In November 2020 we updated the instructions for our Kelly lining. This post covers the new and improved order of construction, so some of the photos in this post will show a different sample than the one you’ve seen in the sewalong so far. Let’s get started!

Your jacket lining should be assembled and ready to attach to the outer jacket. The lined hood should also be ready (if you’re making the collar, follow the construction details in our instructions). Press the hem of the outer jacket up by 1 1/2″; note that it is only possible to fold the hem up by 5/8″ near the right and left zipper facings- this is normal. The zipper facings on both right and left sides of center front are attached, with the inside edge free.

With right sides together, match the raw edges of the lining to the raw edges of the zipper facings on either side. Start pinning from the neck down. The lining should be  5/8″ shorter than the jacket at the bottom of the facings; the outer hem will be folded up and tucked over the lining hem at a later stage.

Here is the lining pinned to the free raw edge of the right zipper facing:

And here is the lining pinned to the free raw edge of the left zipper facing.

When you sew the lining to the jacket along the facings, you want to stop sewing about 3″ from the bottom hem on either side. You can draw in a small chalk line as a reminder before you start sewing. Stitch the lining to the jacket along the inside zipper facing with a 5/8″ seam allowance.; repeat for both sides.

Press your seams towards your zipper (towards center front, in other words) and turn the jacket right side out. Understitch the lining to the facing by stitching 1/8″ away from the edge of the facing, sewing through the facing and lining seam allowance only. You will be sewing on the facing, not the lining. You will stop stitching at the same point 3″ from the bottom hem on either side. Repeat for both the right and left zipper facings.

Next up, we want to turn the jacket wrong side out again so we can finish bagging the lining.

On the right side of the jacket, fold the top and bottom right zipper facings in on themselves with right sides together along the seam where the zipper has been sewn in. You can fold the right zipper placket and lining out of the way so they won’t get stuck in your stitch line. I’ve drawn in my stitch line along the 5/8″ seam allowance.

Repeat for the left side of the jacket by folding the left zipper facing in on itself with right sides together along the fold line.

Stitch along the bottom of each facing to secure in place, and clip the corners so you’ll have a nice sharp corner when the facings are turned right side out. The stitch line should line up with the 1 1/2″ hem you pressed earlier.

Next, pull the lining down and line up the raw hems of jacket and lining, matching side seams. It’s going to look a bit weird at the corners since the lining is shorter. The secret here is to make sure the seam between facing and lining is open. When you stitch the hem in place and turn everything right side out again, you’ll have a nice clean joint.

Here’s what it looks like on the left side:

And the right side:

Go ahead and stitch across the entire hem.

The next step is to attach the lining sleeve to the outer sleeve. With your sleeves inside out, press the sleeve cuff of the outer jacket in by 1 1/2″. Fold the lining sleeve cuff seam allowance up about 1/2″, but don’t press.

Match the outer sleeve to the lining sleeve. Make sure the sleeves are not twisted and that the top and bottom sleeve seams match.

With right sides together, pin the lining sleeve cuff to the outer sleeve cuff.

Sew around the circumference of the sleeve cuff at 5/8″. Repeat for the other sleeve.

Now it’s time for the magic part! Your lining has been attached to the jacket at hem, sleeves and along the zipper plackets. All you have to do now is turn it right side out through the neckline. As you pull everything through, the lining in the sleeve will pull itself into place.

Eventually, it will look something like this:

We still have a few things to do. First, use a point turner at the corners and make sure your plackets create nice, sharp points at each side of center front. You may also want to create a thread chain to link the underarm seams of the lining and jacket to keep them anchored there. More on thread chains here.

You’ll notice that at those center front corners, you have a little gap between lining and placket. Go ahead and hand stitch that closed on either side.

Give everything a good press – corners, hems, sleeves.

Finally,  it’s time to attach the collar or hood. Before we attach it, align the jacket and lining along the neckline and baste them together just inside the 5/8″ seam allowance.

Once the neckline is anchored, match up the outer hood or collar to the neckline. The most important step here is to ensure that the edge of the collar or hood lines up perfectly with the edge of the jacket placket. Keep in mind you are only sewing the outer layer in place – the hood lining or collar facing needs to be pulled out of the way. You may find it helpful to clip into the jacket neckline – it straightens out the curved neckline, making it easier to align and attach the collar/hood.

Stitch the outer hood/collar in place. I like to hand baste at the very beginning and end so I ensure the hood and plackets are properly matching and create a straight, even line when attached.

Press the neckline seam up and grade. Now you can secure the hood lining or collar facing in place. If you’d like to add a hanging loop, baste it to center back of your neck facing now.

Align the neckline seams; you pressed up the seam allowance of the lining earlier, so it should all match up. Match shoulder seams and notches and pin in place.

At this point you can slip-stitch the hood lining or collar facing in place for an invisible finish, or edge stitch in place by machine. In the sample below, we did a simple edgestitch, but keep in mind this will be visible when your hood or collar is done up so make sure it’s neat from the right side!

