The Making of a Trench

I made a trench coat for my DD as a Christmas gift. I posted it on Sew Passionista by Diana. I thought I'd give the construction details here.

I used M5525. The fabric is a fur backed denim and so I had to really think about how to achieve the look I wanted. It helped a lot to dig out my grandchildren's

 crayons and to colour the pattern illustration.

And here's the finished coat.

First I decided that I wanted exposed seams along the princess lines of both front and back but the side and center back seams would be normal

I new the lapels had to show the denim on the outside so I drew the roll line , cut along it, added a seam allowance to both the lapel and the front ..

When I sewed the two together, I realized the lapel was too scanty.

I had to recut it and this time I added another 5/8" to the lapel and that was much better. When I added the collar, I decided to leave out the collar band and that worked just fine.

Now about the exposed seams and as you've probably noticed the outside finish of the collar ,center front,hem , cuffs and belt.

First thing was to separate the denim from the fur on all edges. This was time consuming and hard for a woman who has sore thumbs but it was worth it.Then I trimmed away about 1/2" of the denim.

I then top stitched using a zigzag stitch 2.5 wide and 2.5 long. My awl really came in handy for this step.

For the hem and cuffs. I met with a problem at every seam that was sewn the regular way. These pictures show how I dealt with that.

 I clipped,trimmed away the denim.

tacked down the fur to one side ,

then turned up the hem and top stitched in place

The pocket on this pattern are in seam. Here is how I managed the opening.The exposed fur was a challenge here!

The pockets on the inside. I used a piece of denim for the lining.

The side and center back seams were top stitched like this.

Since the belt ended up quite wide, instead of belt loops, I sewed it at center back like this.

As for buttonholes, I forgot to take pictures but I used a sort of bound buttonholes which left a bit to be desired.

And that's it.My daughter loves her trench and it fits her beautifully.