On the fourth of July I finished a review of Butterick 5402’s jeans jacket pattern. You can find the original review here.
After looking at the photos I realized I had some redoing to do. The button spacing wasn’t right, the waistband was just too long, and going the wrong way. (This would be my usual left/right confusion setting in. I’ve heard it said it’s only folks with strong right brain/left brain connections that have this problem, and I’m sticking with that explanation. My husband does find it exasperating when trying to give me directions, though.)
After cutting out another waistband, I discovered that the length problem was not me, but yet another issue with the pattern. If you sew on the waistband as marked you’ll have to do a fair amount of easing in of the jacket bottom edge and the flap will extend quite a bit over the center front. Instead, just ignore the markings and start sewing on the band from the left center front. The pointed bit that is left extending past the right center front is just the amount shown on the pattern cover, about 1.25″.
I resewed the bottom few buttons to make more of a straight line and added the button that I’d missed. If you choose to add buttons to the pockets you’ll need 11. I’d purchased three cards of four buttons each, so I stitched the extra to the inside of the jacket as a spare.
My final step with this jacket was to take it down the basement and beat it up with a rubber mallet. I pounded on all of the seamlines and edges as this will make them wear more quickly than the rest of the garment, giving it a nice, comfy, worn look and feel. I plan to throw it into every load of laundry between now and next fall. Hopefully by then it will be well-worn and broken-in.
