Tag Archives: Sienna

charcoal Sienna jacket

hello!

I’ve made another Sienna jacket, yes, hot on the heels of the last one.  I realise this is a weird thing to do but I’m well known for doing weird things so it’s just the norm at this point.  I had this large and rather bulky piece of thick, woolly, charcoal knit in my stash and decided that to use just this one piece would actually free up a disproportionally large amount of space in there.  OK then!  I think I originally bought it from the remnant bin in Knit Wit, Nedlands.

This one is a little different from the previous pink one, as well as being different from the pattern… I cut the front so as to have a straight edge and to have the front facing integral with the front.  I also left off the collar and made a hood instead.  I love hoodies and don’t have enough in my wardrobe!  Honestly if I’d had enough fabric I definitely would have made my pink Sienna to have a hood too.

This fabric had two distinct sides; a side that looks like boiled wool and the other side looks like a stocking stitched knitted piece.  I chose the boiled wool side to be the right side of my jacket.  It’s really very bulky stuff so instead of traditional seams I got creative …

for the hood, I turned under a seam and lined the hood completely with a black, sorta silky but not-silk stuff that is thin but nice and soft.  I cut the back neckline facing from the same fabric.  The hood edging is turned over the edge of the hood lining and simply topstitched in place.  After stitching, I trimmed the hood edging inside close to the stitching.

Similarly, the pocket flaps were made by laying the two flap pieces wrong sides together, and stitching together as normal; then trimming the seam allowances off neatly close to the stitching.

The sleeve bands and sleeve band “holding pieces”? keepers?  (forgot the proper name for those) are made the same way.

The front facings, pocket tops, jacket and sleeve hemlines were made by overlocking the raw edges, turning under allowances/facings to the inside, and then hand-stitching in place.

I actually went out to buy new buttons for this jacket when I decided only plain, black, matte buttons would do.  I’d initially stitched on some other buttons from my stash but just didn’t like the result.  So I made the executive decision to go against my “buy nothing” principles this time.  I think it’s ok to do this if you’ve used all the workhorse buttons in your stash and really have trouble finding fabrics that match any of those colourful, wild and wacky buttons that remain in there!

This is an EXTREMELY warm jacket, much warmer than just about all the other ones in my wardrobe at the moment, yes, even my new pink one!  I’ve been wearing this charcoal jacket just around the house mostly, and have saved the pink one for wearing out.  I think we only have a few weeks left of weather cold enough for this one – hey I’m definitely not complaining about that!

I fully expect by September it will be just too hot for it… really I should have made it at the beginning of winter!  In any case, it feels great to have taken the fabric from out of the stash, and into the wardrobe!

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pink Sienna jacket

hello!  I’ve made a chic (I hope) new jacket… and in such a pretty colour, I’m completely in love.  Guava pink?  Strawberry icecream pink? Sherbie pink?  Coral? Ham pink?  haha.  Whichever, I really adore it and feel like it’s one of “my” colours that suits me quite well.

The fabric is a thickish wool felt that I bought from the Fabric Store in Melbourne during our weekend trip over there in March ’22 to see Harry Potter.  The name of the colour is actually “red clay”, and I have a merino t-shirt in the same colour way, blogged here.  I even bought some matching thread in the same transaction, which I have carefully saved ever since just for these very projects.  Quite unlike me!

I used the Closet Core Sienna jacket, a pattern that I have used once before, in a different variation.  This new one is variation C, the shortest of the three.  I like that it’s cropped, a little boxy, and the notched collar.  I also like the abundance of pockets.  This little jacket has five tucked away in its smallish self!

I made a BIG change, of course.  I wasn’t going to, but after doing only a little bit of sewing I decided it had to be lined.  Not lining would have felt a bit sacrilegious to this beautiful wool fabric.  For this I used a pale pink lining fabric from my stash.  Another change; I abstained from topstitching, which this design has in copious quantities, and instead carefully arranged it to have all hidden/invisible stitching as much as possible.

So, the breast and hip pockets are made as welt pockets, and I agonised quite a lot over getting those slanted welts just right, with the pockets inside hanging “down” and not skewed sideways.  This was a lot harder to achieve than I first thought it would be.

Typical of me to make a project a lot more complicated that it should be, honestly, I don’t know why I do this to myself.

The sleeves are the variation with a pocket in them.  I think this is such a cute idea!

