After making two pieces for my boyfriend's outfit I decided to take a break from his costume and work on a small addition to my own. I wanted a cape because sometimes it gets freakishly cold while out at the festival. I was hesitant to make one at first until I saw the blog by Angela Clayton. If you are into costumes her website is a wonderland of beautiful ideas and dresses. Very inspiring. She updates her Tumblr account more often with progress pictures.
One of her posts was making this cloak. When I saw her post I knew I wanted to do a variation of her cloak. She added boning into the top to hold up the hood and that was an idea I couldn't pass up!
I went to the fabric store and purchased 5 yards of crushed red velvet. I wanted to make a burgundy cloak in the same stretch velvet she used but it was way out of my budget to purchase that particular material. So I settled for a velvet that was cheaper and closely matched my dress color. I've had bad experiences with velvet costumes and clothing in the past (not made by me) and I feared that it would be an ucky material to work with. Turns out whatever the costume stuff is made out of is crap in comparison to what they have at Joann's. This velvet I got was thick and soft and comfortable.
I got home and measured out the same measurements for Angela's cloak lengthwise. Her measurements were 67" X 118". I am guessing she is a lot taller than me because I still need to chop off a few good inches from the hem when just using 60". I didn't really follow any rules like you are supposed to for the nap. It looked and felt fine just using the fabric sideways so when it opened it was 60" X 118". I also left it all in one piece instead of making three pieces like she did. I'm assuming she only had to do that because her shoulder to floor height requirement is taller than mine. I'm only 5' 2". Leaving it as one piece didn't make a difference in the way the cape looked.
When that was done I used the hood pattern from McCall's #4698 since I was too lazy to draft a pattern myself. I cut out the hood in the velvet and a second for the lining in black broadcloth. I had this broadcloth in my stash for about a year since it was from last years Renaissance costume. I realized how much I have learned since then. The broadcloth from Hobby Lobby is the cheapest most paper-like fabric I have seen. I didn't realize it until I was trying to decide between that and some from Hancock. The Hancock fabric was way softer and didn't literally cut like it was paper. Still I wanted to use it though and it wasn't too uncomfortable for the hood.
I sewed both pieces together. I had a lot of problems with them matching up and slipping everywhere. I should have used more pins. Once that was together I flipped it right side out and basted the neck area closed. I decided that I was going to sew a gathering stitch at the top of the hood to create my gathers and give my boning channel a marking place. I made the gathers/channel closer to the edge so that the gathers wouldn't be so long in the front. I also top stitched around the entire top of the hood to keep everything in place and not look puffy. I pulled the gathers up to fit the piece of boning I was going to use. It looked amazing!
I especially liked how using a shorter gathering section kept it out of my face. I wish I had thought to make the hood more like in Angela's version because the boning has the top floating above her head since she used a longer piece.
I made a boning channel using a 1" piece of fabric and hand sewed it to the hood. I'm sure there is a better way to do this but I didn't want the channel's stitches showing through the top part of the hood. I shoved the piece of 36" industrial zip tie through the channel and sewed the ends shut.
I had been so excited while making this I didn't go to bed until 2 am! So I forced myself to go to bed and woke up early to continue working on the bottom of the cape.
Angela used cartridge pleating to gather all of the fabric. I did the same thing. I measured out every half inch and marked it on a piece of muslin I sewed close to the top. Then stitched only on the markings.
When I was done I pulled them all together and fixed any that were twisting so they were all in a compact row. I also turned in the sides of the cape 1/4" and then again 1/4" (1/2" total reduction) and stitched so that there would be no fraying or jagged edge showing.
To cover up the muslin I decided to attach a fold of fabric that would also act as a neck drawstring channel. I took a 5" piece of fabric and sewed it to the hood. I wanted a secondary way to tie it around my neck than from the hood. I felt more secure that way.
Then, because I'm barbaric and the stupid regular way to attach them wasn't working, I sewed the pleats straight across with my walking foot to attach it to the hood.
Then I folded over the black fabric to hide the stitching. But since I wanted there to be a separate channel to put a drawstring though, that didn't touch the pleats, I folded in the ends of the fabric on either side and folded the fabric down towards the stitching line that attached the cape and hood. Then I folded it over again tucking the pleating inside. Then I pinned and slip stitched the flap down to the cape. and it made a nice smooth collar/channel for the drawstring. You can barely tell that its supposed to be a drawstring channel. I did this so that if I find a clasp I like at the fair it wont look out of place.
Once that was done the cloak was finished for the time being. Man it was heavy. There was so much fabric in the cape! When I had all the gathers together it almost was too big for the hood. It was a little long but I don't plan on trimming it down until I get my whole costume together to see how it would fit. I don't want to take too much off of the cloak.
This piece is my pride and joy and I am so glad I made it. Even if it doesn't get cold enough to actually wear it I will still have it for years to come. I also felt like Red Riding Hood and it gave me some inspiration for next years costume.
Better pictures will be coming soon!
I have also added new stuff to the blog! I made pages for awesome sewing resources, a detailed about me, and a main resource for my completed projects. I had just way too much free time the other day.
Keep sewing everyone!
No comments:
Post a Comment