Capes are both a timeless wardrobe staple AND a trending style item.

It’s true.

And maybe capes aren’t your thing, or you don’t know how you’d incorporate a cape into your own handmade wardrobe, but I’m here to tell you: the shape is also a blank canvas that gives us the opportunity to refine some high-end, luxury sewing techniques with very little risk.

See, a cape has only a few major seams. It’s basically large cuts of fabric with three to six long, straight seams, plus a zipper or buttons. Maybe there’s a collar, maybe not. But! From there, we can adapt the design to suit our needs, our taste, and our skill without fearing that we’ll ruin a project that has required a huge investment of fabric and time from us.

For example: maybe you dream of making a wool blazer for yourself. It can feel intimidating, and it’s a lot of steps, I won’t lie. You want to make it from a wool plaid, but you’ve never worked with wool before, and the worry over making sure your plaids match has you procrastinating. Enter the cape!!

With a cape pattern, we can work on EXACTLY those skills, in a clear, clean way without the intimidation factor.

This sewalong video series is designed intentionally with you in mind. I’ve selected four capes sewing patterns, and each one showcases a different skill. On top of that, I’ve included general guidelines for sewing with wool, the primary fiber used in these patterns. Each of these videos will live in our How To library, but collecting them all here in this course helps us to collate the information, just in case you want to use ALL these techniques on a single garment.

Through the lessons that follow, you will learn:

• HOW TO sew with wool fabrics, including tools and best practices
• HOW TO match plaid fabrics when cutting and sewing
• HOW TO sew bound seams
• HOW TO sew bound buttonholes
• HOW TO sew lace

We can’t wait to see what you make!

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