A biker jacket, but with no pockets (and in my case- no zips!)

I chose this for a fabric recycling/upcycling project, using old morning suit trousers made from very good quality pin striped and chalk striped wool suiting.  I also used a couple of skirt panels of stretch lace, from a dress where the bodice seams had ripped, and a vintage Chinese silk bag, hand embroidered with a dragon, which was falling to pieces.  

 The stretch lace panels were mounted onto a woven polyester suiting fabric, left over from a previous skirt make, and I quilted them into place using my embroidery machine before cutting out the pattern pieces.  I cut round the dragon embroidery and appliqued it onto the assembled back of the jacket with a zigzag stitch before making up the rest of the jacket, so all of that added quite a bit of time to the construction.

 Vogue V1714 is a front zipped biker-style jacket, but rather than use a zip closure, I decided on decorative frogging made from the same wool suiting fabric, with two buttons. This is the first time I have made this pattern, and although I did not lengthen the body pieces, which I usually do with dresses that have a waist seam, the fit is good, and it certainly flatters the waist. I chose the shorter peplum, but since the front panels are the same for both views, it makes no practical difference to making it up

The lining is partially bagged out, which does make turning and pressing out the collar notches, lapel facings, and over and under collars rather awkward, and you still have to stitch in the sleeve lining at the cuff ends and lower back. There is quite a bit of topstitching to do, rather than understitching in several areas, including round the collar and lapels, which felt a bit odd, but worked well in the end.  As the sleeve lining and the main sleeve use exactly the same pattern piece, the sleeve linings are actually too short, which distorts the sleeve cuffs and pulls them up awkwardly (as you can see from the pictures). So unpicking and re-stitching is required- and if I make this pattern again, I will add extra length to the sleeve lining pieces. Similarly, there is no ‘ease pleat’ in the lining back, as would be usual for many jacket patterns, but too early to tell if this will be a problem when wearing it.

Because there are no pockets, and no lower sleeve openings, and thus no pocket welts, pocket linings, and no zips to insert, this was a relatively simple make by the standards of  some ‘biker’ jackets, and it came together quite quickly. I wondered if I was going to need extra fastenings, such as press studs to hold the front in place, in the absence of the full length front zip but I used a fairly firm sew-in interfacing, and so far it doesn’t seem to need it.

Overall, I think that if you have not made a fully lined jacket before, the pattern instructions are going to be a bit sparse if you are not an experienced sewist, and I really would have preferred proper lining pieces, but the final result does look very stylish, and I didn’t need to buy five zips – but the complete absence of pockets might be an irritation for some.