Making a Leather Jacket: How to Design and Sew Your "Dream" Jacket

1. Intro: Hi, My name's Jeff. A phone. I make custom high end leather jackets on and here to show you how to do it to Leather is awesome. Everyone has 11 jacket. There are endless possibilities of what you can dio. Personally. I love exploring that. It's Ah, it's a piece of art in itself. It gets better with age. Somebody's aware with any outfit and to have your own piece that you made and you can wear around and put that on your body and have people ask what that is or who that is. It's really an awesome feeling. So I suggest working your way up to this project. Maybe start with a really cool Denham material or something that's non leather that's not as expensive. And, you know, practice, practice, practice just your fit. Adjust your technique. But I think after wants this class, we should be well on your way. I would say that this classes for anyone that's interested in sewing a garment of any kind , the techniques that we're gonna go through really apply to a lot of mediums, not just leather and not just jackets. Like I said, this is more of an advanced project, but there's no reason why it can be broken down into some of its parts and Tackleberry easily. So, really, you know, if you have any knowledge of how to operate a sewing machine, it doesn't have to be an industrial machine that could be your mom's home sewing machine that you played around like making curtains with. By the end of this class, you will be able to sew your own leather jacket. We're gonna go through the entire process from start to finish. And that includes making sense of your pattern, which is basically the blueprint for how you construct jacket, tracing the pattern onto your leather hide, cutting it out all the way through sewing fire department. So at the zippers, collar sleeves, literally everything from start to finish. You'll have the raw materials to be able to do that. All right, let's get started 2. Project Overview: OK, moving right along to our project. I'm gonna take you through every single step of creating the jacket. So we're gonna start by taking the pattern that you can get at the resource is link at the bottom. I'm gonna talk about some techniques that you can use for that. We're gonna cut it out. We're gonna lay out all of our pattern pieces once we have him cut in the leather. So it's about 28 piece of leather for the shell and then another dozen or so for the actual lining hardware. All that kind of stuff. Once we have that, we're gonna take a look at it, makes sense of it, see what's what. And then I'm gonna show you how to add zippers, the front sippers properly. We're gonna put on hardware. We're gonna discuss collar construction on and why the collar is constructed the way it is . We're gonna set sleeves in the round without any pins without any snaps without any kind of thing. We're just use our eyes and our hands and trust or machines and trust are patterns. What's very important? Yeah, we're gonna go right through top stitching using the leather walking foot machine and we finish out by backing the lining, Uh, meeting lining the jacket inside out, pulling it right side in, and then some finishing techniques. And yet by the end of this, you should have a perfectly wearable, perfectly functional fitted leather jacket. So first, I'm going to show you some of the machines and the tools that we're gonna be using to make the jacket. 3. Equipment and Materials: Okay, let's discuss the tools and the machines that we're gonna be using to make this project. I'm gonna be using two different types of industrial sewing machines. They are industrial, but that does not mean that they're crazy, expensive or unattainable or anything like that. Because they're not. You can find them very easily used, and they're easy to operate. And yeah, so this is the 1st 1 It's your regular industrial sewing machine. It's a Dukie. But there's about out of 50 different brands that do a very similar thing. This you will find in pretty much every single sewing garment factory anywhere. It's not specific toe leather. It will be used for making shirts, jeans, bags, literally anything. So I use this for all of the regular seems. And then I use a specific machine to do the top stitching, which is the decorative stitch that goes along the very visible parts of the jacket with a little bit of a thicker thread. So this is for like the, you know, the guts, and then the other machine is for the nice stuff. This is the other machine that I use for top stitching. As I mentioned It is specifically for leather and materials like canvas vinyl things like that that are a little thicker and don't feed as nicely on the other industrial machine. It's called a walking foot or triple feed machine, and that just means the way that the foot moves. So the leather, which is kind of not slippery. It's not slick. It gets easily stuck and bunched up this. Make sure that it feeds evenly. When you're sewing seams, I'll go into that a little more in depth later and show you how it's used. Besides that, the basis of the jacket that you're making basically the blueprint eyes the pattern. This is one pattern piece. It's one that you see is a little warning a little used. This is a top sleeve goes right there like that. It's made on a thicker paper that's called oak tag paper, and you'll see there's a few little cut outs here. They're called notches and the Notches air basically a roadmap that makes all of the pieces line up properly. So when you're so in, let's say the under sleeve to this. You're gonna match up the double notch to the double notch in the single knocks to the single notch, and then everything goes together perfectly. And there's just no fear that anything you usually can't mess up that way in terms of alignment of pieces. Eso you trace the pattern obviously, onto your leather hide. This is one of the other hides I'm gonna be using to make. Thesis is deerskin. It's really, really Soft said. It's like a soft hand. This is the good side of smooth side, the back. The swayed side is not treated, not processed on. That's all gonna be hidden. So this is it's a little thicker than what you might see for a normal jacket. I like it because it's gonna give a nice, thick body. It's gonna fall nicely. You'll see that as we go along. But it's also very multiple, very supple. Um, yeah. Besides that, I got a nice pair of shears. Scissors. I always, always must. You got have a few pairs, like one specifically for paper, one specifically for material. And this is a notch er that it's how you transfer the markings from the pattern that I described onto the leather. So basically, once you trace out the piece, you put the not sure to go, and then you have the peace knocked out a Sfar raw materials, you know you have the lining, which is just They were gonna use a stretch taffeta for our lining, but yeah, the possibilities are really endless. I mean, you could make this exact same jacket in denim. You can make it in vinyl if you wanted a cheaper option. Um, but yeah, the goal of this class is for you to make a leather jacket, But I do suggest that you work your way up toe leather with one thing about it is it's very permanent. Eso If you're selling like a piece of fabric and you have a strain needle hole, you could just, like, pull the pull the seam up. And then there's not gonna be a whole because it's like a woven fabric, leather or vinyl or something. Once there's a whole, there's a whole forever. So basically, don't mess up. But you mess up on, you know, more beginner fabric like a Denham or something like that. And then when you're ready and you're you trust your your your making ability and you're confident that you won't make any stray holes or anything like that, then, Yeah, Please move on to a letter, because it's probably the most fun material to work with. All right, we're gonna dive right into it, and let's ah, trace our pattern pieces onto our leather. 4. Tracing and Cutting: This is one of the leather hides that we're gonna be working with today. Um, generally leather is sold by the square foot, and hides can range anywhere from 5 to 7 to nine square feet for some animals. And other animals, like a cow that is obviously larger, could get upto 2025 30 square feet. So this particular one is about 6.5 7 square feet, and it will require maybe maybe four of these hides to make an entire leather jacket. Um, this one here is deer skin. It's incredibly soft. It's called the hand. The feel of it is really soft, and I usually work in lamb, sheep, goats, deer, calf, sometimes cow. They're all suitable for making a jacket. So it's pretty much just whatever whatever feel you like. Whatever. Look you like, um, stretch texture Pretty much. You know, it's it's It varies widely between the hide and between the animal. Okay, so first thing is, we lay it out on the table and you take the pattern that I introduced before, and you try to lay it out in some efficient way across the hide. A couple things they need to note is the high. It is very much an animal, like it comes directly off the animal, and you can see basically what the animal look like. So back here is the but and this is the neck you can kind of just tell from the general shape. So therefore it's gonna be a different texture, thickness, stretching this anything. It's gonna vary across the hide. So you wanna lay out your pattern accordingly that you're missing any blemishes you're missing any weak spots in the hide that might have too much stretch or like too much crinkle or they're just not as structurally sound. So the piece that I'm gonna show you right now is the top sleeve on the sleeve is comprised of two pieces, tops, leave and under sleeve. Um, so this is the top portion. It's the most visible portion, and I want to lay it out somewhere in the middle of the Hyde, which is the stronger, the more structurally sound and the more free of blemishes that might occur on the animal hide. So what I do is I just kind of lay it out, get a good deal of how the pieces are gonna match together. I also like them to go in the same direction if they're the same piece. Um, that way, if there is a certain like stretch or pull at the hide both sides of the jacket or are going Teoh respond in the same way