannery.  It was built in 1881 and unlike most of the historic buildings in the city, survived the earthquakes and has since been developed into a mall complete with eateries.  I no doubt will be visiting regularly once The Fabric Store opens here next month.