Chanel jacket solution: zip me up and zip me down

The jacket's front closure hooks were destroying the boucle - snagging and pulling on the loops, intolerable in moment-to moment wear. Upon returning home from work, I had to pull them back into the fabric body with a crochet hook. What's a girl to do? use her noggin to come up with another solution. Here, an exposed gold zipper to match the one at the back of the skirt. It adds a nice symmetry to the two pieces. One zips up above, the other down below. And adds a tiny bit of gold bling that I always felt the jacket needed.


Of course, since the jacket front's finished - sewed, understitched, prickstitched, and trimmed - I could only sew the zipper tape onto the lining. It's not how I'd have done it if the zipper was in the original plan, but I can live with it. The zipper adds nice heft to the jacket front - weighs it down, straightens and smooths it, the effect is a vast improvement to the fall of the garment. So, that's a battle I feel I've won.

Working on the dark brown-blue cash suit too - but slooooowly. I took a look at the V2218 top, compared it with my Go dress bodice, and decided I like the Go dress shape better: smaller, flatter side back panels, and larger, curvier side front panels (for a curvier me, natch!). I went with the Go pattern, created a top based on that bodice, muslined it - and it's a Go!