from that stretch. Whereas if you laid one out vertically and went out horizontally, the high might have more stretched this way or more this way and then your right sleeve just gonna be different than your left. So I just lay it out. That looks good to me. I don't see any major major blemishes or anything that is really ugly that I don't want to get on my outer sleeve. I just take a couple waits. You can use any kind of weight these air from like an actual like barbell weights set smooth out the pattern. Make sure there's no no wrinkles, no bunched up parts know anything underneath it, so kind of just manually smooth it out, and I generally just traced with a regular Sharpie marker, you can use a pen, uh, for darker hides. I use a metallic sharpie like a silver or gold, But since This is like a light orangey tan a black Sharpie as you're going through. Remember to mark all of the notches. The notches that I spoke about before are basically the roadmap that allow you to line up the various pattern pieces together. So you can't join the two wrong pieces where you make sure that there seems lineup evenly from start to finish on every single line that yourself just take your time. All right, so we have the right tops. Leave Trace. Now, when we do from there is I'm gonna flip this over. So once leave is the top sleeve. And when you flip it around and stops it side obviously, um, it's just kind of planning on laying that one out just like that on for this pattern, I'm using just one side and then flipping it over, um, autumn Or, like production ready pattern. Let's say if you're making, like, 1000 jackets, you might actually have a separate one left and one right. Um, but for our purposes, it doesn't really matter again. Just checking for wrinkles, crinkles, blemishes, anything like that. I think we're good. I pushed down the edges of the pattern as they go along and I keep the pen rather vertically. So I'm making sure I'm not ducking it underneath the pattern. And therefore making the leather smaller than the pattern should actually bay. Marking off all of my notches. There's 1234 on the top of the sleeve. Your pattern might have three. This one. I have an extra one two notches in the back and there we go. So we have to outer sleeve portions traced again. Just take another look. Make sure your lines a relatively straight no wrinkles, no blemishes. And I think we look it and that's that. Okay, next step is toe. Cut this out. Um, it's night and day when you have a really good Paris years, Um, the's where I think under $40. There they stay sharp a long time. Um, it's easy to get them sharpened at any place that does that. And the key to cutting this stuff out is you want to cut your line completely off because the line the with of the Sharpie was on the outside of the pattern. So therefore, if you leave the line in your pattern is gonna just slightly grow. Um, the fact that he used the really skinny Sharpie. It's kind of negligible at this point, but if you use a thicker Sharpie or chalk or marker or anything like that, your patterns gonna grow. So if you cut on the line or outside of the line, your piece is gonna be too big. So when you're going along cutting, just cut the line completely off. But do not cut into your actual pattern piece. I also save all my scraps because a lot of the smaller pieces you can often use for smaller parts of the jacket, maybe like a sleeve cuff. Or maybe I use them for for a label or a tag. And also, once you have enough of him, you can actually, uh, selling by the pound toe hobbyists who make like wallets or hearings or key chains or anything like that. She has save all your scraps. Be careful not to stretch and pull the leather as you're cutting it. Um, as I mentioned, some hides have more more tugging and others this particular one not so much, but be careful that every time you're cutting your not pulling because your line is going to become crooked and jagged. One piece done. This part of jacket Just a quick tip when you get to a line, if you can see, um, so this needs to be all cut away. This small piece here, if you're a righty like I am, I like to keep the larger part of your out of your pattern to the left, the partner cutting off to the right. That way you have, like more toe, more to grip and more to handle, and it doesn't a bunch up or a stretch. And it's much easier to miss the line if you're only gripping a really small, skinny part. Also pretty sure that everyone's been cutting since kindergarten, so you probably got the basics down. It's really nothing, which different then, cutting a piece paper and they are ready to be fused and I'll explain without isn't a sect 5. Interfacing/Fusing the Leather: The next step is to fuse or interface your pattern pieces that we just cut out. Basically, if usable is a separate fabric that's a stabilizing fabric, it's very light. It's very thin, comes in many different sizes. Thicknesses, blends of material, anything like that, Um, and you use it on certain pattern pieces to give them a little extra, like strength or protection against stretch. So that's going to be places where they're zippers, like things that get that get pulled on, things that get tugged the neckline where your collar is. So that's just stabilized a little bit. The upper portion of your sleeves hem lines where pockets are a zipper pockets anything like that. So since we just cut out the upper sleeves, we're gonna start with fusing these and we're gonna fuse just along the upper portion, the part that actually goes into the arm hole and we're gonna fuse the lower portion. So at the bottom is where where the hem is, the part that gets tucked back that attaches to the lining. And around here I do a little of like zipper gusset. It's called and that obviously he gets pulled on, goes like that. So where you want to stabilize that as well? Um, this is the kind of thing. There's really ah severe lack of information about ironing leather on defusing leather online. Um, kind of like pick through a lot of things, And for me, it was a lot of trial and error. You got to figure out, um, basically what the right material, like I said to use it was the right interfacing, the right usable. This is Try Kat Polly. It's ah poly blend that has a good amount of glue on the back that when you apply the iron and apply steam ah, the glue melts very quickly and then therefore fuses itself to the leather nicely and easily on. The thing with leather is you don't want too much steam. You don't want too much pressure pushing down, and you don't want to leave the iron on for too long because it's going to melt the leather to scorch leather, and then your piece is gonna be useless. And then you just spent $50 on a hide. That's just useless. Um, so the little formula that I've found I haven't really seen anyone else do this yet, Um, I put a towel on my work surface, just a regular like bath towel, and the reason is it's porous and it's thick so the excess steam doesn't build up at the bottom of your table and and come up as condensation as water that can come up from underneath and work your leather. So this kind of allows the steam to disperse evenly. Then I put a piece of denim, the only reason that I used the Denham in particular. You can use any kind of, you know, caught in muslin, broadcloth, anything like that. I used the denim because the towel has a lot of nap to it, so it could actually, um, like in Dent the leather and you'll get this nap on the back of the leather. You don't really want that kind of texture on their, so this is just a lot smoother. Then I just think, Ray, the piece of tracing paper and this. It's thin. It's light, it's porous and it's perfectly smooth. So when you put your leather piece on it, um, you know it's not going to get stuck, and you know it's not gonna mark up your piece you know where it doesn't have any ink on it that's gonna get transferred when you're steam it or anything like that very, very important. Before you touch anything with your iron. Before you get the iron anywhere near your leather, take a scrap and test it out. I can't stress it enough. I was tested twice because of use. Like I said, too much pressure too much. He too much steam. Um, it's gonna permanently scarred your leather and then it's then it's toast. Okay, so again, testing your fuse Bull testing your iron, testing your leather. So I take a small piece, not too small that you're not able to get a good feel of how it's going to, ah, affect the entire piece. Ah, and also don't take a piece from the end of the leather. That's exceptionally stretch here. Exceptionally weak. Take a take a good, sizable nice chunk that reflects how your actual pattern piece looks like. So I put it down the good side face down on my tracing paper. I also I like to very loosely trace around the test scrap with a pen, and this just gives me a rough idea that once I steam it, if the thing like shrivels up and it's, you know, smaller by, they can inch all the way around they don't know something's wrong because I'm going to see these lines that I just drew. Um, so this, you know, if you were if you were doing a longer run, like if you were making again, like I said, like 1000 jackets or something like that, you do much more rigorous testing of your fuse herbal, your leather, everything. But for me, um, I think this should suffice. She got just a little ink border that outlines your scrap. Put this crap in there. So I cut a small piece of usable or interfacing, and I'm gonna put it down there. Two sides, one of which has glue on it. You could feel that's rough, it's bumpy. And you could say it looks like little water droplets, and the other side is flat and smooth. She put the glue side down on the wrong side of your leather, and then I take the tracing paper and put it right over the top and just make sure that everything stays flat. Make sure there's no um bumps, air bubbles, anything like that. So this is the iron that amusing today? Um, it's I bought at a Best Buy. It's like $50. It's a regular home iron that you would iron shirt with, Um, there are certain industrial irons. There's gravity feed, which is basically just an oversized version of what this is that stores more water. Um, there are industrial irons you can get that have separate boilers