Prince Charles Jacket in the Making

[Dileasgubas]

Also useful for dry cleaning.

Something you might find interesting.... I recently pulled the silver buttons off of an Argyll jacket made by one of the well known, good quality Scottish tailoring companies. I never go anywhere fancy enough to need silver buttons and will replace them with something a bit more tame. Anyway, the epaulet buttons and front single button were typical shanked metal buttons, sewn on in the normal fashion to go through the corresponding button holes.

However, those on the cuffs and pocket flaps (just surface decoration with no button holes present) were the same type of shanked button, but installed differently. They were installed through a small hole in the fabric with washers and split rings on the back side. The lining on the back side of the pocket flaps was sewn around the sides and bottom of the flaps, but not along the top, allowing access to the split rings. The button backing washers and rings on the cuffs were installed through a small hole in the sleeve lining's seam, which was later closed by hand.

Though it seems like a curious way to install buttons on a relatively expensive jacket, it does do something of value. Since the silver buttons have a raised shank on their back sides, the system pulls the decorative buttons down tight to the fabric, rather than having them sit proud of the surface and wobble around. I don't know whether or not the various retailers sell buttons with washers and rings available, but if you can find them, it's a pretty clever system for stabilizing these decorative buttons.

[MacLowlife]

Ladystitch, I think you can do a good job, but I am sure you'll do a better job if you have a look at a few quality PCs. Being an open jacket, the PC needs a canvas front to hold its shape. Aside from its tails and its length, it's a suit coat, otherwise. Like most formal wear- and most highland tailoring- what seems at a glace to be a uniform standard design quickly becomes a tribe of similar but distinctive individuals. Your choices and your influences will dictate exactly where these jackets fall on the continuum.

[LadyStitch]

We are planning on using high quality hair canvas as the interfacing from B. Black and Sons. I follow and post on patternreview.com , and have seen that review. I would love to read a blog of someone doing the project. I already know that for one of jackets I will need to do a "bay window" adjustment to it in order to fit properly. I do that all the time for his custom work.

Thank you for the recommendation on Tartantown. I was concerned on the quality of the buttons. While I can request a swatch of the fabrics, that is not exactly possible or cost effective to get samples of buttons.