I happened to have the perfect coloured velvet ribbon to make the hanging loop, so I love this detail!

Do you think I had the right buttons in my stash?  No! I did not! and I’m still on a kick to not buy anything new, as much as I can.  I still have a small blob of modelling clay left, so made my own.  I’ve done this multiple times before and love how hand shaped and painted buttons look.  I made ten – the pattern requires eight, so I picked the best eight for the outside of the jacket, and sewed the two spare ones on the inside, on a scrap of felt, just in case I need them in the future.

I can’t actually decide if I prefer it buttoned, or unbuttoned.  I’ve been wearing it buttoned, but worry it looks a bit funny.  But it’s obviously warmer that way!

I love how this turned out!  To be honest, I finished this jacket just before we went away, but didn’t have the time to blog it.  Since coming home though, I’ve worn it several times.  My new favourite coat!

Here it is worn with my pumpkin silk Mysotis dress, blogged here.  Love this mix of warm spicy colours!  It’s been very very cold here this winter, and my new coat has proved itself delightfully snuggly; absolute bliss. I’m going to thoroughly enjoy this coat for the remainder of this winter, and the next… and the next…

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Sienna maker jacket

Ok, hopping straight to the crux of things; I absolutely J’FREAKINADORE this jacket!!  This is the new Sienna maker jacket pattern from Closet Case patterns, and I was lucky enough to be chosen to test the pattern.  This is view B, made using a deep bottle green cotton twill bought at Potters Textiles.  I actually found this in the remnant bin, believe it or not… yeah, Potters often does really BIG remnants.

 

We’re not supposed to reveal our tester versions of a pattern until it has been released, but I simply just could not resist sneakily wearing it! and have been (im)patiently waiting until I could chat openly about it… in fact, I took it on holiday with me recently when I visited the USA with Yoshimi on our sort of sewing-tour, because I really really wanted to include it in my travel wardrobe.  Also, I knew that Heather, with a bit of luck, was actually going to release it right about the timing of our trip.  And she did! yay!  so I was able to indulge my love of it in full.

photo taken in San Francisco by Yoshimi

And I wore it, literally Every Single Day.  This thing could most probably walk itself around San Francisco and New York by now!

The design is fabulously comfy; loose and stylishly slouchy, just slightly oversized in a good way, with two piece sleeves, notched collar, and a veritable tonne of pocket real estate.  A small but nice detail is a handy hanging loop included in the pattern pieces and instructions.

The belt from views A and B is pretty cool, snaking through a neatly faced slit opening, before wrapping around your waist and attaching itself to a little tab on the side.

Above can be seen the paler olive green poplin I used to finish the raw edges inside in a bias bound finish.  I kinda wish I’d hunted out  deeper bottle green that would match more closely the colour of the jacket, but both Yoshimi and Cassie reckoned the paler colour looked really good, so I guess it’s ok then.  I bow down to better, more stylish opinions than my own.

I flat-felled the side seams, centre back seams and both sleeve seams; I chose to do both sleeve seams because I knew I’d be wearing the sleeves rolled up most of the time, and wanted it all to look nice on the outside.

In fact, the only spot where I used the overlocker was the armscye; I figured these would remain pretty much totally hidden, most of the time, so meh…

I love how neat and almost … ?military? the jacket appears when firmly belted…

… and I enjoy wearing it open too, with the belt tucked into a side pocket.

 

OR, you can wrap the belt around your back only, just to pull in the back pouffiness a little, and tie it to the tab.  I often find with a jacket that I develop a strong preference for either open or closed, however with this one I tried wearing it all different ways on different days, and really liked it equally worn any which way.

As mentioned, the pocket situation is pretty fabulous.  There are enough pockets in this thing to satisfy the most fanatical and ardent of pocket-lovers, honestly.  View B has two ginormous patch pockets on the hips, a small breast pocket pictured above, and a large inner breast pocket picture below too, nicely big enough for your passport, phone, bus/train pass; well just lots and lots of stuff really.

But wait! there’s more!!  The jacket also has two quirky little pockets on your sleeves!!   ok, so you’re probably not going to use these ones super frequently, but they are there!  I guess you could store an electronic pass in there, for one thing, so you only have to brush your arm up against the detector without getting it out.  And they look pretty cute!