that always have the water at a constant temperature. But for our purposes, just your regular home iron that gives plenty, Steve, and it's totally fun. So we're gonna use the steam. As I said over the leather, you don't want too much pressure. You don't want too much steam and you don't want to stay on for too long. So it's gonna put it on. Give it one blast to steam. Take it off. Just for good measure will get one more. That's it. Let's see how we did normally you would cut the usable to be the exact same size as your leather. But since we're just testing this, it doesn't really matter. So the first thing I noticed um, it looks like the leather did not shrink. It stayed within the parameters of that little border line that I drew around it. So that's a good sign. And let's say there's no discoloration. There's no water spots. There's no burn marks. This is from the ink. That's not a big deal. That's my fault. Um, yeah, the edges look good. They're not shriveled up. So I think that was a successful test. So it's not about successful. Then I'm confident that I can move on and fuse my actual sleeve. So now I'm ready to fuse The are interfacing to my sleeve. Um, it's do or die time. I hope I don't mess it up. Um, So what I did was cut my fuse above to match the curve, the curvature around the top of the arm hole again. The part that goes right in like that and this is just to stabilize the arm hole. It's something that gets a lot of poll, obviously a lot of movement. Um, you could just use your regular pattern piece to cut out your interfacing material with. If you have a thinner leather, you might want to do more of the sleeve for this case. Since This is Ah, rather thick piece of leather. We don't need to fuse all the way down. So again, I have the good side of leather face down on the tracing paper. If usable, make sure the glue is face down onto the back of your leather. And then I put my little piece tracing paper on the top. Make sure there's no air bubbles, no wrinkles know anything like that. But I didn't get this side did enough. So leave your paper down and just hit it one more time. Looks good to may. Everything's flush. No bubbles. Turn it over. No burns, no watermarks know anything like that. So that's Ah, that's good fuse. Now I'm gonna move down to the bottom. This is the headline. We want to stabilize that seriously. That and this is the side where the zipper goes that I mentioned. We want that to go like that. No bubbles, no wrinkles. Every which everything appears to be fused properly. Didn't take too much steam. It didn't take too much time, didn't take too much pressure and didn't take too much heat. Um, so if you can keep all those things to a minimum then you have the greatest chance of protecting your leather and making sure that you're not going to scar it. So let's take a look at the right side. Here's the top that we did. I don't see any issues. There's the bottom that we fused, and I don't see any issues there as well. Last step after infuse Take your nacho that I talked about before and I have my notches labeled here and just quickly punch them out and then you're done. This piece is ready to be soon. 6. Laying Out the Jacket: before I start making the jacket, especially when it's, Ah, new color scheme and new design in your style. I like to lay everything out just so I can visualize it. And I think it's important, since this is your potentially first time making your jacket that you can kind of look at it and make sense of what all the pieces are. Because there's about 28 leather pieces, individual separate leather pieces that go into making the shell. And that's on, including the lining. That's not including zippers, hardware, anything like that. So it's a lot of pieces, and there's a very specific way that you can just look at it and make sure that you cut the right thing. You didn't cut, you know, to right side backs, as opposed to right side and a left side back. So I just like to lay it out. Visualize that and it's exciting. I mean, you look at it and you say about this looks like a jacket, so it's kind of a tan. Whether that I'm using, I decided to go with a swayed back panel, so that's just this panel right here. The upper portion. I only do a couple of their suede accents like the under collar is going to be swayed. So here I was gonna briefly go through the pictures. This is the upper back. Lower back. We have the hem facing. This is the part that goes inside the jacket and attaches to your lining. Side backs, shoulder yokes. Um, that's these rate Here. These are the sides. This where your zippered pockets go also where you start the actual closure Zippers. Yeah, and then you have your front facings, and that's it. So let's get into actually selling these pieces together. 7. Sewing the Collar: Okay, let's get down to actually selling the leather garment or the leather shell as it's called . Uh, this that I described earlier is just your standard industrial sewing machine. It's Ah, Dukie 8700. Um, the only difference between this and any other machines that are industrial that you've probably seen is this has a computer in it and it does little fancy things like on the foot automatically lifts it. Cut your thread for you can automatic back stitch just a bunch of stuff that's convenient, but you don't actually need, um so I'm gonna not really use all of the features now. But like I said, this is not specific to leather selling at all. This is the same machine that you would see in any garment factory being used for denim jeans, shirts like button down shirts, bags, anything like that. Um, but I like it because it's quick. It's efficient for sewing the the main seems of the jacket. And then we're gonna go to the leather machine that's gonna give us a nice decorative top stitch. But we always start here. So, yeah, a lot of you're probably already familiar with how toe thread the machine and want the bobbin. I'm going to go through really quickly. Um, I'm using matching thread for this like tan, orangey Goldie material Here is my bobbin regular old industrial bobbin Wind it around now we're gonna win the but area. Okay, One wound bobbin when I put it In the bombing case, there's many, many Resource is online about how to properly threat of sewing machines. So I don't really need to go into that with you. Uh, just threaded up real quick through there, through there, through there as far as the needle goes, Um, there are certain needles that you can get that are specific to leather. There's Tri Pointe Diamond Point needles that are basically have a knife like edge that pierced the leather hide more efficiently. I use them specifically on my walking foot top stitching machine that I use for the decorative stitching on top. I don't always use the leather needles on this machine just because the leather that I'm working with is not exceptionally thick or heavy. Um, it just it's just not required the normal eagles that you would get, like a size maybe 16 that you would use for most other processes, like denim or anything. They were just fun. Earlier, I talked about the pressure foot. This little thing. It's the piece that rides on top of the fabric. One thing that's different about sewing with leather is used a Teflon presser foot. Basically, it has less friction. So when it glides across the sticky, um, side of the leather, ah, metal foot would get held up, it would bunch up the material, whereas the pressure of the Teflon foot just glides over it very nicely. Okay, so now I'm going to. So the collar for you. There are three pieces to the collar. There's the top collar. So this is the part that's gonna be showing when you wear it like that. And then there's the under collar, these air to pieces that gets sewn together. And these were like If you pop the collar up, which is not unheard of with like a leather jacket, you would see the under collar from the back. I'm doing the under collar in suede. Just I think it offers a nice little contrast Teoh to the smooth leather. So I'm assuming most people love a little bit of selling experience, but basically right sides together. So wrong sides are facing. You can see that the under collar is completely interface, completely fused, as is the upper collar. That's just to give it stability. Uh, matchup here edges on. We're using a 3/8 inch seam allowance. I explained the reasons for this earlier when we were going through our pattern, but basically on the entire jacket. We're using 3/8 of an inch for the seam allowance. I know a lot of times you'll see half inch. A lot of times you'll see 5/8. Um, there is a very specific reason for 3/8 again that I mentioned earlier, and this is one of the place that you definitely say it, and I'll explain to you why it's necessary when we move over to the walking foot machine. So it's not the scene Back Stitch finished with back stitch, and there's our under collar is sewn together. Okay, now we're ready to attach the under collar to the top color. You can see that when I Lonnie's up, there's a size difference. The top collar is slightly larger. Me about anything but in sure. So some purpose. It's not an accident, and it just has to do with the way that the over collar, the top seam of the fur collar, rolls over when the tour attached. And how when you're wearing it, because it's a it's a curves piece. Um, the way that it falls around your neck and the way that the points of the collar fall. You'll see it when we have completed garment. So the way that I do it, um, I start out just matching the sides good again, 3/8 inch seam allowance. And then I know that the bottom collar is obviously smaller, but we want to to match up. So I pinched with my fingers of the point and kind of Suddenly it's not stretching. It's more, um, curving and scrunching up the bottom piece just to get those sides completely matching. And this is what's gonna help the collar fall around the neck of the way the way that we wanted to. Great. So it's pretty much lined up from a little off there, but it's not a huge deal. Um, one thing you're gonna see a lot of times when people so points that you go right, Like to the end lift up and then pivot. I don't do that. I don't think the best way when I'm sewing points. So this seem. And then they seem I always just so right off