Give the hood or collar a nice press.

There are just a few steps left to put the finishing touches on your lined Kelly Anorak. Our drawstring casing is only basted to the outside of the jacket- we need to topstitch it in place to secure it. Pin the lining to the jacket where the drawstring casing is positioned, ensuring the lining is lying flat and smoothly against the jacket.

Topstitch 1/8″ away from the folded edge of the drawstring casing. You will sew through several layers: the drawstring casing, the outer jacket fabric, and your jacket lining. You can carefully unpick your basting stitches every few inches as you sew, to make sure the casing stays in place.

If you haven’t threaded your drawstring through your grommets, do so before topstitching the other edge of the casing in place, otherwise it can be tricky to manipulate.

Topstitch the bottom edge as well.

Topstitch the right zipper placket in place by sewing along the inner edge through all the layers.

Secure the left side of the zipper in place by topstitching 1/8″ from the zipper through all the layers.

Now you can install your snap buttons and go singing in the rain in your new jacket! See more pics of our lined waterproof Kelly Anorak in action here!

Please note for our blue waterproof sample, we removed the folded flap on the pocket and added a flap to the outside so the pocket would be completely concealed and waterproof. If you’d like to do the same, please note we’ve created a bonus pattern piece with modified instructions. You can download it here.

When we first released our original Kelly Anorak pattern in October 2016, we had a few requests for a lined version. We’re happy to devote a few sewalong tutorials to our Kelly Lining pattern expansion, because while a lot of the construction steps are similar for the lined and unlined Kelly Anoraks, there are a few differences. If you’ve never sewn a lined jacket before, it may seem complicated at first, but hopefully after seeing the steps broken down here you will see that sewing more challenging projects is completely manageable if you take each step in a bite-sized, easy-to-digest chunk! The first little baby step will be assembling your lining and preparing your lined hood.

With the sleeves, pockets, and zipper placket attached, your outer jacket should be finished now, and you can put it aside while you work on the lining. With right sides together, match the two back lining pieces together along center back and sew at 5/8″.

We need to sew a pleat in the back lining to give extra room for movement when putting on and wearing the jacket. Match the notches at the back neckline and pin in place. From the notches, sew a line horizontal down the the center back seam about 2″ long  to create the pleat. Backstitch.

Press the pleat and the center back seam allowance to the left side of the jacket (as you are wearing it) and baste the pleat in place along the neckline.

This is what the back lining will look like after the pleat is made from the right side of your lining. (We hope we aren’t blinding you too much with our shiny copper penny Kasha!)

Sew the bust darts on the front lining pieces and press them down. With right sides together, sew the front and back lining pieces together at the shoulder and side seams. Press all seams open.

The front and back neck facing pieces should be interfaced. Assemble the neck facing by sewing the front neck facing pieces to the back neck facing along the shoulder seam. Press the seams open. You can neaten the edges of the facing if you wish by trimming down any seam allowance that peeks out.

With right sides together, pin the neckline facing to the jacket lining. The longer (outside) edge of the facing is the seam you’ll be sewing. The smaller inside edge is the actual neckline of the lining. If you are having trouble matching the edge of the facing to the lining’s neckline, remember that when you are matching a convex curve to a concave curve, you want the pieces to line up along the stitch line, and not along the raw edges of the fabric.

Sew together at 5/8″ and press the seam down towards the lining. Grade and understitch the lining in place around the neckline.

With right sides together, sew the top and bottom lining sleeves along both seams and press open. Sew two rows of basting stitches along the sleeve cap of the sleeve linings within the 5/8″ seam allowance and gather gently.

With right sides together, align the sleeve lining to the arm opening of the lining body. Make sure you are matching the correct sleeve to the correct arm by matching the double notches which indicate the back of the sleeve.

Sew the sleeve linings to the body lining and press the seam allowances towards the arms.

Now we’ll prepare the hood. With right sides together, sew the side hood lining pieces to the center hood lining piece and press seams open. The wide part of the center hood lining panel should be towards the front of the hood where it will frame your face. Sew a line of staystitching just within the seam allowance along the neckline of the hood so it doesn’t stretch out when we go to attach the hood later.

Repeat for the outer hood fabric pieces, but instead of pressing the seams open, press them towards the center of the hood. Finish your raw seam allowances with your preferred method and topstitch into place.

We finished our seams with our trusty iron-on seam tape to make sure our waterproof fabric keeps our head dry!

Stitch the hood facing pieces together along the top short seam and press open.

With right sides together, match the straight edge of the hood facing to the front opening of the hood lining and sew.

Press the facing away from the lining and the seam allowance towards the back of the hood. Understitch the lining in place.

Your hood lining is ready to be attached to the outer hood. Before we proceed, please staystitch hood lining at 5/8″ along neckline hem of hood lining and press under using the stitchline as a guide (we don’t have a picture of this step).

