I’ve always enjoyed seeing how raincoats can sparkle and look amazing. I’ve used Jalie City Coat pattern for this raincoat success.

Do you remember back at school the smell of plastic yellow raincoats? This is one of my distinct school day memories and I’m so glad this fabric has raised the bar on stylish and affordable raincoats.

This Raincoat Fabric comes in 4 colourways and I was so tempted to make the black version but I chose the purple colour. It’s amazing in real life.

The Fabric

This fabric is bonded so the plastic side is the ‘right’ side and the ‘wrong side is woven. If you’re not watching the fabric as you sew it, it can move quite a bit.

The plastic side tends to stick to itself so once you’ve cut out the pattern pieces, make sure you take the time to release the pieces from each other. There were a few times I thought I’d lost some pattern pieces but they were all there. I just had to look at them closer.

One thing I discovered is that you can lightly iron this fabric on the wrong side as long as you use a cotton ironing cloth. This will stop the plastic from melting. I did a spot of ironing on some of the seams but I used my ironing cloth and ironing ham. I only ironed each seam for no more than 5 seconds. That was enough time to avoid ruining the fabric.

Later on I realised that using an iron-on interfacing was not going to work to reinforce the front seams for buttons and buttonholes. I used a wide strip of black woven fabric from my stash to give the front of the raincoat stability. It worked a dream and you can use any fabric because it won’t be seen.

Seam Finishes

I mulled about this before I started working on this project. If the fabric had only been plastic, I may have used bias tape to finish the seams.

The base fabric is soft, so the fabric edges are also soft and do not fray so I’ve left them in their raw state. You can see how I’ve tested out using the overlocker to finish these seams. This really didn’t make much difference to the wear of the fabric and overlocking added more weight to the seam that I didn’t like.

The other finish that I would have loved to use on this coat was topstitching. Because this is a ‘raincoat’ I decide to avoid adding more holes in the fabric that would need to be sealed later.

What I am investigating at the moment is using a light-weight sealant on these seams and until I find a decent one, this will be a faux-raincoat.

Lining the Coat

I chose to use Jalie’s City Coat pattern because it’s unlined.

Sizing

There is enough weight in this raincoat that it sits nicely as a coat and I’ve made it two sizes bigger than I needed so there is some airflow when I wear it.

This pattern has a hood option so I will make the hood later and attach it using buttons on the outside of the collarband.

Right now I love the existing collar.

Will I really wear this coat?

Yes. Especially when it might rain. Once I figure out how to seal the seams this will be a cool looking faux raincoat. I know I have a time of Odicoat in my sewing room.

And that’s the second part of the tale of two coats.

Thanks Minerva!