Found: The Anatomy of a Burberry Trench Coat

This April and May I’m sewing along with Sherry at Pattern~Scissors~Cloth. A bunch of other talented seamsters and I are all making coats following the construction methods used in ready-to-wear tailoring. Mine is a Burberry-inspired trench coat, and here’s a reflection on my efforts to sew well.

I drafted the collar for my Burberry-inspired trench coat early in the process of this Sew-Along.  I used Sherry’s tutorial and my own best guess as to the height and width the two collar pieces needed to be.  I intended to cut the underside of the collar from the Burberry rainwear that I used for the lining, but in all of the cutting, I forgot and just cut two of the exact same top collar pieces from the camel gabardine.  I figured it was what was meant to be.

Then today I found this post by Gorgeous Things’ Blog:  Inside a Burberry Trench.  In it, Gorgeous Things takes a ready-to-wear Burberry trench coat and photographs all of its little details.  I learned quite a bit:

• The collar stand and under collar are both made of two pieces and both look to be much wider and taller than the pieces I drafted.
• The underside of the collar is cut from the Burberry print on the bias, matching my original intentions.
• The under collar is stabilized by parallel rows of stitching.
• The buttons are stabilized on the reverse side by small plastic buttons.
• The buttonholes are done with a machine and are not bound buttonholes.
• The sleeves are three-piece raglan, not the one piece like my pattern.
• The sleeves are not lined with Burberry fabric, instead they’re lined with satin twill.
• The lining is bagged, which is what I intend to do… soon.

I wish I’d known the details of the collar before I’d started the drafting process, but I’m very happy with the coat that I’ve made so far.  As I said, I figure what I’ve made is what was meant to be.  But, I’ll definitely save away these tidbits of information for future coats.