80s jacket rescue sans shoulder pads

Take a look at those shoulders hanging right off the end of Gabbi's form!

As you may have guessed, this is an 80s era jacket.  I think it was my Mum's. It was actually made in Australia (gasp! - doesn't happen much now) and quite well made too - fully lined and quite good pattern matching.  Awesomely capacious patch pockets.  I'm pretty sure it's a polyester blend fabric, which I don't love, but it's okay for what I had planned and it's clearly very durable.  The buttons are horrible though, a very cheap looking plastic.

To work - obviously those shoulders needed revision.  Since the sleeves were too short on me, I decided to get rid of the whole shebang and just cut the sleeves and oversized shoulders off.

The sleeves were filled with this weird orange powder which got everywhere.  I believe it to the be remains of the disintegrated foam shoulder pads.  The sleeve caps were also padded.

I pinned in the new shoulder edge 5cm shorter (about 2 inches in the old money) and also tapered them to my sloping shoulders.  Then I cut both the outer and the lining fabric to the new line.  I also added bust darts which is why the vest hangs so much better on Gabbi in this photo than the jacket did previously.

I removed the buttons.  Although the jacket was double-breasted I like the jacket hanging loose so I've left buttons off  The buttons holes blend in quite well, even in real life.  Maybe I'll change my mind but I've already been wearing it this way.

And those huge pockets are indeed awesome.

Happy sewing!