The Final Touch

With the lining now sewn into place, It was now time to add the buttons. Buttons are the very last thing to add to a garment and require some forethought. For instance, how thick is the buttonhole? If the buttonhole is built into a fairly thick knit or fabric (like ultra suede), then the button must have a fairly long shank to prevent a "pinched" look when it is fastened. If the shank is not long enough, it is possible to artifically build it up by constructing a thread shank.

When attaching buttons to ultra suede, a backing button should always be used to prevent the anchored button from pulling through the fabric if stressed.

Once the buttons were sewn into place, I tried the jacket on, marked the hems and sleeve lengths, and completed the project with a hand stitched hem. The jacket was now ready to wear. The above picture shows the front view of the completed jacket.

This is a back view of the completed jacket. You can see that I split the sleeves and added black ultra suede on the portion of the sleeve that contacts the body of the jacket. I did this because I did not want the beads and sequins to snag each other as I moved my arms. The ultra suede piece solved the problem.

Since completing this jacket, I have made many other garments using the cut and sew method when I wanted to add other fabrics to my knits. It allows me a variety of options that plain knitting and shaping do not allow and is a fun way to add variety from time to time.