With right sides together, match the hood lining to the outer hood along the front curved seam. Sew together with an even 5/8″ seam allowance, drawing in a stitch line if necessary so the curved sides of the hood are smooth and symmetrical.

Grade the seam and clip or notch the curves where necessary. We updated this sewalong in November 2020, so the image below is not quite correct. The seam allowance for the facing/hood should actually be pressed up at 5/8″ and caught in your stitching.

Turn the hood right side out and press well. It will look like this:

We didn’t photograph an example of a lined coat with the collar instead of the hood – refer to the instructions that came with our lining expansion to see how the collar should be assembled.

In our next post, we’ll show you how to sew the shell, lining and hood or collar together for your finished coat!

 

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Read the next post in our Kelly Sewalong series. Get the pattern here.

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If you are sewing a lined Kelly Anorak, in this post we will cover how to assemble and attach your outer sleeves (for the unlined version see this post).

With right sides together, match your top and bottom outer sleeves along the seam with the single notch. Sew, press seam towards top sleeve, and finish the seam allowance using your preferred method.

Repeat for the other sleeve seam. It can be more difficult to top-stitch the second seam once your sleeve has been sewn into a full tube, but it is possible! Start from one end of the sleeve with the sleeve turned inside out. Go very slowly and re-adjust after every few stitches when you get close to the end.

After both sleeves are assembled, sew two rows of basting stitches within the seam allowance around the sleeve cap.

With right sides together, match the sleeve to the sleeve opening of the jacket. Pull on your basting stitches to gather the sleeve cap and ease it in to the arm opening. Make sure you catch the pleat of the back yoke with your pins or clips to secure it in the seam.

Sew the sleeve to the jacket and press towards the arm away from the jacket body.

For our waterproof lined Kelly Anorak sample, we trimmed this armhole seam allowance down so we could finish it with our iron-on seam tape.

It was a bit of a challenge pressing the seam tape around this 3D curved edge. We used a combination of our tailor’s ham and sausage to help manipulate the surface, and we ironed an inch or two of tape on at a time. The sleeve openings are one of the key places where it’s important not to extend the seam tape too far past a seam allowance, or you’ll have too many layers of fabric and seam tape at certain points.

Once your sleeves are set in, you can start to assemble your lining as directed in this post.

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Read the next post in our Kelly Sewalong series. Get the pattern here.

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For those of you sewing the original unlined version of the Kelly Anorak, your jacket is now only two sleeves away from being fully completed! In this post we’ll show you how to sew the two piece sleeves and attach the cuffs. Actually, we’ll begin with a special bonus we’re excited to show you- an alternative way to sew the cuff extensions to ensure beautiful and neat flat fell seams– both on the inside and outside!

The cuff extensions on the original top and bottom sleeve pattern pieces were drafted generously. Our original instructions tell you to fold the cuff extensions under by 5/8″ before topstitching and eventually sewing the sleeve seam. If you are finishing your sleeve seams with a flat fell seam, you will find that the flat fell seam width doesn’t match the width of the cuff extensions, and you may need to clip into the seam allowance just above the cuff extension to get the flat fell seam to lay flat, or tuck the fabric in this area under at an angle. We drafted wider cuff extensions for the reason that it can be fiddly to press and topstitch narrower extensions especially if your fabric is very thick or stiff, and we hoped to simplify this step. However, it is possible to have everything line up. If you’re curious to see how we finished our cuff extensions, please read on!

To make sure the finished cuff extensions match the width of our sleeve’s flat fell seam, we need to trim a little bit of fabric off of each extension. Below we have a set of sleeve pieces with wrong sides up. The top sleeve piece (F) is on the left, and we have trimmed off the entire cuff extension in a straight line. The bottom sleeve piece (E) is on the right, and we’ve trimmed off 1 1/8″, leaving a 1/4″ extension.

Take the bottom sleeve piece and press the 1/4″ cuff extension in towards the right side of the fabric.

Here is a close up of the bottom sleeve with right side up. Yes, the bottom sleeve cuff extension is wrong side out, but it will be hidden by the top cuff extension when the sleeve is finished.

With right sides together, match the bottom and top sleeve pieces along the seam with the double notches, and sew together with a 5/8″ seam allowance, stopping exactly where the bottom sleeve cuff extension has been folded over. This should be where the single notch is, just above the cuff extension.

At the single notch where you stopped sewing, clip into the seam allowance of the top sleeve by 5/8″. Do not clip into the bottom sleeve piece, cut the top sleeve only. Press the top sleeve cuff extension in towards the wrong side of the fabric by 5/8″. We will be pressing and finishing this seam of the sleeve towards the top sleeve. To prepare this seam for flat-felling, grade the top sleeve seam allowance to 1/4″.

Here is another close up of what your sleeve should look like at this point.

Now fold and press the seam allowance of the bottom sleeve over the seam allowance of the top sleeve that you graded. This will fold the bottom sleeve cuff extension in again by 3/8″.