into the edge and then take my material way and then so right over it perpendicular Lee. Um, that's really the only way that you're gonna get a perfect point right there in the corner . Ray, let's move on to the other side. Same deal here. Match up your sides all the way to the end. And there we are. All right, You could see there's a little that. Sure, there's a little bulk. There's a little gap and you want that. Okay, Next step. Now that we have both sides of the collar sewn, we want to. So along the top seem as far as not just go. You're going to see that we only have one notch. It's in the centre collar center of the top collar, and that's gonna line up directly to that center. Seem of the under collar. So I just pinch that so I don't lose it again. Just know there's no pins. There's no clips. There's no anything. You really don't need it. And you get a better seem without it. So right over that point perpendicular and we're the lineup edges. Take it a little at a time. Go slow when you need to make sure that the center notches still lining up. It is great. And there we go. You know, we have fully so in color like that. So the next step would be Teoh, turn this right side out. Um, I'm sure a lot of you have some experience to know that you got a clip, your corners or else it's gonna be all bunched up, and you're never gonna get a nice, crisp corner in there. So you want to cut right to where those two lines meet? Don't cut into the lines. Don't cut over your thread into the actual piece, but get pretty close to where that Linus and then I just put around it. Give yourself a little extra room, just like that. Let's do this at and now this collar is ready to be turned. Okay, So to turn this collar right, set out, I'm gonna open it up this way, and I want a nice, crisp line across the top. So what I do is that you kind of take my fingers in finger press. These two seems open. I also I have this Wait. It's £3 weight and has a nice little beveled edge. So sometimes I just like Teoh ride that right in between those two seems and foursome open . So that's just gonna give us a nice, more crisp line when we actually turn this right side out and then go to top stitch it. You'll have a little bulk here in the under collar. If you want, you can take a hammer and lightly, very lightly. Kind of tapped that open. Um, I wouldn't recommend going crazy on it with a hammer, a rubber mallet, because it's gonna mar the outside of your leather. Okay, that looks okay to may we do the same thing here. Just lightly. Thinker. Press him open. Amusing my fingers in the back toe. Push it open. Next thing is where to turn the corners. So I'm to take a finger. There's many ways to do this. Um, for leather, you kinda have to use an alternate method of the normal things that you see online. um, with the with the fabric, it's much easier because you really you press it and you iron the points, and you can so a little piece of thread in there and pull out the corner with leather. It's a lot bulkier. The seems your thicker. Um, it kind of limits your choices. So what I do is I stick my finger directly into the corner, put my thumb over it on the corner and pull it right side out. Obviously a little stubby right now. Push it out as much as you can with your finger. Don't stretch the seems too much, you know. Don't pull on it. Don't you know, kind of make them twist out of alignment. We go to the other side finger in some of the top, push it out like that. Um, probably a bad idea. But it works for me. I'd use a Phillips screwdriver to really poke out the end of the tips. Um, you don't want to really, like, force it into the tips because you're gonna rip your leather and going to push your seems out too much. Um, but you just want, like, a nice, non sharp. Um, you know small headed objects. Teoh, finally push out the points. Let's go very lightly. Very gently. And we have very nice point. Um, you know, obviously is a little rounded with No, This is not like I said. There's not a collard shirt. This is not a button down shirt. You're not gonna get that completely. Um, pointed point. Um, this is best we're gonna get, and I like it. It works for me. So we're gonna set this aside for a minute. Um, the next step would be the top. Stitch it on the walking foot top stitch machine, and we'll get to that in just a little bit. 8. Adding Zippers: Let's move on to adding zippers to the front of your jacket. Um, this is your standard separating zipper. Choose for the front enclosure and attach is to your side front panel to your center front panel. It goes like that. Um, so two sides of the zipper obviously, um, they're both going to get attached to the outside edge in my style. The way that I do it, I do a zipper on each side. So there is two sets of center front sippers, so you can includes the jacket this way or to close the jacket this way. I'm just going to show you one side right now for the sake of time. Um, yeah, Basically, putting on zippers seems to be a lot harder than it is. That usedto really scare me now it doesn't. The key here, if you don't already know is a zipper foot. This is a Teflon zipper foot, I believe. A right hand zipper foot. Um, compared to the out of the presser foot that we've been using for everything else, you can see the difference. It's a lot narrower. And basically, with this lets you dio is get the seem much closer to the zipper teeth. Whereas this foot, you can only get so close here you can get closer to the CME and that allows you have much straighter, a much nicer seem along your zipper's. Okay, let's start out by adding the female side, um, or the receiving side of the insert to our center side piece or a side front piece. What we're gonna do is we're gonna have when a. This is the right side. Obviously, because the zipper is facing you. We're in a full disappear over, so the edge of the tape is gonna line up with the edge of our scene. You'll see that the zipper poll is upside down and backwards. That's fun. It's great. Um, it could get in the way. If you want to pull it off, you can take off the zipper pull. I gotta be honest. I've forgotten to put it back on like, a dozen times on, and then once it's not on, you have to, like, rip apart your jacket. So I highly advised to leave the Super Poland, so do not forget to put it on later. Once you closed the same. So let's Let's so this up. I have a little line here, little notch where the zipper tape is going to start. Just line up the ends and we're only an attack this into place right now. We're not gonna This scene that I'm doing is just to keep the zipper in place. And then when we put the center front on top of this Teoh join the rest of the CME. This Just make sure that this zipper doesn't move when you're adding the top piece together . Um, I mean, for me, there's a lot easier than working with three separate pieces at a time and trying to sandwich the zipper tape in between this piece and the side piece. So this is the final product that we want. We want the super tapes sandwiched in between these two pieces of leather, but I find it's easier just toe attack the tape into place first. So I'm gonna talk this into place just using 1/4 inch seam allowance. You know that we're gonna end up using 3/8 of an inch, but it's gonna get attacked with 1/4 of an inch in. That leaves this room to move. Okay, The key with sewing on Super Tate is not toe pull on and not to stretch the zipper tape and not the Poland and not to stretch the weather If either one of one of them stretches when you're selling this, you're gonna get ripples in the final scene between this ever poll, and then it's gonna look not so great when you finish the product. So just trust your machine, trust your pattern and let the machine do the work and just let it feed nice and evenly. And don't get scared one more time. I want to note I'm not using any clips. I'm not using any pains, anything like that. Ah, highly recommend not doing that. Um, the machine feeds properly. It feeds evenly, and you don't really need to have anything tacked in place. Just make sure that the edge of the separate eight stays along the edge of the letter. Move one with one hand and the zipper tape with the other, and this you keep them separated or semi separated until right before it gets under the needle. And that's how you can sure that you have a good eye on it. You have a good eye on your see him, and it's always gonna be lined up. It's important to really slow when you're doing this. And I said, just practicing on a scrap piece of leather. At some point, I'm moving my pull out of the way so I don't so over it, we're very curved piece here with a gradual curve. Um, just make sure you account for that and do not stretch the leather to conform to the zipper . Tate, let the machine do the work and gradually ease in that curve. All right, that looks that looks great to me. We have a nice even quarter and see him going all the way down. Um, pretty confident that our zipper is going the right way because when you fold it over, it operates properly. You'll notice that the, uh, I didn't cut this to size before we started sewing this. So the zipper tape is actually a little too long for a panel. That's fine. Um, I'm gonna show you how to separate how toe shorten, separating zippers. Um, it's really just the simplest taking a needle nose pliers and pulling off the extra teeth that you don't need. And then putting on a new a new closure on the end. New zipper, stop. All right, I'm gonna move on to the centre front panel and show you how to put the zipper tape on that . It's pretty much the exact same process. All right, so now I'm going to attach the center front piece through the side front piece that we already put the super tape on. Um, you'll see that these have this gradual curve at the top. Um, and this is the shoulder seam. And this is the bottom seen, um, I think it's really important. I always start at the shoulder seam and line that one up first because it's the most crucial to get even if you saw it in this tape properly, you shouldn't have any ripples. You'll see how flat this is. It's really not hard to get that flat. Um, and then these notches, that, um, again, we spoke about the notches earlier. They're gonna line up properly, and they're gonna make sure