For my buttons, well, I was on a use-up-the-stash mission in the lead-up to my holiday, since I knew I was going to blow that one right out of the water during our holiday! anyway, I had some old wool-covered buttons in my stash, long ago cut off an old cardigan, and I coloured them in with a felt-tip pen to blend in nicely with my green drill.

To be honest, I had actually wanted to make the long version of the jacket, however my piece only allowed me to cut this shorter version.  I was initially a little sad about that, however I’m so in love with the finished version I couldn’t possibly remain sad for long.  And I am still keen to make the longer version!  I don’t very often want make the two views of things straight away like that, so if that’s not true love, I don’t know what is!

Interesting factoid, well to me anyway; my Stylebook app tells me I’ve worn it 17 times already and I’ve only just blogged about it.  Unbelievable!!!

    Details:

in holiday photos, I am wearing my cockatoo top and skirt, details here
White sandshoes by Trenery,
Black booties by nylon, bought at Zomp boutique
Prada gold hand bag

other photos:

Mustard tee; the Nettie pattern by Closet Case patterns, mustard merino, details here
Skirt; Vogue 1247, in outback wife barkcloth, details here
Tights; self drafted from my custom-fit pattern details on how to make your own here
Boots; Roberto del Carlo, bought at Zomp boutique

photo taken in New York by Yoshimi

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khaki suede top; 6 different ways

Last week, on a whim; I randomly decided to mini-wardrobe-challenge myself to wear this khaki/olive suede tee  for one whole week, styling it differently each day … I’d made it five years ago! back in 2014 and it’s been such a great versatile piece!  It’s mostly a winter-y sort of a thing to wear, though it’s quite nice to pop on for a half-warm but not hot day.  A transitional piece, is what the cool kids of fashion would say, yeah.  Although, what am I talking about??  I’m the cool kid, well I can dub myself so here in the realm of my own funny little blog at least, anyway!   #imtheONLYkid

So yeah, I made this 5 yrs ago, using Burda 10/2009;121 and a very realistic dark olive green suedette that I bought in Tokyo during a holiday there; original post is here.  I remember Yoshimi bought the same stuff in pale pink at the same time, and made herself a top too.  I’ve worn my own top lots over the past five years, ‘cos it pretty much went with everything I own, though I still did develop favourite ensembles with it.  One of those I included in my previous 6-different ways post, with my terracotta skirt! but I decided it would be sorta cheating to include that outfit in with this six too.  Although it totally should be here too really, because it still ranks amongst my favourites for this year.

Anyway! without further chitchat!  I made every item of clothing I’m wearing in the following pictures, with the exception of my shoes.  All items are linked to their original construction post.

Below left: worn with my over-dyed Nettie tee, sage green wool tweed skirt, and my self-designed chenille scarf and black tights; and my old black booties.  I love love LOVE the olive green and raspberry colour combination together…  Need to establish more opportunities for such in Ye Olde Wardrobe….

Below right; worn with an ivory wool Nettie tee, my purple Jade miniskirt, ivory hand knit möbius scarf, black tights, and my beloved motorcycle boots.  I guess purple is basically a variation on raspberry, because the olive/purple colour combo similarly speaks to my soul too!  Sadly this little skirt bit the dust last year too…

Below left; proving that chambray goes with everything.  I wore this outfit on a warmish day during my recent Week of the Olive Suede Top.  My blue chambray shirt is an oldie but a goodie, and the little blue denim skirt is another staple.  Also wearing unseen sockettes made by moi.

Below right; with my over-dyed Nettie tee, my once yellow, over-dyed corduroy skirt, a scarf knitted by Mum – oh, ok, there is one item of clothing not made by me! –  my over-dyed khaki leggings, and hand knit socks.  And my favourite desert boots.

Below left; This is my outfit from just yesterday, an unexpectedly very wintery day.  Worn with my mustard merino Nettie, my outback wife barkcloth skirt, hand knit mustard cowl, black tights, and my mustard raincoat. Did I mention that olive green and mustard is another favourite colour combination?!  Maybe I should amend that to say, olive green and anything?

Below right; I paired the olive green top pretty frequently with white, black to black-and-white combinations; all of which it looked pretty good with, I thought, lending warmth and life to the general colourless-ness, however chic said colourless-ness may be!  I picked this outfit for this post though, because it was one of the few times I tried belting the tunic.  I actually like it a lot belted; slightly 80s-inspired in a look that makes me nostalgic, in a good way.  I think I should have done this more often I think!

