Valhalla's Things — POLARVIDE modular jacket

A woman with early morning hair wearing a knee-length grey
polar fleece jacket; it is closed at the waist with a twine belt
that makes the bound front edge go in a smooth curve between the
one side of the neck to the other side of the waist and then flare
back outwards on the hips.
The sleeves are long enough to go over the hands, and both them
and the hem are cut

Years ago I made myself a quick dressing gown from a white fleece IKEA throw and often wore it in the morning between waking up and changing into day clothes.

One day I want to make myself a fancy victorian wrapper, to use in its place, but that’s still in the early planning stage, and will require quite some work.

a free cat sitting half asleep on an old couch, with a formerly
white piece of fabric draped between the armrest and the seat.
A piece of cardboard between two seat pillows provides additional
protection from the wind.

Then last autumn I discovered that the taxes I owed to the local lord (who provides protection from mice and other small animals) included not just a certain amount of kibbles, but also some warm textiles, and the dressing gown (which at this time was definitely no longer pristine) had to go.

For a while I had to do without a dressing gown, but then in the second half of this winter I had some time for a quick machine sewing project. I could not tackle the big victorian thing, but I still had a second POLARVIDE throw from IKEA (this time in a more sensible dark grey) I had bought with sewing intents.

The fabric in a throw isn’t that much, so I needed something pretty efficient, and rather than winging it as I had done the first time I decided I wanted to try the Modular Jacket from A Year of Zero Waste Sewing (which I had bought in the zine instalments: the jacket is in the March issue).

After some measuring and decision taking, I found that I could fit most of the pieces and get a decent length, but I had no room for the collar, and probably not for the belt nor the pockets, but I cut all of the main pieces. I had a possible idea for a contrasting collar, but I decided to start sewing the main pieces and decide later, before committing to cutting the other fabric.

As I was assembling the jacket I decided that as a dressing gown I could do without the collar, and noticed that with the fraying-free plastic fleece I didn’t really need the front facings, so I cut those in half lengthwise, pieced them together, and used them as binding to finish the front end.

the back of the worn jacket, other than being clinched in by
the belt it is pretty straight.

Since I didn’t have enough fabric for the belt I also skipped the belt loops, but I have been wearing this with random belts and I don’t feel the need for them anyway. I’ve also been thinking about adding a button just above the bust and use that to keep it closed, but I’m still not 100% sure about it.

Another thing I still need to do is to go through the few scraps of fleece that are left and see if I can piece together a serviceable pocket or two.

folding the sleeves back by a good 10 cm to show the hands.

Because of the size of the fabric, I ended up having quite long sleeves: I’m happy with them because they mean that I can cover my hands when it’s cold, or fold them back to make a nice cuff.

If I’ll make a real jacket with this patter I’ll have to take this in consideration, and either make the sleeves shorter or finish the seam in a way that looks nice when folded back.

Will I make a real jacket? I’m not sure, it’s not really my style of outer garment, but as a dressing gown it has already been used quite a bit (as in, almost every morning since I’ve made it :) ) and will continue to be used until too worn to be useful, and that’s a good thing.