that once you so these like seven or eight inches that not just gonna line up. And those two notches were gonna line up straight down to the bottom and not just your roadmap to make sure that everything is going evenly the entire length of the scene. So we put right sides together. You'll see this is a little trickier because it's not just a straight line. There are these opposing curves here. That's cool. That's fun. One little trick that I've realized is that once I have the zipper tape sewn to one side of the panel, I like to put that on the top. Um, I just find that with the pressure foot pushing down on it so the pressure is on the top. It just nicely just kind of squeezes it out and make sure that everything stays aligned without getting too rippled, and I find it just kind of easier. Thio Thio manage and negotiate the bottom piece without any weight on it. So let's start out. We're in a line up the corners. We trust our pattern. We know that the pattern was made well, where the corners air completely aligned, so we don't need to worry about clipping pinning anything like that. Now, this is where we're gonna go back to our 3/8 inch seam allowance. Sometimes I cheat and go a little further than three. It's but, um, Dr three, it's get a couple stitches at the top to make sure it stays lined up. Now let's get our not just lined up that looks perfect to me. I'm just gonna pinch them and without really twisting or pulling, were yanking on anything to stretch the leather. I want to ride out that seem at 3/8 of an inch, go very slow. Make sure that your top piece, the edges lining up completely with the bottom piece okay, successfully navigated that notch. Let's go down to the next one pension that with my fingers, this one's a little easier because it's more of a straight line. All I'm doing is using this hand to very subtly lineup. The bottom piece of the top pieces I go along still looks good, too. May got a nice even stitch and we're the home stretch. Let's just move this. It would pull out of the way. So so over that great and we're line up the bottom edge like that. Everything still lines up. Very well. Be careful. It's very bulky here where the end of the zipper is. Um, this is again while you use the zipper foot. Because you can get really nice and close to the big, bulky part without running over it through a little back stitch at the end. And we're done. That's me. It looks great. Um, I don't see any ripples. No curves, no stretch ease. Um, the top shoulder lines up perfectly. The bottom lines up perfectly. And this is ready to be top stitched to secure this seem in place. 9. Sewing the Leather Shell Pt.1: Okay, so now we're gonna move on to the back panel of the jacket. This is the center back. Upper part portion. It's swayed, You can tell. And this is the lower back portion where it's gonna. So these two together, I know we didn't fully go into what, where and who was fused. All this information will be included in the pattern. A to the resource is linked below. But basically, this is fused because this is the bottom ham of the jacket, and that's something that definitely needs that extra stability. All right, let's light it up. We got right sides together. Yep. I'm still using the zipper foot right now. Um, you don't have to. I'm just using because it's on the machine. Not a big deal. It's a good machine. So it still feeds nice and evenly. So I have a center notch that de marks the centre of the back pieces, so let's just make sure those two notches airline up looks good to may side one decide to, and they're of the 1st 2 pieces of the shell zone. I was gonna move over real quick to top stitch this on the walking foot machine and then I'm gonna put in the sides of the back. Let's so the side back panels together, this is another one where you have two opposing curves. Just wanna gently Easier than when you're selling. But you're notches uh, should match up very well. You got a double notch here, which denotes the back. You have, ah, notch at the natural waist and then at the bottom 3/8 of an inch. As always, trust your pattern and trust your machine and just ease that in. Just check as you go along. You know, make sure that your notches air lining up Nothing is too crazy. Once I done ready to be top stitched and I'll just go ahead on my own and you go ahead on your own to shut the second side, and then we'll move over to the walking foot machine and I'll show you had a top stitch This and top stitch the zipper that we did before 10. Overview of Leather Machine: So here we are at the walking foot sewing machine. Uh, this is the really the only tool that everything we're using that's leather specific. That's not to say that it's not used for canvas and get him and stuff like that. Um, this apartment really known as a leather machine? It's called a walking foot machine in the way that it feeds the material. Um, just a brief explanation. A normal selling machine has feed dogs on the bottom with a static presser foot, and the feed dogs move the material like that while the presser foot stays stationary. This is a triple feed or also known as walking foot, where the needle actually digs in and moves the fabric around while these set of feet walk over the fabric or the leather, while the few dog at the bottom also pushes it through, basically just a complex way to not get the material that sticky because leather is pretty sticky and suede is sticky. Ah, and it would get bunched up if you tried to top stitch it in the regular machine. On this just allows it to feed very nicely and very evenly, so you can just see. I'll give you a quick demo of how how the foot moves. You kind of see inherently why it's called a walking foot machine. So the feet move up. The needle moves forwards and backwards all simultaneously, while the feed dollar get the bottom that actually feeds the machine feeds the material goes for All right. So I didn't show you how to thread the other industrial machine. It's pretty much like I said, something that's easily found online, and if you do it once, you get it. But I'll briefly walk you through how to thread this machine because it's different and not everyone has one another. Everyone has seen one before. I already won my bobbin. You wanted the same exact way that we were on the other one with bother wander on the side . This has a horizontal hook as opposed to a vertical hook. Like the other sewing machine. You put it straight down. It lays on the hook. There's a little spring that attach is over. The top thread goes through. There's like a little tongue that it goes underneath and that's it. The bobbin just lays there In that scene in the story then for the top thread, it's through our thread stand. This part is the same as normal sewing machine. Up through here, there's these two loops. Here you go down through one down through a number two, you have the top tension wheel. So this is how you adjust the tension that we spoke about with before, Um, that we spoke about before. Um, it regulates the tension of the top thread and the bobbin thread eyes adjusted down here. And that's how you get a very nice even stitch that looks the same on both sides. So it's really the same as any other sewing machine, including like a home sewing machine. In that sense goes up through this little flywheel is another spring. Follow the guides around again. There's diagrams all over the Internet for this. Um, I don't want to waste too much time talking about threading, um, through that all through the needle and then the last step that sometimes I forget you have to go through the hole in the actual walking foot. I don't know if you can see it, but there's a little hole that the needle goes through. It's not a slotted thing like a normal sewing machine. Presser foot. So that's it. Pick up the bobbin thread just like you would. I'm pretty much any machine and you are ready. Ready? The self close that and that's it. One thing you really have to remember with this machine is you have toe hold the thread when you start each scene or else it's gonna get in up and it's gonna get tangled down here in the bobbin and you're not gonna be happy. And it's from it's the only way to break this machine is allowed to get tangled, so we start each thread, make sure you have a good hand on this so the top threat isn't sucked back in. Let's get right into it. So here's our back piece that we sowed earlier, and I read tops business on my own. But let's top stitch thesis. I'd see him to the center back. Uh, you could do it. Either way, you could do back over like that, or you could do side back over. So basically just depends on which way you push the scene. I like Teoh, since there's a seam here that naturally wants the lay flat I like to let sit like that and therefore I do side back over back. But you could do whatever you want. So what I'm using here is there's an edge guide that spring loaded. It may be tough to say, but there's this little guide here that makes this a top stitching foot, and you ride that spring loaded guide right along the inner side. This is something that you can get for regular sewing machines, home sewing machines, anything, and they come in various distances from the spring to the needle. So this is like about an eighth of an inch. They have 1/4 inch. If you want a bigger gap, a wider seem. But eight of an inch or 3 16 works just well for me. So let's start. Let's hold the thread. It's make sure this is all even in flat go very slow, maybe three stitches and then we're going back stitch, just like we normally dio Dan were often running. Really, every time you stop, uhm is a very stopping go kind of process. Make sure you stop with the needle in the down position because if you start with the needle in the up position. It's easier for your fabric to walk. But if you stop with the needle down, it can't move and you're seeing will get messed up. Obviously, I'm using black Thread here one because I think it looks really cool, but to because you can actually see it so hopefully you can follow this seem pretty well. There's a lot of bulk here because we have this stick seem, but the machine is good and it should just go right over it. Awesome. Let's keep going. Make sure as you go along, make sure that the the U Seem is completely presto