Inside a Contemporary Jacket

Apparently once you start ripping jackets apart, you can't stop! I remembered that I had this Banana Republic jacket in my closet from my early editorial career. I would guess that it's about 8-9 years old at this point. It's a little conservative for me these days, so I thought it would make a great comparative example to my 40s jacket deconstruction.

Of course, it's not a very fair comparison. I got this jacket on the clearance rack (I would guess I paid around $50, tops) while the 40s jacket was custom made by a tailor and would have been very expensive. The fashion in the early 2000s called for a very different silhouette than a 1940s silhouette, so it's no huge surprise not to find a lot of tailoring structure (or even shoulder pads) in the Banana Republic jacket. However, I honestly remember quite liking the soft silhouette of this jacket; which is part of why I bought it. Looking at it now, though . . . it may as well be a cardigan jacket. The thing is rawther filmsy.

From the outside, it looks pretty nicely tailored, if a little limp.

 The shoulder line, sleeve caps, and under sleeves look a bit sad.

(Like my new clock?)

The inside is another story. It's unlined (a detail I had forgotten), but all the seams, darts, and hem are finished with lavender bias binding.

 The back facing extends all the way across the back, giving the upper back some support.

I removed the front facing, back facing, and upper collar. The facings are fused with a lightweight tricot interfacing. 

The under and upper collars are exactly the same; both have a separate pattern piece for the stand and both are fused only with one layer of the tricot.

Inside the jacket, I found interfacing on the front and back (where the facings were).

This is good for support across the shoulder, but you'll notice that the area around the arm (which is prone to stretching) has no support.

There is a line of stay tape along the roll line, stitched on with a blind hem stitch.

I'm sure the whole thing was steamed well, which gave the roll line and collar some definition and set the shape.

That's really all there is to show--it was a bit of a letdown after that 40s marvel of tailoring, don't you think?