First wool coat in a long time

Hisashiburi no uuru no kooto

Here’s another shirt I shortened the sleeves on. I bought it a few years ago at a thrift shop. I own a few shirts from this brand I bought new (mostly on sale), and it would have been well over 10,000 yen full price. This one had blouse style cuffs. 

The slit backings were a single strip of fabric. The backing was just stitched straight on the slit. 

I shortened the sleeves 4 cm, so I extended the slit 4 cm. Because of the blouse style cuff, the top of the slit didn’t have a v shaped cut. Since there were fewer moving parts, there was a smaller room for error, so it turned out better than the white button up shirt. 

I also shortened the sleeves of a tweed Uniqlo coat. This is my first wool coat in over ten years. I chose this one because of its timeless design and simple, easy-to-alter sleeves. 

What I really wanted was a tailored camel coat, but the only tailored camel coat they have at Uniqlo this season has actual cuffs that button open and closed. Which is awesome, but really difficult to alter nicely so that the buttons and the opening can be salvaged. 

BTW, coats that button open and closed at the cuff are a throwback to the days when doctors made house calls. Patients' homes would be poorly heated in winter, so the doctor would do his (they were all male back then) work wearing his coat with the sleeves rolled up.)  

I ripped the lining from the cuff and turned the sleeve inside out. The cuff had interfacing fused to it, so I peeled it off, shortened the sleeve (about 5 cm), and fused the original facing back on. Then I stitched the (also shortened) lining on the new cuff line. 

I realized after I'd finished one sleeve that I'd bought a book on how to sew your own coat a couple of years back, hoping it would help my alterations. By the time I remembered this, I was so far along that I decided I might as well finish both sleeves the same way so they'd be symmetric. Maybe I'll have the chance to sew my own coat or alter another sleeve one of these days, and the book will be put to good use.

And yes, they ended up crooked, but since the lining is stitched to the cuff inside the sleeve, this time, no one will ever notice. Unless you turn the cuff inside out and look carefully. Which I will let you do if you ask me nicely.