one side. Um, therefore, it's not folded over and you don't get that. It doesn't get crooked midway through nearing edge, Doc stitch at the top. Take it out, chop it and we're looking good. We just got a little wet here over. That's not a big deal. I don't try. Yeah, we have a very nice, completely even, um, contrast ing stitch. So obviously you would continue on and do this for pretty much every part. Now you would go in, and so the shoulder yoke then tops. That's that. Replicate that on this odd attach the side seams, you know, Just complete the garment intuitively, as it would be completed living move on and top stitch the zipper that we did earlier. Okay, let's move on to top stitching the scene that we did earlier Where the zipper is sandwich then. Ah, this one is also very intuitive. Basically, make sure that the zipper teeth are facing outwards towards the center. So it's this piece here on the jacket so the zipper can't go like that because then you won't be able. Teoh zip. It should make sure that the poll the zipper pull is going in the right direction. I'm gonna hold your thread when you start so it doesn't get sucked in. Go up in back stitch and then just ride. Ride your top stitching one. When it comes time, take your zipper. Pull moving on the way back. Stitch of the top on. We're good to go. There is Are finished. Citing, um, obviously, here. This is the side panel. You can add any kind of pocket you want. I usually do a double well pocket with the zipper. Um, not going to show you that there's plenty of resource is online. Um, and I don't think it's really fundamental to the construction of the jacket that there is a pocket there. So basically, just take a look around, take a look at what other people are doing or what I'm doing. Leather jacket wise. And then, you know, copy what you like the best, and you could put a pocket with flap. You could put a zippered pockets. You could just put an open pocket. You can move your pocket up here, here, whatever you want to do. But just for the sake of simplicity, this is our finished side and front from scene. Okay, now we're going top stitch the collar that we saw earlier. We're going to do all of the stitching from the top side, which we know is the smooth side. And we're just going to go one side, then across the top and then down the remaining side. I like to do all of the top stitching from the top, as opposed to flipping it over in any point. Just because this is a rather aggressive machine, actually, and it elects that sometimes leave subtle marks on the leather and stuff. So if you leave one side the whole time. You're not gonna get any any weird marks that are inconsistent. This is kind of the scariest part that I find about making the jacket just some afraid to mess up because it's such a visible portion. But basically just again, let your machine let your pattern do the work, trust it and make sure I don't know if you can see that. Well, to make sure that the where the two pieces meet the suede and smooth leather, make sure that they're completely on the side and one is it folding over the other. So I also I don't like to sell around the corners. I think it's really hard to get a very even line that way, so I just cause the leather is very bulky, especially this one in particular. I e go up about 1/4 inch away from the point due back stitch and then just stop and then restart on the top. I think it's just a different look. It works for May. You can do anything you want that may. I'm gonna leave it right there. I'm gonna quit my loose ends, and now I have one side top stitched The top is a little trickier because if you remember, the under collar is slightly smaller than the top. Now you can actually see the reason for this when you're in a top, stitch it. The under collar falls just on on the right side of the upper collar, and it's designed this way. So when it rolls over the top, seem rolls slightly over the under one, and it gives you a little different look. Little better look, and it makes it fall around your neck. I'm a little nicer, so you just want to keep that in mind. Keep on again. Kind of kind of together. But make sure that the top collar rolls over the bottom one just slightly. I'm gonna start like I said, about 1/4 inch away from the point. Remember to hold on to your loose threads. It's the quickest way to mess up is not remember that. Make sure they're sure they're staying relatively lined up because you don't want your color toe go askew. This is really where the edge stitching foot comes in handy because it make sure that you can't mess up the with of the stitch of the top. Okay, we're halfway there. Okay. Looks good to May. Very even back. Looks good to thank you to the top stitching foot. And now just the last side. Hold your threads back. And there you have it. Fully top stitched collar with good looking stitch that's even all the way around and that's ready to be put into your garment. Something that I'm not actually go into today. Um, I'm gonna try to make it abundantly clear in the pattern and in the instructions included without about how to do it. Um, but I think you will have any problem if you just lined up the notches and trust your pattern and trust your machine. 11. Sewing the Lining: okay. I want to briefly talk about sowing the lining. I don't want to waste your time too much going through the entire process. It's very, very similar to sewing the actual leather shell. The pieces are generally the same, and you have to have a few fewer pieces on the lining because the back and backsides, we're joined. And, um, just things like that. So the sleeves, I have two pieces here. It's exactly the same as were more or less the same as the actual sleeve of the shell that we showed earlier. You haven't understood? Leave and you have an over sleeve. Okay, so we're gonna attach the under seems of the under sleeve to the top sleeve. Same thing that we've been doing all along. 3/8 inch seam allowance. No pens, no clips, no nothing. We have one notch down here that lines up. Okay, so that's sewn up nicely. You can use your iron. You compress this open. Ah, if you like, that will give you a nice little crisp. Seem OK, so one difference here from the outer sleeve in a little bit, we're gonna go into how Teoh attach the lining to the jacket and how Teoh bag B a G bag aligning, which basically is the process by which you attach the lining to the shelves inside out as an right sides together, you make a closed, um, closed like loop of jacket and you pull the entire jacket out through a hole that you leave in the sleeve of the lining. Sounds confusing. It's not that confusing, um, as a little straight leader. But on one of this leaves, So let's call it this leave, which is the left. Leave the left lining sleeve Doesn't matter what you use. You're going to leave like maybe 6 to 8 inch hole in the side, the outside outer sleeve of the lining. What I do is I call it leaving a hole, but it's actually a lot nicer if you finish the CME. But between those six and eight inches, you take your seamless with Um, which right now we're using 22 and 1/4 2.5 size seem. Set your machine to the maximum, so it's just easier for you to pull those 68 inches out later. Um, so going to so the entire scene, and then when you're ready to bag the lining later, you just pull out those six inches eight inches or whatever. And then that's the whole that you're used to pull out the leather jacket when you back. The lining and last step of creating the entire jacket is you're going to just close that hole by top stitching it again. Sounds kind of confusing. It's not so in the outer sleeve. I always like to start on the top. It's the most crucial part for you to line up. That looks good. We got two notches here. Matchup between launches. Okay, so I've done a few inches down. Let me doc stitch here. Just the line it up. I'm gonna switch my dial to the longest stitch length possible. And let's go a few inches with a very long stitch land that we're gonna uses our whole toe Open up later When we die. The lining. Okay, that looks good. To may set my stitch back. Teoh, my normal Stangeland back stitch a couple times so it doesn't come out and then finish up your scene. And there you have it. I'm not sure if you can see it, but between here and here. I have a longer stitch land, and that's the part that we're gonna take our seem ripper and pull out later. And that'll be our whole from here. What we're gonna dio I'm not gonna demonstrate it all right now, because, I mean, it's pretty simple and intuitive. Just so the rest of your lining the pattern should make it abundantly clear which which pieces go where there's really there's no weird things. There's no audibles. There's a little plea in the back. Um, but that's very easy to navigate. Um, we're already we already know how to set in sleeves from the other lesson. So the way that you set the sleeves in the lining is exactly the same that you set him in the shell. There's no collar to worry about, their no zippers to worry about. Obviously, um and that's it. So there is our lining 12. Setting Sleeves: Okay, so we're kind of jumping ahead here. Um, you should be pretty well equipped to be able to get the jacket to this point. Um, so where we're at now, Um, obviously, this is a different jacket than the other one we're working on. Um, the entire shell is sown. The entire shell is top stitched that we learned about on the walking foot machine. Ah, I got my pockets and I have my zippers. And I got my belt. If you're gonna do a belt, I got my collar. I have my neck facing. The jacket is not top stitched. The lining is not installed, and the hem facing is not installed. Uh, So what we're gonna do now is we're gonna put the sleeves on. Uh, this jacket this is actually for a customer and who wanted quilting. So this just has, like, some foam in it. Ah, it takes forever to dio to get these lines perfectly straight. But it's got a really cool spacey look, I guess biker Look, I installed once leave already just to show you what it looks like when it's in. And now on this side, we have just an empty normal. I know that some people talk about setting sleeves in flat versus setting sleeves in the round. Uh, in the round is basically what we're gonna dio. And for our