Leather jacket refashion

This refashion was inspired by blogger, sewist and amazing fabric dyer sallieoh...I want to make one just like the off-white one she did, but I'm working with what I can find at the thrift store here, so black it is! I pinned the jacket to my "refashion ideas" board on Pinterest and immediately started looking for a leather jacket with soft, supple leather that would drape nicely. Found it and paid $6!!!

I set about deconstructing this by removing the lining, then the collar, sleeves, shoulder pads, facing, etc.

Then I turned it inside out, put it on, and drew lines with chalk showing where I'd need to take things in and make the big cuts.

Can you see the chalk lines just above the pockets?

After making the chop, I took in the sleeves, made a slight adjustment to bring up the shoulder line, trimmed up the excess leather and reattached the sleeves, as well as took in the sides a bit.

I decided to keep the sleeves long, seeing as I'll be wearing this in cooler weather.

From here I trimmed off the the areas where the buttonholes are and where the buttons attached, then sewed on two same-sized sections of the leather that I'd trimmed from the bottom of the jacket.

Here's where things get a bit tricky...Up until this point everything was pretty straightforward...but my next step was to take in the lining and reinsert it into the new jacket...never done this before, and I knew that it would take time and require a lot of patience. So, I got to it. I took in the sleeves, cut off the length, slowly started sewing it into the jacket. Along the way I decided to reinsert a collar to give the neck some shape and it is almost like large piping. I sewed in the lining up to where the extra leather flaps were attached, and to allow for better drape, left the flaps unlined. I trimmed up the flaps, used some black lace tape to prettify where the lining ends and the leather flaps attached and made tiny adjustments here and there all along the way. It took somewhere between 4-5 hours all told, and I still may make a couple of small changes, but I love how it turned out!!! Very much like Carissa's leather jacket that she made for the Refashion Runway Challenge :) (Which she is rocking, btw!!!)

Seen here with my coconut shell feather earrings, thrifted cami and skinny jeans...in my bathroom! The only room with good light once the sun has gone down ;)

And that's that! I am tired, my head aches a bit, but it's done, and I'm really pleased with how it all came out. Being an "on the fly" kind of sewist, I really had to slow down and take lots of care with this one, which was a good learning experience and I love perfecting new ways of finishing items so that they are just as pretty on the inside as they are on the outside. It's not perfect, in that sense, but far better than some of my first refashions ;)

Well, here's hoping that you are either finishing or starting your day well...be creative today! It'll do ya good ;)

Peace,

Andrea

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