Topstitch the bottom sleeve cuff extension into place, sewing as close to the edge as possible so this topstitching lines up with the seam of the sleeve. If you start from the inside of the sleeve, you can drop your needle down where the seam of the sleeve ends to continue the stitch line.

This is what it will look like from the wrong (inside) of the sleeve. Do your best to make the two separate stitch lines match up.

To finish the top sleeve cuff extension, fold and press under by 1/4″, then again by 3/8″.

Topstitch the top sleeve cuff extension into place. We’re sewing from the wrong side of the sleeve, since we’ll be sewing our flat fell seam from the wrong side too and we want the stitch lines to match up.

Our cuff extensions are topstitched and our flat fell seam is trimmed and pressed towards the top sleeve.

Topstitch your flat fell seam in place. Start sewing where the top sleeve cuff extension topstitching ends.

Time to add a cleverly-placed sturdy bartack to secure everything and hide any topstitching flaws! This is what your sleeve will look like from the right side:

And this is what the cuff extensions look like from the wrong side of the sleeve. They are perfectly lined up with the flat fell seam!

With right sides together, sew the second sleeve seam and finish the seam with your preferred method. This seam should be pressed towards the bottom sleeve.

Because the sleeve is now a fully-formed tube, it can be difficult to topstitch the entire length of this second seam. It is possible if you are very patient and re-adjust after every few stitches. We are topstitching our flat fell seam from the wrong (inside) of the sleeve, so we start at one end with the right side out. If you are topstitching from the outside, you may want to secure the flat fell seam with some Wonder Tape to make sure it stays in place while you sew through the sleeve tube.

Repeat the steps for the second sleeve so you have a right and left arm.

It’s time to prepare the sleeve cuffs. Please note that if you followed our above method for trimming and finishing the sleeve cuff extensions, you will need to trim 5/8″ off one short end of each of your sleeve cuff pieces so that they will match the newly finished sleeve opening diameter. The outer side of each cuff piece should be interfaced.

Press the long non-interfaced edge of each cuff piece in by 5/8″. With right sides together, fold the cuff in half and sew the short sides together. Trim the corners.

With right sides together, pin the interfaced side of the cuff to the sleeve opening. The edge of the finished cuff extensions should line up with the seam allowance of the cuff. (If you trimmed your cuff extensions to make sure they matched the width of your flat fell seam, it is important to trim the cuffs or they won’t line up).

Sew the cuff to the sleeve. Grade the seam and turn the cuff right side out, using a point turner to shape the corners.

Press the cuff into place, and make sure the folded edge of the inside of the cuff covers the stitch line. Pin or glue-baste in place.

Topstitch 1/8″ all around the cuff. We like starting our topstitching near the bottom sleeve cuff extension so the beginning and end of our stitching is concealed.

The sleeves are finished. All we need to do is attach them to the body of our jacket.

Sew two rows of basting stitches within the 5/8″ seam allowance between the front and back sleeve notches.

Gather the basting stitches to ease the sleeve into the arm opening of your jacket and pin into place with right sides together. Sew the sleeve to the arm opening of the jacket using a basting stitch to make sure the sleeve is smoothly attached before sewing together using a regular length stitch.

Repeat for the other arm and press the seams towards the sleeves. You can finish this seam with either a serged stitch or by covering it with bias tape. We trimmed our seam allowance down by about a 1/4″ then covered it with some black bias tape to match our jacket hem.

Time to put the finishing touches on your unlined Kelly Anorak and take it for a spin! Check out our post on installing snap buttons!

In this post we’ll show you how to assemble and attach either the three-piece hood or stand-up collar for the unlined version of our Kelly Anorak pattern. If you are sewing the lined version of Kelly, these construction steps are covered in our post on assembling the jacket lining.

After assembling the jacket body and installing the zipper placket,  you are ready to install the hood or collar. Start by stay-stitching  just inside the seam allowance all around the neckline of your jacket. This step is helpful to ensure the neckline doesn’t stretch out too much when you set in either your hood or collar.

SEWING COLLAR

We’ll show you how to sew and install the collar for View B first. You should have two collar pieces, and one should be interfaced. The interfaced piece will be your outer collar. Press the longer bottom edge of the non-interfaced collar piece in by 5/8″.

Align the two pieces right sides together and sew along the sides and top at 5/8″. For our collar, we used the “thread tail method” covered in our tutorial on how to sew sharp collar points for our Kalle Shirtdress pattern, but this is an optional additional step; sew normally and use a point turner if you’re not feeling ambitious.

Grade the seams and trim the corners of your collar, being careful not to cut too close to your stitch line.

Pin the interfaced outer collar to the neckline of the jacket with right sides together. The stitch line of the collar on either side should match up with the finished edges of the jacket. You can clip or notch the neckline of the jacket if necessary to ease the collar in. Just be careful not to cut past the stay-stitching line you sewed earlier!

This is what your pinned collar should look like from the wrong side of the jacket body. Notice the seam allowance extends past the edge of the zipper placket.