purposes, it's really the only option. Um, it's only option to get a very nice clean Taylor. Look, when you set him in flat, basically, you leave the side seam open and you leave half of this open. So it's just the shell is flattened out like that, and you sew the sleeve in just like you would any normal straight scene, and then you close the side arm and under sleeve accordingly. Um, there's various reasons that I don't recommend that, Um, but let's just say we're gonna be setting this leaves in in the round, and you should do the same. So back to our notches that we've talked about many times. This is pretty much the most important. Um, use for notches is in this lethal. It's pretty standard where the notches were going to be. I should have one or two more than you normally would, just better for educational purposes. But the under sleeve. So the side seam of the jacket, which falls Ray here. I'm honestly, if, um there should be a notch to mark that two notches in the back because we know that the back always has two notches, so you don't differentiate it from the front One notch at around. What is that, like eight oclock and then the top of your sleeve. You're like 12 o'clock where the top of your shoulder lines up your knee a notch there, so obviously there's corresponding ones on the sleeve as there are in the arm hole. Since the notches were lead out as they are, there's really no way that you can mess up by putting the wrong sleeve in the wrong hole. It's basis just impossible, because the notches won't line up. So we're gonna dio this. We're in a Jess. Stick it in to the whole the sleep off. Um, and we want right sides to face together, just, like always, writes out of the sleeve, faces out matches to the right side of the show and twisted around to you know that you're not just are lined up. You said up there is my bottom one there, the two notches for the back at like 1 32 o'clock If you were looking at this from the other side. Uh, my top? Yep. Top lines up. Andi? Yup. Sidelines up and we're going to go. So the same goes for every other part that we showed. You don't want to stretch. You don't want to pull. A lot of times you're going to see ease built into a sleeve or the sleeve cap meeting to the sleeve cap is larger than the arm hole. Eso If you've read about that I heard in the past just know that that's not an issue here. There is no ese. The arm hole, the diameter or the circumference actually of the arm hole is exactly the same as the measurement around the entire arm. She don't need to do any kind of gathering sticks. You don't need to ease manually. Um, and again, I keep saying you do not need to pin this. Ah, and you do not need to clip it. Main reason, obviously, for not using pains as I mentioned already, is it's gonna leave holes if you put a pin through here. That holds gonna be there forever. Same way is if you mess up with CNN and If you use clips, it's just they spring out. Sometimes it's hard to keep, um, to keep him lined up. Sometimes you so over them and then break your needle and it just it just not needed. So let's start. So yet I know this is gonna look a little sloppy in a little messy. Um, from where you're sitting. But I'm gonna start in the bottom right on the understudy of underneath your armpit on you could really start anywhere. But have you been placed this, like the scene? Kind of got a finical it and worm it in there. But do that without, Like I said, without stretching, you're gonna use three A thin seam allowance. Sound like a broken record, but that's what it is. Start your stitch with back stitch and always try to line up one set of notches ahead just so you know that you're going in the right direction. So here we go. Let's go around the armful. I take it very slow. Keep your eye on the 3/8 inch mark. Ah, you can turn and switch around the shell I was needed. Make sure that it's not bunched up underneath and make sure that you're not, you know, sewing over something that's like accidentally flapped and fold together because I knew, you know, have a big mess. One other thing that I forgot to mention. Actually, I typically like to. So with the sleeve on top and the arm hole against the bed of machine, I've seen people that advocate for both ways. This is just how I do it, Um so feel free to experiment both ways. I don't think that really makes a difference. Um, just do whatever you feel comfortable with. All right, those notches lined up, let's move on to the next set of notches, which is just right back here in the back of the sleeve, head everything line and up. Like remember not to stretch the leather in the shoulder yoke when you're going around, curves the shoulders. The easiest place to do it. Especially when you're leather as a little stretch to it. Just make sure that everything feeds naturally and normally in the machine. This is another reason why we don't use pins or clips or anything, because it makes things just feed less. Naturally, it seems like this is going together pretty Well, when the homestretch, we just have one more set of notches to line up. And I just continue right over the original stitch where we started out, Doc Stitch and you're done. So you have a pretty nice and even stitch line going around. Let's turn it right side out just to see how we did. Um, you're gonna need Teoh kind of flat in some of these seems there's a little bulk in the shoulder yoke. You know where there's 45 pieces of leather stacked on top of each other, but you can say there's no Bunches. There's no accidental holes. Everything right down to the underarm lines up really nicely sometimes actually like to re stitch over this twice just to get a little more stability. But I don't think you really need to. And now you have a jacket with two fully installed sleeves, and this is ready to have the lining attached 13. Sewing the Lining Pt.2: All right, so we are getting there looking good. We have a completed shell and we have a completed lining. So let me just share the lining really quick. Um, it looks very much like the shell. It's got the sleeves. Everything is in the same exact place. One thing is I went ahead and over locked all of the raw edges, Um, in Overlook machine, where searcher, as it's sometimes called, basically just encapsulates the raw edges that has four or five threads and two needles. And just make sure that these things don't unravel or, you know, the threads at the Rogers don't pull apart. It's not necessary, but it just gives it a nice finished look. I also went ahead and put the bottom hem facing and attached it to the bottom of the lining . So this is the leather piece attached to the line of peace. Now it's time to partially attach this to the shell, and we're only gonna so across the bottom and about three inches on the side, and then we're gonna set it aside, and then I'll show you why. All right? Just does everything else we have right sides together. So the right side. The outside nice side of the garment is going to get so it against the right side or the good side of the lining. This is where we get our little inside out. Very strange looking government. All right, we're gonna start with the side facings is where the zippers go in the front were to fold them back, and we're going to attach the hand facing that about three inches up on the lining. And we're gonna so from this corner up to about here back stitch it and then completely stop 3/8 inch seam allowance, as always. Okay, Looks good. This is what gives us this really nice square here. And that's gonna be on the inside of the garment. What's like right there? It's moved to the other side. Get the belt out of the way. If you have a belt on your garment or not, that's up to you. So we're gonna continue Teoh. So the hem to the bottom there are not just hear that match up with each of the side seems so. This is front, side, side, back and back. And you'll see in the hem. There's a notch idiot spot. So you really don't have anything to worry about? It's gonna line up just perfectly. Remember not to stretch it. Let the machine in the pattern do the work for you. All right, We've reached our first notch and where perfectly aligned don't get number two, Right? Center back. We have three notches. One denotes center back and the other two are for each side of the hem pacing. And that looks like it's lining up just fine. Great. We're halfway there and there you have it. That's all set. It's gonna reach up here. Up here is grab my scissors just like we did with the collar. We're gonna clip this corner, so we were able to turn it properly. We're gonna clip this corner, so we're able to turn it properly, and then we're going to temporarily turn our jacket right side out, using the same method of turning that were used on the collar with my dangerous Phillips screwdriver. Right? Push that out. So you have a nice little corner and thats what it will eventually look like so that we're just going to go temporarily. Now that we have the lining attached, we're going to go ahead and do our top stitching across the entire top, starting at the collar down through the zipper, across the hem line that we just showed right there. And okay, back up the other side. Once we do that, we're gonna put the jacket on or take a look. If it doesn't fit you. If you're making it for someone else, Um you try it on someone else and then we're going Teoh, that's gonna give us a really good estimation of what it's gonna where it's gonna fall where the lapels are gonna fall, how the shoulders fall, all of that. And then we're gonna use that information to mark up where we're gonna put the hardware. So these little snaps for the lapels that I have right here we're gonna mark that we're gonna install the hardware and then we're gonna just finish sewing up the lining and bagging the warning and then you have a done jacket. So almost there. Here we go. 14. Topstitching: Okay, Now we're gonna get into top. Stitching are partially line jacket. It's this kind of a tricky part. It's ah has the greatest chance of, like, messing it up and ruining everything that you've already done on. Believe me, I've been there. I've done it. Let's try not to do that. Now, let's just go really slow and Ah, focus. So I'm starting to stop stitch right where the collar meets the lapel in