Wednesday 9 January 2013

Sewing and knitting

I bought a very pretty coat many years ago (see it here worn by my dear friend Anna). It came with a detachable fake fur collar-lapel thing. It looks beautiful and it is rather effective against a cold draft, but the fur itself leaves much to be desired.

A few years ago I found an incredibly soft, long haired fake fur at the local yarn store, and bought quite a bit of an ivory colour. With this I made an extra tall collar, I put the elastic loops in the same places my other collar has them. I still have a lot of fur left. Thinking of lining a little cape UFO I have in the chest.

Anyway, my plan was to buy some in black to make another collar for my black coat, or to put into this cape, but when I went to get it, some time later (this fur was very expensive) they had ran out. All this time I've been checking if they restocked it, and finally asked. They said it was just too expensive, and also difficult to find. You tell me about it.

I still haven't seen it coming back, but this Monday, they finally had some very soft fur. It is not nearly as long haired, but it is also very nice. I bought a little for a simple collar following the same shape than the original:

Left, new collar, right, original one. It feels like garbage bags chopped up very thin.
I made it yesterday, some interfaced rustic silk, salvaged from an old dress, makes the lining, and some loops of elastic attach it to the coat. And this is how it looks in another of my coats. Why, just sew some buttons on the inside of the lapel, and you can attach the collar to it:

Excuse the picture quality: 10:30 AM, pitch dark indoors.
Continuing on the UFO chest project, yesterday I mended some of Pim's trousers:


First I sewed a patch of fabric on the inside, and over the hole in this woven fashion, I don't know how it is called in English. My skills leave much to be desired, so I knitted a little patch to go over it. This is knitted in very thin laceweight with 1.5 mm needles, making it my smallest knitting to date. 12 sts on the side make for 3 cm approx. I cast on the outside edges and swirl decreased towards the center. It is St st and would curl, but it is sewn down, so... It passed the BF's approval since it is the same colour and quite discrete. We'll see how it holds up after washing, this may get interesting... I sewed along the edges but also along the swirl, so hopefully it will maintain the shape.

Oh and this one, I cast it on Monday. Just a yummy yarn (in the skein at least), needles and improvisation. Triangular shawl, perhaps. Just for fun. It doesn't seem like the yarn should be frogged, so we'll see what comes out of it.


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