About a year ago, I made this jacket for myself:
I am really proud of this jacket, and I highly enjoyed the whole tailoring process. I used a really good book for instructions and barely got to use any of the techniques. I wanted to explore every aspect of the tailoring process! So I decided to make my husband a suit. During a sale at Vogue, I bought this pattern:
Alec Baldwin from the early 90's called and he wants his suit back. Am I right? Am I right? But anyone who's tried to find menswear patterns knows that the pickins are slim, to say the least. I kept thinking I could always make the fit slimmer and shorten the hem, and at least it would look better than the picture on the cover.
Time passed, seasons changed, I sewed many more garments for myself. In April I took a trip with my best friend and my mom to NYC, and of course we spent an entire day drooling in the Garment District. While I was there I bought fabric for Jon's suit. He said he wanted either a David Tennant's Doctor shade of blue, or a grayish-dusty shade of tan. I don't know if anyone else has tried to look for an intense shade of navy blue wool suiting that does not look black, but let me tell you, it does not exist. Anywhere. The Doctor has a staff of people dying and stitching him the most deliciously perfectly delectable suits on the planet, and I just don't have those kinds of resources! I'm sorry Jon!
So I had to go for the dusty tan. I picked up this fabric at Mood. It's a flanneled wool with a nice heather-y texture and not too flowy of a drape. I brought it back to Ohio and he liked it.
Very soon after getting home there was another Vogue pattern sale and they came out with this pattern:
Muuuuuuuch better. Modern fit, flattering lapels, double vent in the back, check check check.
If you're keeping up with this story, you'll notice that it has now been 7 months since I bought that fabric and pattern. My excuse is that it has been a crap-storm of a year and I had barely any time to sew for anyone, let alone make a tailored suit. And even then I still made two button up shirts for my husband (which you can look at here and here if you're curious.)
But all of these circumstances have converged onto what I think would be the perfect anniversary present. You see, he knows I have everything I need to make him a suit (minus interfacing with I think I'm going to buy today) but it's already been so long that I've been promising him a suit that he probably doesn't believe that I'll ever get it done. Additionally, I have a new job in which I work at home and have 2 hours off in the middle of the day to work secretly and undisturbed on sewing. I'll have to try the muslin for the jacket on him, but after I'm done with fitting, I can throw him off the scent by saying things like, "Ugh it's gonna take so long, I'm too intimidated to get started on the real thing!" Or something like that.
I decided last week this is what I was going to do. I steamed every square inch of my wool, traced the pattern and cut out the muslin, and I already have a pants pattern that I know fits him. 16 days to go and I'm gonna put the pedal to the medal! Also, this has given me an incentive to start blogging, which I always put off doing, before.
So what do you think? Can I do this???
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