front facing. And this is just gonna give us nice structure going right down along the front, zipper the hem and back up the other side never to hold your threads. All right, we dock stitched at the top. So here you have to just go little by little and make sure that you're to join. Pieces are lining up on the side. Depending on how thick your leather is and how bulky it is, it's gonna be a little easier or harder to do so this leather is pretty thick and it's pretty spongy. So you just kind of got a watch. All right, stop in there at the corner because that's the look that I like. Check. It looks like a good top stitch looks a good top stitch will trim all these threads better later. All right, down in the front again. Just check your attention. Make sure that your top and bottom tension look about the same because this whole seem is going to be seen from both sides. So if this is the front of the jacket, your lapel is gonna fold out like that. So you're gonna see this seem. But then you're also going to see this sort of scene. You're gonna see all that up to there and then that, so to make sure it looks good from both sides. And that's all about fixing your top tension and bottom attention. Okay, Gets a little trickier here because you have a zipper in the way that you can't really see where the edge of your material lines up. You have to just feel under there with your fingers and make sure that it it's ah, laying down the way that you wanted to. Okay, back stitched reach under. Take a peek, Go like want and time. I can't rush it. Let's just take a peek to make sure it looks good. Looks good on this side. Looks good on that side. Great. Some pulling slightly on the zipper while I'm simultaneously pulling out from the bottom. One thing, though, is if you pull too much, your zipper is going to get little like waves in it. You don't really want that. So never, never pull and stretch your material too much again. Let's check our progress. It looks really nice. Straight. Nice, straight. Very happy. Always stop with your needle in the down position. Okay? It's gonna get a little bulky here. Still looking good. Okay, so we're all done with the top stitching. We started here. We went. Oh, it down there along the bottom and back up to the other side. So now we're gonna try on the jacket. We're going to see where the lapels fall. Fortunately, I'm a similar size to this client that this is for eso. It'll fall in a very similar way. Um, like I said, we'll try. The jacket will suit where the lapels fall, Mark, where we're gonna put the snaps in here and here. There were no install the snaps and then finish up eso in the lining. And then we're pretty much done. Here we go. 15. Attaching Snap Hardware: So now we're all, ah top stitched around the entire side and bottom hem so you can pretty much see what our jackets going to look like with lining partially attached. Looks great. We got some nice corners, and there it looks, well tailored. It looks like a like a nice suit jacket or something like that would look. But obviously we're not attached anywhere else yet. What I'm gonna do is I'm gonna put it on. I'm going to see where the lapels fall when I zip it up and that's gonna indicate where I put the two snaps here. So just to show you if we can check this out over here on each lap has four pieces to for the top and two for the bottom. And the reason that we partially lined the jacket and the reason that we're doing the snaps before we finish it is because we need access to the inside here to put the back of the snap. You take a look at this other jacket. There's a topside which is on the lapel in a backside. But the back side needs to be installed before the lining because it's inside the lining. If you did it after, they would be on top of lining. And that's just not that professional looking. So me try on or new jacket. Just be careful if you're doing this. Since the lining is not fully connected, especially in the back neck, it'll be really easy for you. Teoh. Rip some of the scenes. Just be very gentle when you're trying it on. Don't let any of this rip all right, so it's a little too small. It's not quite my size. Uh, when you zip it up after where I think it would be comfortable and let's see where the lapels naturally flop, it's gonna be somewhere around there on this one would be somewhere around there. I like to keep him kind of equal distance on either side. Some is gonna just like my finger there, and then I'll just get a tape measure on Mischer, down from the seam down to there, and that'll be the measurement for where the snaps get placed. Um, I'll take it right over the to the snack machine to the kick press. After that. Here we have a kick press. It's basically a spring loaded press with a norm that goes down and it lets you install snaps and grommets, islets, rivets, anything like that. Here, we're gonna use it to install the snaps for the lapels. Like I said earlier, there's four pieces, um, to like male side and two on the female side on they go into the set of diet. It's a dissect that allows everything to be lined up. So once it's all lined up, I just press all the way down the pedal and snaps the two pieces together. And we have a functioning side of the stuff, so it's going to continue the same thing on the other side. And then we're gonna add the opposite side. This, that I'm switching out the dye set. Now it's a separate. Die for the top and bottom. Now we're going to top. Okay, we're gonna add the top snap now that us to snap like that. Therefore, this piece is on the bottom socket and cap like that. Boom. No, we're sure it's going the right way. That seems a little bulky here, so it's a bit tricky toe. Get it to line up. Great. One more such okay, then we have to functional snaps 16. Sewing the Lining Pt.3: Okay, so this is more or less the final step. We have the lining and the shell both turned inside out again. And we're gonna finish where we left off about two steps ago. And we're continue sewing the lining to the shell all the way around, and then we're going to attach the sleeve lining to the sleeves, also inside out. And then we're gonna open up that hole that we showed previously in the outer arm of the lining. We're gonna turn the entire jacket inside out. This called bagging the lining. She got plenty of notches in your lining pattern in the shell as you go around the top. So just make sure you rely on your notches first when we come across is right here about eight inches up from the bottom. So that's lying. That guy up. Be careful, not toe stretch. Either one. We're also gonna have a uncomfortable feeling lining 17. "Bagging" the Lining Pt.1: All right, so we're down to pretty much the last step. We're going to attach the sleeve lining to this live. It's a little difficult t illustrate this, but basically, I have the jacket inside out, Uh, kind of facing itself, and it's all sealed. It's even overlooked this. You could do that if you want. So it's like a complete system and you can't see the inside. So what I need to do is I'm gonna line up the shoulders so I don't get the sleeves twisted around. So I know that these line up fold back the lining, the sleeve lining, making sure there's no twists, there's no turns, fold back the actual sleeve and then I'm going to just line up the notch. Uh, it's right here on the inside, lined up with that notch, and then I'm gonna just so around, um and then I'll have the sleeves that air joined. I'm gonna go ahead and do that, and then we're gonna pull it through the hole. Okay, There's once leave so unto itself 18. "Bagging" the Lining Pt.2: So now we're pretty much there. We're gonna open up the hole that we left in the sleeve with our seem Ripper. Ah, and then we're gonna reach in and pull out the jacket. So let me start by opening up that whole right. Here we go. We're gonna pull it right side out. Says Graham. Some leather. Be careful not to yank too hard. So you don't ripped the rest of your seem and we're turn it right side out. Okay, so we are finished. Planet through and out, actually. Finally. Looks like a jacket. Let's see if it works. Yeah, it feels like a jacket. Um, yeah. Next step pretty much is just Teoh kind of iron everything out. Not with an iron, like, you know, with your hands. Just making sure that the lapels fall exactly where you want to. You know, maybe crimp crimped the zipper a little bit with your hands, make sure the lining is falling properly. And then we're just gonna wanna top stitch around the cuff back to our walking foot machine , and we're gonna turn the arm inside out, and then we're gonna close up the whole, um, me where it's gonna put those sides back together the size that we took apart with seem ripper. We're going to put him back together and just to, ah, top stitch on a regular machine and top such that closed. And then after that, that's pretty much it. You know, all. They had some, some islets to the belt buckle, so we'll be able to properly put that together. But otherwise, this is a done jacket. Good job. 19. Final Thoughts: Thank you again, everyone for watching. Moving on from here. I really encourage everyone. Teoh really tackle this project with an open mind and please suppose some pictures of what you're working on. You know, maybe go out to a leather store, pick up a great hide some awesome hardware, some lining, and send some pictures of what you come up with. Yeah, the more creative the better. There's really no limits toe anything. When you're making your own jacket, I invite everybody to look at. The resource is links that I have at the bottom there. That's where you'll be able to find the pattern that's pretty much more or less the exact pattern that I used, where you can pick that up and follow right along, man. Also, if you have any more specific questions, I know it's a long, drawn out process. It does take a while, but if you have specific questions of stuff that I glossed over, please feel free. Teoh email me and post about him, and I'll definitely respond. He also, if anyone wants to be like one on one advice or anything like that, I'm always available and yes, so check out the links. You know, watch all the videos a few times, have fun, get some awesome material, and I can't wait to see what you come up with. Yeah, thanks.