Sew the collar to the jacket, then turn your collar right side out. Press the seam allowance up towards the collar and grade.

Use a point turner to make sharp, crisp collar corners. Here we used the thread-tail method we mentioned earlier. Give the collar a good press and slip stitch the inner collar to the neckline. The fold you pressed along the bottom of the inner collar earlier should help conceal the neckline seam perfectly. To finish, topstitch around the entire collar at 1/8″.

SEWING THE HOOD

Now we’ll show you how to sew the hood for View A. With right sides together and matching notches, pin the center hood to one of the side hood pieces. The wider part of the center hood piece should be positioned at the front of the hood where it will eventually frame your face. You will find you’ll have to ease the center hood panel to the side hood, especially if your fabric is very thick or stiff. Stitch and press your seam towards the center hood.

Repeat for the other side of the hood. Finish your seams with either a flat fell or faux flat fell seam. We prefer a flat fell seam in this area since the seam is visible when you are wearing your jacket with the hood down.

It can be a little challenging sewing a flat fell seam along a strong curve but a tailor’s ham should help. (Psst… little secret! We cheated and used Wonder Tape to keep things in place instead of pins. We also did our topstitching from the inside of the hood to make sure we were properly catching the flat fell seam in our stitch line.)

Your three-piece hood is starting to take shape!

Time to prepare the hood facing. We’re missing a picture here, so see the original instructions for guidance. The facings should be sewn right sides together at the short edge. The long seam should then be folded and pressed under 1/4″.

Once the hood facing is assembled, match the curved edge of the facing with the hood, right sides together.  Stitch along the perimeter of the hood opening at 5/8″ and backstitch at each end.

Grade the seam and clip or notch around the curve of the hood opening as necessary so that everything will lay flat when teh facing is turned to the inside of the hood. Press the facing so the seam rolls to the inside just stlightly.

Now it’s time to attach the hood to the jacket. With right sides together, pin the hood to the jacket neckline, leaving the interfaced hood facing and seam allowance free on either side. You may need to clip into the neckline of the jacket to help ease the neckline and hood together, but do not cut past the stay-stitching line you sewed earlier. Sew along the entire neckline, backstitching at either end.

From the inside of the jacket, you can see that the right zipper placket and left zipper facing line up with either edge of the hood.

Press the seam allowance of the neckline up. There are a few different options for finishing this neckline seam. You can finish this raw edge either by serging or by covering it with bias tape, but in our sample, we finished our neckline with some black 12mm twill tape. We’ll show you how to the same below.

To add a hanging loop for your coat, center a loop of ribbon, chain or whatever you would like to use on the back neckline. We used a scrap of leather for our loop. Sew the loop to the seam allowance only.

Using twill tape to finish this seam reinforces the neckline and secure the hanging loop in place. Since the hood facing will hide the first few inches of either side of the neckline, it’s not necessary to finish the entire raw edge of this seam allowance. Pin the twill tape in place along the seam allowance of the neckline.

Starting from the right side of the jacket, stitch the twill tape to the seam allowance of the neckline, leaving the jacket and hood free. Our twill tape is black, so we switched to a matching black thread for this step. With an edge stitch foot, stitch as close as you can to the inside of the stitching you made when sewing the hood to the jacket. Trim any excess seam allowance or hanging loop ends that extend past the width of your twill tape.

The next step is a bit like finishing a traditional collar stand when sewing on a shirt collar. Wrap the hood facing around the end of the neckline seam. Keep the right zipper placket or left zipper facing flat along the seam as you roll it out of the way. The end of the jacket neckline will be sandwiched in between the outer hood and hood facing. Pin in place and make sure all the layers are nice and flat.

Sew along your original stitch line. Grade the seam and clip close to the corner.

Turn the hood and hood facing right side out, and use a point turner to sharpen the corner where the hood meets the zipper facing. The facing should conceal the ends of the neckline seam allowance, whether you finished it with a serged stitch, bias tape, or twill tape.

Pin the free edge of the twill tape in place along the neckline.

To secure the twill tape and seam allowance of the jacket neckline in place, sew along the free edge of the twill tape using an edge stitch foot. We want this stitching to start exactly where the hood facing covers this seam allowance, so we tucked our edge stitch foot under the facing to drop our needle precisely in this spot. We used our green thread here so it would match the fabric from the outside of the jacket hood.

The next step is to secure the hood facing in place. Pin the facing evenly around the edge of the hood.

Topstitch all around the opening of the hood, catching the edge of the facing in your stitch line. Because we used the triple-stitch function on our Bernina, we actually did this topstitching from the inside of the hood, since the needle and bobbin sides of this stitch were equally attractive. This helped make sure the topstitching was catching the facing evenly all around the hood.

You can see where the hood facing topstitching lines up perfectly with the twill tape topstitching along the neckline.

Your jacket now has a hood or collar! The next step is sewing the sleeves and sleeve cuffs!

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Read the next post in our Kelly Sewalong series. Get the pattern here.

