Butterfly Jacket Class at the Bobbin Case

On Tuesday and Wednesday I taught a class called the Butterfly Jacket (my name for it) at the Bobbin Case Bernina shop in Rochester. This beauty was all sewn and just being fitted before adding the lining and the finishing work.

The starting point was the beautiful hand dyed fabric in the back panel.

Beth made this wonderful jacket from hand stamped fabric from India which she had purchased at a local quilt show.

The striking back panel is pieced.

The lining has already been added to this one and its ready to have the side seams sewn before its finished.

The beautiful back panel came from John Marshall.

Mancuso Philadelphia Quilt Show - Our Garments

Our display at the show. Our reason for the field trip (other than staying at the great hotel) My vest made from the Quilters Vest Pattern. I made it 8 years ago as a class sample displaying Seminole Patchwork and scrunched fabric.

Paula Schultz's ensemble and Janet Root's mola jacket.

Bev's mola jacket and one of Marcia DeCamp's jackets.

One of my Bernina outfits.

My Bernina Tiger outfit and Guatemalan coat in the center.

One of Marcia DeCamp's jackets, Pat Berardi's jacket in the front and my Bernina outfit behind it.

Barbara Ackley's jacket with my Mola Jacket behind it.

Two of Beth Brandkamp's garments in front and my green jacket behind them.

Claire Welch's travel jacket which she wore on a trip to Germany.

Bev looking at my Fairfield Fashion Show garment.

Two of Marcia's jackets.

Pat Pauly's blue and red coat in front, followed by Nancy Crouch's jacket, June Silberman's beautiful Mola jacket is next to it.

New Jacket Progress

I am making progress. The fronts and backs have been cut out and sewn together. I added a strip of the jelly roll to the front.
And two strips with velveteen in the middle to the back. If you click on the photos you can see the hand stitches in the fabric. Now I have to make the sleeves and have only pieces left from the original scarf.

Beginning a New Jacket

The start of a new jacket. The main material is a two yard piece of silk from a sari, with another two yard piece of silk sari on the reverse and the entire thing is quilted with hand stitches in India. If you click on the photo you can see the stitches. It is designed to be a shawl and has a beautiful drape. The left side is one side of the piece and the right side is the other. In the middle is a strip of purple velveteen which I will use in the jacket and in the band. On the right is what I do with jelly rolls which I purchase in quilt shops. They are basically a few shades of cotton batiks cut into 2 1/2" strips the width of the bolt...about 42". I cut them in half as they are too big for my purposes, then cut them into 1 1/4" wide strips to insert in my garments and quilts. I will draft my own kimono jacket for this piece which will be based pretty much on my hip measurement and the length I want in the finished jacket.

Finished Jacket

The jacket is finished and I am pleased with it. The leaf fabric came from my friend Nancy Board and is an Alexander Henry print from over 20 years ago and a favorite. I made a couple of bog coats with thei piece I had back then.

Its a made to measure kimono style. The band is purple velveteen. There's a bit of trim with hand dyed ribbon and beaded shisha mirrors.

"Orange" Jacket Sew In Day Four

Inspector Suki, ever vigilant, guards a piece of my fabric against all intruders. Then tries to take a break, as usual, in Beth's chair.

Marcia begins to make progress on her jacket, which is looking a little blue at this point.

And Beth composes some beautiful sleeves and tries to convince us that the gold strips are really orange.

And at the end of the day the jacket is all but finished. Its a beauty!

The yellow strips at the very bottom will become a print.

Inspector Suki takes a well earned nap under her "tent" in the afternoon.

And I have made a bit of progress on the jacket fronts.

Jacket Class, Day Three

Beth continues to make progress on her jacket which seems to becoming a bit on the green side. And my new orange jacket begins to take shape.

As I audition pieces for the front Beth suggested two beauties by Kaffe Fassett.

Nancy continues work on her tiger jacket. She wore a beautiful sparkly jacket today.

I finished piecing the back and the front begins to take shape.

Beth added some of her beautiful marbled fabrics to the mix.

And after more work on her kimono jacket Marcia took her Chinese collar apart to begin work on her orange jacket.

Marcia's Studio Day Two

I bit the bullet and trimmed the slanted edges off this quilt and now have to quilt it. And am finally getting serious about using one of the Flower Collars from Southwest China in a jacket. I will probably start with the orange one on the left and have made a couple of strips of hand dyed fabric to coordinate with it.

Marcia worked on a kimono jacket made from a knit purchased in Turkey.Her orange jacket is behind her.

And Nancy made a lot of progress on her Tiger jacket.

A Great Day at Marcia's Studio

Today was day one of a three day "Jacket Sew-In" at Marcia's beautiful studio. We began with a bit of show and tell as Marcia showed us her gorgeous quilt begun at Nancy Crow's Barn and now beautifully quilted. Stunning. I had finished piecing the wonky blocks and now planned to cut them on a slant.

Beth began a jacket using tiny Slash and Burn squares as the center of the back.

And Nancy Crouch began a jacket with a tiger focal point.

Inspector Suki took time out from her busy schedule to check Marcia's calculations.

Beth adds a bit of orange to her jacket.

And Marcia begins work on an orange jacket with an intricate collar from China as the focal point.

As it turned out the quilt top wasn't long enough to slash and turn on point and came out a bit "skewed".

I will probably trim off the "off center" sides and make it into a square.