Worn with my Eve dress, black tights. and the lovely suede booties Craig bought for my last birthday…

So!  Sadly, the tunic has pretty much done its dash now… while the fabric seemed reasonably sturdy it actually was not; and over years of use it eventually developed a few holes from rubbing and little tears, particular around the side splits and the underarm area.  I haven’t actually tossed it out, but I may think about repurposing the fabric for something else sometime.  Because I still really really love the fabric!

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caramel corduroy skirt; 6 different ways

So, this is one of the things Craig picked out during our “their choice” challenge and said “this is horrible”  *sob*  Oh dear, but I could see it was true… the last few times I’ve worn it I’ve subconsciously hidden it under a long tunic because yep, it’s got pretty darn shabby.  But I loved it so and it was so useful!!!  It’s been thoroughly appreciated and loved to death in fact, I’ve already done a 6 different ways post on this very same skirt in its previous life as a yellow skirt!

You know what though, I don’t actually mind getting rid of things, even old favourites! because you do get into a bit of a rut and get to wearing the same old same old over and over and over … it’s a stagnation of sorts and one should shake it up every now and again, get rid of the old and force oneself to wear other, newer things.  Also, it’s spring and I’m in the mood for spring cleaning.

Speaking of that! I finally updated and wrote something in my “about me” page!!  it’s only taken me, like 8 years or so… hehe.  Have a read and please let me know what you think..

OK, my favourite ensembles with this skirt…

at left: worn in a 100%self-made outfit, with my triangles jumper, my navy blue tights, and my handmade winter boots… and there is my dear old Sienna of course.

This jumper is one of those wardrobe prima donnas that actually goes with but a mere select few things, so the caramel skirt, which went so nicely with it, is going to be a big hole in its life  🙁

at right; in anther 100% self-made outfit…worn with my forest green twist top, mustard cowl, piped trench coat, charcoal knitted gloves, black tights and again my handmade boots

at left; another 100% self-made outfit… with my ivory sweater, my caramel suede jacket, black tights and the same handmade boots.  This outfit was part of my third time joining in the one week one pattern thing, where I chose Vogue 1247, of course!  I’ve made up this pattern STACKs of times!

at right; wearing it with my olive suedette Burda tunic, my over dyed Nettie Tshirt, a scarf knitted by Mum, my over dyed tights, my olive green knitted socks, and rtw olive desert boots, long term favourites  Actually I really love this outfit A LOT

at left; in a 100% self-made outfit, worn with my snuggly chocolate jumper, bright green knitted hand-warmers, my ivory infinity cowl, my black tights, and once again, my handmade boots.

at right, this is probably one of my all time favourite ensembles with the skirt, worn with my mustard Miette hand knit, my raspberry scarf, black tights… no doubt I had a self-made Tshirt on underneath but I can’t remember now!  Those boots are my rtw ones though…   😉

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purple-y Jade mini skirt, 6 different ways

During another of my sometimes brutal wardrobe clean outs, I parted ways with this little purple skirt… I have to admit it was a little gut-wrenching to get rid of this one because it had only been in existence for one sad little winter, albeit a glorious one, since I wore it at least once every week!  Aah! little purple mini skirt, the light that burns twice as bright burns but half as long… and your light has burned so very very bright…  *

I made it in a purple wool/silk knit from KnitWit, using the Paprika patterns Jade skirt… and it was such a devastatingly useful, mix-and-match-tastic item of clothing! actually as all sludgy coloured little mini skirts are.  Sadly, the knit, while a gorgeous colour, of a lovely weighty thickness and with a magnificent “quality” feel and texture to it, didn’t have a huge amount of recovery… and I’d used a VERY stretchy black poly for lining it, some leftovers from my tights! if I recall correctly!  Definitely not sturdy enough to give the purple knit the backbone it needed, so the whole thing got floppy quite quickly.  Toward the end of winter I actually worried a bit that it would at some point slide slowly and gracefully south down my smooth, black-tights clad legs to my ankles and become a rather gorgeous purple hobble…. haha wouldn’t that be glamorous/fabulous/amusing… NOT.