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I really think that as far as jackets go, the Kelly Anorak is a totally approachable project even for a more beginner sewer. The only part I think might be a little confusing is our zipper placket. Since the jacket was originally designed to be unlined, the placket offers an attractive way to conceal the zipper and create a professional, neat finish on the inside. The method differs a little for the lined version, but we’ll be covering both in this post.

Before you get started, the body of your jacket should be fully assembled. You will need to attach the drawstring casing (if you’re installing one) to your jacket before sewing on the zipper, since the ends of the casing will be secured into the seam allowance of your right zipper placket and left zipper facing (see our earlier post). If you are not lining your jacket, finish the hem of the jacket now. Use a serged stitch or bias bound finish (I did a Hong Kong finish for this sample – see this post on how to sew these seams).

SEWING THE RIGHT PLACKET

To get started, let’s assemble the placket itself. Ensure the exterior side of the right placket (pattern piece J) is interfaced.

With right sides together, stitch along the bottom edge only. Trim the seam and clip the corner so when you turn it inside out it creates a nice sharp 90 degree corner. Press.

In the image below you can see how it will be attached to the jacket. Notice the the raw edge is on the top along the neckline.

Line up the placket (J) with the right side of the jacket, raw edges together. The top should align with the neckline, the finished bottom edge of the placket should align with the bottom notch along center front.

Sew the placket (J) to the jacket along the seam allowance.

Now open your zipper. Pin the left side of the zipper to the side of the top right facing (pattern piece K) as shown below (when I say the left side of the zipper I mean as you are looking at it; technically it is the right side of the zipper since it’s being sewn to the right side of the jacket if that makes any sense). The zipper teeth should start 1/8″ below the 5/8″ seam allowance so they are not caught in the stitching when you finish the neckline. It’s okay if the zipper doesn’t span the entire length of the facing – just ensure the zipper stops at least 5/8″ from the bottom, again so it’s not caught in a seam line.

To ensure proper snap placement later, it is important to sew the right and left sides of the zipper to their facings at the correct 5/8″ seam allowance. You will also want to make sure the zipper teeth are at least 1/8″ away from your stitch line so you can move the zipper pull freely. (If you are using the first edition of the Kelly Anorak instruction booklet, it may indicate a 1/2″ seam allowance at this step. This has since been corrected, and you can download an updated version of these instructions here).

If you are sewing the unlined jacket, the bottom right facing (pattern piece L) should be folded in 1/4″ twice along the side with the higher corner and stitched into place. Leave as is for lined version since this seam will be finished later when it’s attached to the lining.

Stitch the zipper to the top right facing (K) using a zipper foot. I set the zipper tape in 1/8″ from the raw edge and sewed 1/8″ from the teeth to get the correct seam width of 5/8″.

Here’s what your zipper will look like when sewn the the top facing.

Right sides together, align top (K) and bottom facing (L) along the zipper seam; note that the taller side of the bottom facing (or the side you folded and stitched if you’re not lining it) is on the opposite side. Pin into place.

Stitch together using a zipper foot; try to stitch as closely as possible to the original stitch line attaching zipper to top facing.

Fold wrong sides together and press flat, so the zipper is sandwiched in between.

Now to stitch the facing to the jacket… open the facing and pin the top facing (K) to the right jacket front.

Stitch together at 5/8″.

It will now look like this when unfolded.

Now grade the seams to reduce bulk – this means trimming them so they step gradually down and you don’t have one big bulky seam. The widest seam should be touching the main body fabric, or the side you’ll see from the right side of the jacket.

If you are sewing a lined Kelly Anorak, you are now finished with the right side of the jacket and can move on to the left side. The raw edge of the bottom right zipper facing will be finished when we sew it to the lining. Skip down below to where we install the left zipper placket.

FINISHING THE RIGHT PLACKET (UNLINED VERSION ONLY)

Unlined version only: fold the facing right sides together along the zipper seam. Starting at the notch 5/8″ from the edge of the jacket hem, sew a straight line across the length of zipper facing, at a ninety degree angle from the center front seam. Make sure you are not catching the zipper placket in your stitching; you can see below I’ve drawn in my stitch line and folded the placket out of the way.

Stitch the bottom edge of the facing all the way to the end.

Trim the corner so when you flip it right side out it creates a nice crisp corner.

Turn everything right side out. The facing edge is now finished and in line with the finished edge of the placket.

Before we stitch the facing and placket down, ensure the hem seam is finished. Press the hem up 1.5″ all the way around. The folded hem should align with the finished placket edge.

To lock everything down securely, topstitch along the length of the zipper facing, 1/8″ away from the zipper teeth.

Then press the placket flat and topstitch along the length of the placket, anchoring it through all the layers below. You can topstitch along the placket itself or just next to it; depends on what you prefer.

Here is what it looks like from the wrong side once it’s fully topstitched.

SEWING THE LEFT PLACKET

Now to the left side! This facing is a little different – since we’re sewing the zipper straight to the center front seam, the facing is in one piece instead of two.

