Carrie experimented with echoing the angles of the asymmetrical front band style to the entire Tabula Rasa Jacket in her Rose Trellis Jacket. Here’s a look at sleeve and back details which echo the angled asymmetrical front band and hem. (The pattern modifications for the asymmetrical jacket front are covered in our recent post Draft an Asymmetrical Band Front.) Carrie started with a sketch of her ideas.
Back Mimics the Front
At first Carrie considered adding an asymmetrical back yoke, but for simplicity ended up deciding on a straight back yoke and added a sashing strip to visually carry the contrast fabric to the jacket’s back.
The lower portion of the jacket is split into two overlapping sections; the underlayer has a straight hem and the over layer an angled hem, just like the front of the Rose Trellis jacket. The back pattern was extended 4″ beyond center back to create a 3″ deep overlap plus 1″ to finish the loose edge by pressing it under and topstitching in place. The same pattern can be used for fussy-cutting both left and right back; the right back as shown below and the left back by folding the angled hem extension out of the way and turning the tissue over.
Sleeve and Cuffs Angled to Echo the Hem
Modifying the sleeve pattern to echo the angled hem was pretty simple. After turning the entire sleeve up to 3/4 length, Carrie folded the outer edges up by 2.5″ from a center point. She also wanted to add a cuff with the contrast fabric, which required a little more thought. Ultimately, each sleeve was finished with a 2-piece cuff that meets at the center point of the sleeve. Here you can see how the sleeve and cuff pattern work together.
To prepare the cuffs, four pieces were cut from the contrasting fabric and lightly interfaced. Each piece was folded right sides together along the fold line, stitched closed at the point, then turned right side out and pressed.
Before stitching the underarm seam, two cuffs were stitched to each sleeve, coming together at the point. The cuffs are pressed away from the sleeve to finish its hem. Those seam allowances were clean finished with the serger and topstitched to secure them in place.
Closures for Overlapping Fronts
Don’t forget to give some forethought to plan out closures for the overlapping fronts of an asymmetrical front band jacket. In the Rose Trellis Jacket, Carrie used ties to secure the left front (under layer). Prepared fabric tubes were inserted into the right front/side seam and into the seam at the end of the left front band.
For the right front (outer layer) she found the perfect accent button in her stash, but it was a large rectangle and not well suited for a button loop. Carrie fell back on a favorite solution for problematic buttons, hiding a plastic snap underneath the decorative button. A short tube was added to the hand made button to TIE it all together!
We hope you are having fun playing with the asymmetrical front band style for your Tabula Rasa Jackets. We’d love to see photos of your makes! Have you found ways to extend the theme into other elements of the jacket?