Anyway, because it’s been that good I thought I’d give it a little farewell party… the fact that I only wore it for one winter and still found six outfits where it is paired with almost totally different items of clothing in each one is testament to its versatility!  Also, since these were all taken during my Year of Handmade; you know, that year in which I wore ONLY clothing and shoes made by myself, ahem…I made every single blinking thing I am wearing in each of these photos, which is why the black boots appear in so many outfits, sorry…

Links to all construction posts provided  🙂

Below: at left; with its matching top, charcoal gloves, black tights, black boots
At right; with ivory top, blue cardigan, navy cardigan, purple scarf, charcoal glovesnavy tights, black boots

Below, at left: with charcoal twist top, raspberry tights, black boots;
At right; with pink jumper, green scarf, lime green hand warmers, black tights, black boots

Below at left: with ivory top, grey coat, raspberry scarf, black tightsblack boots
at right: with coffee Tshirt, striped jumper, black tights, black oxford shoes

Ok, so it’s awff to the sewing room… because clearly I need a new one …

* Blade Runner, after Lao Tzu

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thank you

To everyone who left such caring and lovely thoughtful words on Sienna’s last post, thank you so very much.  Your kindness has meant so much to me, more than I can say.

picture from 1 year ago, Bunkers Bay

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Sienna

This is the hardest post that I never wanted to write, but I feel I owe this to all my lovely long term readers who have over the years come to know our darling, dear old lovely girl, Sienna…

She’s been here on my blog with me since the very beginning, from my very first post, and has been my beautiful partner in crime, so to speak, on so many of my weird and funny blog-photo taking outings.  Oh how I’ve giggled on many an occasion as we scrambled about on rocks and on beaches and in the bush as I’ve set up my camera and tripod and Sienna has stuck faithfully to my side, sat patiently beside me, or foraged about sniffing and waiting loyally for me to finish whatever the heck I was doing.  I often took her into many an isolated, deserted spot, mostly because I was so terrified of someone coming along and seeing this insane woman posing in some outlandish home-sewn outfit, posing ridiculously in front of a tripod… oh man… and having Sienna with me always made feel safe and of course, accompanied.  She was my little assistant.  My bloggy-doggy friend.  She kept me company, that was the thing.  Keeping me company.  She listened silently and unjudgingly and lovingly as I talked endlessly to her about life, the funny things we saw.  Oftentimes about the craziness of blog photos, how was I going to set up my camera in whatever position this time, to get the picture I wanted? and how ridiculous I was being.  Just politely wagging her tail every now and again.  Just “being there”.  And I would hug her and tell her over and over what a good good lovely girl she was.

 as a puppy

Oh, I’m crying my eyes out even writing this, even though I thought I had no more tears to cry… saying goodbye to her and hugging her for the last time, crying into her ruff; was so hard, so so awful…

Poor Sienna had been unwell for many months; she was diagnosed with inoperable liver cancer back in May.  She had been a bit poorly, and I had taken her in for a scan just after taking this picture for me-made May, and was told the terrible news that same day.  I thought about saying something here or on social media, but decided I wanted to give her her dignity for as long as possible …  we’ve known her time was limited for quite a while now.  The last month she has been quite frail, had all but given up on eating and she deteriorated very rapidly over the last few days of her life.  I wanted desperately to wait longer than we did, but even I had to admit in the end that to wait longer was possibly cruel and selfish.

she absolutely LOVED this fluffy cushion…  would toss it around the room, then lie and contentedly suck on it for ages….

Sienna loved the beach.  Well, she loved walks and walking anywhere really, but the beach was her very favouritest walk of all.  It perked her up and she would frolic in the shallows like a puppy.  We took her to Dunsborough last month, like we always do; and as always, I took her out for our early morning walkies while Craig slept.  She had a tiny, brief little dip but came out straight away and sat down, refusing to walk.  She just wanted to lay on the beach quietly.  For Sienna to not want to walk on the beach, well, it was jut a big thing, that’s all.  A big, huge thing; something that she loved most of all, and she didn’t want to do it… earlier that day I posted this picture of “my view” for bpsewvember and it seemed particularly poignant…. that was a heart wrenching moment.  That moment was like a turning point for me, in letting go of my denial.

So there it is.  I thought about editing a lot of this, but no.  Sienna was the best-est of friends to me for so many years, and she deserves all my words and all my thoughts.  Even all these silly tears, although she wouldn’t have understood them.  She would have just sat quietly with me, looking lovingly at me, as always and just privately wondered what the heck I was doing probably.

actual shot from a blog photoshoot

Thank you for reading, and for all the lovely comments about Sienna over the years.  It’s meant the world to me that other people have loved her too xx

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