Unlined version: finish the slightly higher side by folding in 1/4″ two times and topstitching. Leave as-is for lined version.

Make sure the center front jacket seam is interfaced – the zipper will be applied here and if it’s not interfaced you’ll get a wavy seam.

Pin the other half of the zipper into place along the left jacket seam, ensuring it will be sewn at the correct 5/8″ seam allowance, and that the zipper teeth are 1/8″ away from the stitch line. Make sure it matches up with the zipper half on the right side of the jacket.

Stitch to the jacket using a zipper foot.

Next, fold the left facing in half, wrong sides together along the first set of notches. Press.

With right sides together, unfold the facing and line up the raw edge with the center front jacket seam.

Stitch together using a zipper foot, as close as possible to your original stitch line when you attached the zipper. When you open up the facing it will look like this:

If you are sewing the lined Kelly, you can move on to assembling and attaching the lining. The left side of your jacket should look like this at this point:

FINISHING THE LEFT FACING (UNLINED VERSION ONLY)

Fold the facing right sides together along the pressed edge and sew across, 5/8″ from the bottom edge of the facing, just like you did on the right side of the jacket. The stitch line should line up with the folded edge of the hem. Trim the corner down so it can be crisply turned right side out.

Grade the seam, press everything flat again and topstitch thezipper to the facing along its entire length, anchoring it through all the layers.

Now topstitch your hem down. I stop the hem topstitching where it meets the placket on the right side, and the zipper on the left side.

Whew! Hopefully this walks you through this stage! It’s quite a few steps (especially when I break it down this much!) but I think it’s so worth it. The inside ends up looking as pretty and polished as the outside, doesn’t it?

 

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Sewing a lined Kelly Anorak? Read the next post in our Kelly Sewalong series.

Sewing an unlined Kelly Anorak? Read your next post here!

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If you’re installing a drawstring casing on your Kelly Anorak (a completely optional step, but one that adds a little waist definition), try on the body of your coat first to make you like where it sits at the waist. You may find you need to raise or lower it slightly so it hits around your natural waist.

If you are sewing un unlined Kelly Anorak, you must position the drawstring casing on the inside of the jacket, so install your grommets or sew your buttonholes to the exterior of the jacket. When you have decided on the placement of your drawstring, reinforce the grommet or buttonhole placement with a scrap of fusible interfacing. If you are sewing a lined Kelly Anorak, the casing will be sewn to the outside of the jacket. In this case, you will install the grommets to the drawstring casing instead. See this post on installing grommets if you need some help.

The grommets included in our Kelly Anorak hardware kits have the correct size opening to fit a 5mm drawstring. If you have sourced your own, make sure the opening of your grommets is big enough for the drawstring you would like to use. If you are sewing a buttonhole instead, sew a test buttonhole first. Your buttonhole should be no longer than 1/2″. Open the buttonholes before sewing the drawstring casing to your jacket.

Assemble the drawstring casing by sewing the front casings to the back casing along the short ends and stitching the seam allowances down flat along the raw edges. Press the long edges under by 1/4″.

Position the drawstring casing along the waist of the inside of the jacket (for the unlined version; if you are adding a lining the casing will go on the outside). I like to use a quilting ruler to make sure the casing is perfectly aligned along the waist of the jacket.

Try your jacket on one last time before stitching the casing down to make sure the ends match up on either side of center front. It is normal that the casing is longer on the right side of the jacket- you will trim it to fit.

For the unlined version only: topstitch the top edge of the drawstring casing in place by sewing 1/8″ from the edge.

It’s easiest to add your drawstring after sewing the first line of casing topstitching but before sewing the second. You won’t have to feed it through with a safety pin later.

Once the second line of topstitching is sewn, you are ready to attach your zipper.

If you are sewing the lined version of the jacket, you will baste the drawstring casing in place on the outside of the jacket instead of topstitching it right away. We will topstitch the casing later once the jacket is fully assembled with the lining attached. For our waterproof sample we machine basted the casing in place, but you can also keep it in place for the time being with some sticky tape if you would rather avoid piercing your waterproof fabric with too many pins and needles. Notice that the grommet is attached to the casing rather than the jacket body – you’ll want to make sure you are putting it in the right spot on the casing, as indicated on the front jacket pattern piece

Next up: installing the zipper placket!

 

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Read the next post in our Kelly Sewalong series. Get the pattern here.

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In this sewalong we’ll be demonstrating how to sew a jacket with both our original unlined Kelly Anorak sewing pattern and how to sew a lined version using our Kelly Lining pattern expansion. The construction for both jackets is very similar, but there are a few things that differ if you are sewing the lined version. A quick note about the navy lined version you’ll see demonstrated- we used a specialty DWR (durable water repellant) fabric called Ultrex. If you’re interested in sewing a waterproof anorak too, we have also shared a few tips we learned along the way about how to sew with this kind of fabric in our post about sewing with waterproof fabrics and seam tape.

