Can Claire Sew a Coat?

I want to make a coat this year - hopefully before the weather in London warms up too much❄!

I've never made a jacket, let alone a coat before, so this will be totally new territory for me - but I think that it'll be a challenging, yet fun project for me.

I plan to work in my preferred style "slow sewing" and to take my time on this to get a great finish :-). I shall probably work on the coat on and off between other makes, as I don't want to get frustrated with it when I hit a proverbial wall. I don't want to end up making silly mistakes because I want to get it finished and "done with" - I'll be keeping my fingers-crossed that my plan for "slow and steady" will win me that race LOL!

I've ordered a copy of Simplicity 1197 to work with.

It's a re-printed retro 60's style that reminds me a lot of much loved, vintage second-hand Camel coloured wool coat that I bought from a charity shop in my teens. It has Raglan sleeves, and a trapeze shaped silhouette - so, it should be a.) easy to sew-in the sleeves, and b.) have minimal fit issues over the waist/hips etc. (yay!).

I plan to make a Toile in Calico/Muslin fabric first to tweak the fit. I anticipate that I will need to make my customary 1.5cm-2cm FBA (full-bust adjustment). Possible other tweaks that could occur are all problems that I encounter with RTW (ready to wear) coats are: needing to length sleeves + hem, and narrowing/tapering-down the horizontal width between the waist and hem (I have hips typically 1-2 sizes smaller than the pattern-size I use for my bust and waist).

And then, I've got some inexpensive grey wool-mix fabric to try it out in - after which I can hunt down some appropriate Camel toned Wool - yay!