Oh…the 80s. I can bring up the exact feeling of walking through my middle school’s halls. The feeling of walking into the local Esprit store after saving up babysitting money and getting my own Esprit bag. My first Duran Duran tape. Keds that never stayed white.
Enter: The Marion Jacket. Pipe Dream Patterns is releasing 3 (!!!) coat patterns today. I’m going to show you one today, and one tomorrow.
I’m going to tell you a little secret. I took a big break from pattern testing, then I tested a couple and was so…what’s the word? Disillusioned? Disappointed? Meh? I’ve been generally not very thrilled with a few independent pattern makers lately. I expect more out of them than Big 4, and it’s been really hit & miss. Ginger jeans being the exception (and an unblogged Named Patterns Kielo dress I’m wearing now.) That, and some have been pushing affiliate programs to sell their patterns, and that just smacks of inauthenticity to me. Keep your LuLaRoe-schemes out of my good hearted sewing people’s lives, YKWIM? Is that grumpy? I don’t care. It’s a weasel move to post affiliate links in sewing forums. THERE. I SAID IT. We can have more independent pattern makers in the market without resorting to crappy sales tactics.
Why am I going on this Negative Nelly tangent here? Because I REALLY do love these patterns and I want anyone reading this to know I’m authentic when I tell you I love them. I took a risk to test these patterns. I put my own pattern making on hold, the teaser shots were that good. I used my own, rather expensive, fabric. I put in my time to crawl over instructions as if I was both a beginner sewists AND my middle school Lit teacher (shout out to Mrs. Z!!)
The Marion fits my current “I want to be 80s Bananarama” vibe. I used 2 yards of my left over Cone Mills denim, 1 yard of the ultra dark, and 1 yard of the very dark, or whatever they were called. I put them both in the bathtub with a pretty strong concentration of bleach and let them sit for a couple hours. I tested with 4″ scraps beforehand, naturally, so I knew pretty close to what I’d get. The Marion has these incredibly cool origami-like pieces that finally come together in the end, and it’s magical. I wanted to accentuate those lines and also relive some of the early denim bleaching of the 80s, let’s be honest.
The jacket is cropped and a bit oversized with perfect batwing-dolman sleeves. I added on a cuff, however, I only did it to add another contrast piece, and the cuff is folded back, so that sleeve length you see is actual-sleeve-length. I’m of the tall variety, so the sleeves, I feel, are pretty dang long. I like this, but if you’re going true blue 80s, you’re might going to want to crop those or roll them.
Let’s talk drafting for a second. I made absolutely zero changes to size. I cut a straight size US 12. Joann is pear/hourglass, so her sloper is too – which I LOVE because I am hourglass. I didn’t muslin/toile either pattern. I’m taller than Joann by quite a bit, but I wanted this coat cropped, so didn’t lengthen it, and like I already said, the sleeves are spot-on for me. Additional note: most beginners don’t know this, but in a collar there is something called “turn of the cloth” and that’s the amount of fabric taken up by folding the collar. If not accounted for, it can make your collar roll back up – this is more common on coats due to the thickness of the fabric. This pattern has a separate piece for the top and bottom part of the collar so you don’t have that flip-up-collar problem. In my book, that means a pretty darn good pattern drafter.
There are two waistband options – straight down to a fifth button, or a belt extension to pull through a D-ring. I chose the D-ring and have no regrets.
Please ignore my confused face, but this really is the best shot I took with the belt done but the front open. I will not be using this for my Bananarama cover band headshot. My face aside, there are also pockets. I know y’all like pockets. Being a cropped jacked, they’re a bit high to not feel like you’re cupping yourself or acting like a wounded chicken – as would be the nature of a cropped jacked, but they are roomy and useful for keys/phones, etc.
Even with the flat-felled seams on the thick denim fabric, this was a really quick sew. Seriously. The bleaching experimentation took more time than the actual project.
So, the usual stuff: pattern was provided to me, all fabric, tools, bad facial expressions, opinions about really great new patterns, and opinions about other companies’ crappy sales tactics are my own.