Our Kelly Anorak sewalong will dive right in without explaining the cutting and interfacing stage, since the required pieces will vary depending on if you are sewing the unlined or lined version, and if you decide to add a hood or collar. If you follow the fabric cutting diagrams and interfacing guide from the latest updated pattern instructions, you will have all your pieces ready to go and you can start sewing. The most important thing to pay attention to in the cutting stage is the positioning of the pattern pieces for the zipper plackets and facings, as well as making sure you mirror your pattern pieces when necessary. Don’t forget to transfer all important markings such as pocket and grommet/buttonhole placement from your pattern to the wrong side of your fabric using a removable  marking tool!

Onwards! Let’s start by assembling the back of the Kelly Anorak. These steps are the same whether you sew the unlined or lined version of the jacket. With wrong sides together, fold the bottom edge of the back yoke up, matching the single notches, and press. You can use a seam gauge to make sure the fold is even.

Here is a close up of the fold showing the matching single notches:

Open the fold you pressed, and with right sides together, lay the back yoke on the back jacket piece, matching the single notches. Sew the yoke to the back with a 5/8″ seam allowance. It’s helpful to draw your stitch line in with a marking tool to ensure you’re sewing in a straight line!

If you are sewing with waterproof fabric, it’s ok to pin here as the yoke will be folded up over this seam allowance, covering your pin holes.

Fold the yoke up along the fold line you pressed earlier and line the yoke up with the back jacket piece along the neckline, shoulders and armscyes. Draw another stitch line with your removable marking tool along the back yoke between the single notches and topstitch along this line. A pleat will be formed on the bottom edge of the yoke.

For our unlined cotton twill Kelly Anorak, we used the triple stitch option on our sewing machine whenever possible for our topstitching for added strength and visibility. If you like, you may baste the pleat of the yoke to the back of the jacket along the armscye, so it is treated as one piece of fabric later when you sew in the sleeves.

We’ll assemble the front of the jacket next. Using the trim lines on the pattern pieces, trim the right jacket front and right front yoke pieces along these lines. Apply a strip of interfacing about 3/4″ wide along the center front of the left pieces. This is what your front jacket pieces should look like with wrong sides facing up:

With right sides together, pin the front yoke to the front jacket and sew at 5/8″ seam allowance.

It’s normal if the edge near the armscye does not line up. When you are pinning pieces like these together, you are matching them along the seam allowance, not along the raw edges.

Press the seam down towards jacket hem and finish with either a flat fell seam or a faux flat fell seam. We have a full tutorial on sewing flat fell seams here if you’d like more guidance.

    

 

At this point, it’s recommended to assemble and attach your pockets to the jacket front before attaching the jacket front to the jacket back. You’ll find it’s easier to do this step now before sewing the front and back together using the following “burrito method” since you’ll have less fabric to manipulate under your machine. Skip ahead to our gusseted pocket tutorial to attach your pockets!

Once your pockets have been attached, you’ll be ready to finish assembling the jacket body. Take the back jacket piece and fold the back yoke down and away from the shoulder seams.

With wrong sides together, line up the left and right front jacket pieces with the jacket back along the shoulder seams. Pin in place and baste together just inside the 5/8″ seam allowance. Here, you see the back of the jacket facing right side up with the back yoke folded down so the wrong side is facing up. The front jacket pieces underneath the back of the jacket are right side down on the table, with wrong sides up.

Flip your project so the front of the coat is facing you. Starting from the hem, tightly roll the front and back jacket pieces together up towards the shoulder seams. The unfolded back yoke will be hanging down, with right side up.

Fold the back yoke up over the rolled-up front and back jacket pieces and match at the shoulder seams. Pin in place and stitch at 5/8″ seam allowance through all three layers. Grade your seam.

It’s time for the best part! Gently pull the rolled-up front and back jacket pieces through the neckline of the jacket.

Press well and topstitch along the shoulder seams.

(Psst… finishing the shoulder seams this way is the same basic shirt-making method we use for our Kalle Shirtdress pattern. Now you can sew anything!)

We did not use the burrito method for assembling the jacket body for our navy waterproof Kelly Anorak sample. Because this fabric is very thick and stiff, it would be tricky to pull the roll through the neckline of the jacket. This version is also going to be fully lined, so it matters less if the shoulder seams are cleanly encased between the jacket back and the back yoke. In this case, we simply sewed the left and right front jacket pieces to the back of the jacket and back yoke with right sides together. We trimmed the seam allowance and pressed them towards the back, topstitched, and finished the seam with our iron-on seam tape.

With right sides together, match up the side seams of the front and back jacket pieces. Sew at 5/8″, press the seam to the back, and finish with either a flat fell seam or faux flat fell seam. For our waterproof lined version, we trimmed the seam, pressed it to the back, topstitched at 1/4″, and finished with seam tape.

By now your jacket is starting to take shape. The next step is to attach the drawstring.

 

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Read the next post in our Kelly Sewalong series. Get the pattern here.

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