PENDELTON WOOL x LEATHER JACKET

New jacket - Pendelton Overall wool with black leather sleeves and trim.I picked up this great piece of "Overall" fabric at the Pendelton mill store last time I was in Portland. It's 64" wide with a large 26" bold graphic repeat, 82% pure virgin wool, 18% cotton. I found a remanent that was exactly one repeat and I instantly thought how well it would work cut into the simple Letterman-style pattern of my last jacket. Here's my soon-to-be purchased fabric piece below.
These pics are from the Pendelton website, but I think they give a pretty clear sense of how big the repeat is. It took a bit of puzzle piecing to figure out the best way to cut this so it would line up perfectly.
In the end, there is one clear repeat on the front and back of the jacket. I couldn't believe how perfectly the fabric design fit into my pattern pieces, total luck here.
My biggest challenge for this jacket was making button holes. I don't have a buttonhole machine and I wanted something really nice for this style. So I took on the project of learning to make handmade buttonholes the old-fashion way. Below images are scanned from a 1960 booklet called How to Make Buttonholes which I found on the totally awesome and helpful tailoring blog that I am obsessed with: TUTTOFATTOAMANO.
This kind of buttonhole basically involves cutting a slit in your fabric, overcasting the opening, laying a cord down, and purl-stitching around the entire thing. I made about 15 practice holes before cutting into the actual fabric, but it would take years to really perfect this kind of hand technique. In addition, this fabric was a real bitch to work with as it had the tendency to fray and easily pull apart. The finished holes came out decent and I'm excited to use this technique more and improve with practice. Click to see bigger.With the Fall Equinox having just passed and the weather quickly changing, I'm gearing up for lots of new Fall/Winter styles. I need something to keep warm while I'm working...