Zip-up Hoodie

Week 03 of my weekly designs was riddled with pattern mistakes causing me to take an extra week on this design to get everything just the way I wanted it.

During a recent scouting trip to the fashion capitals in Europe (Paris & Milan) I immediately realized that I did not pack any hoodies for my winter trip, because I didn't own any. Every hood folded over an overcoat collar was a subtle reminder of my slight discomfort and my multiple hoodie and jacket patterns that sat half finished in my studio.

Immediately after returning home I began searching for a fabric that would live up to the design I was envisioning during my trip and playing with some old jacket patterns I had left incomplete. 

After sourcing some heavy weight french terry and 2x1 ribbing I decided to do a new pattern from scratch that would do justice to the materials.

 I had four main goals for the design going into this project, the hoodie had 2 have a center zip, relaxed shoulders, sit right below the natural waist, and have an offset shoulder seam. I don't know if this is just me but I loathe hoodies with standard shoulder seams and armholes, hoodies always look best in my view when the shoulders are extremely relaxed to the point where the sleeves connect to the bodice around the bicep peak. As for the shoulder seams, I just prefer when they do not sit directly at the peak on the shoulders, I end up consciously dissecting the pattern and have a hard time seeing the garment as one singular object. This caused me to run the shoulder seams along back of the shoulders to hide these seams from the frontal view and somewhat detach the visual form of the garment from the visual form of the pattern. 

The Final Garment is a hoodie that sits an inch below the natural waist, this is the perfect length I've found the properly compliment our bodies form an proportions, while staying long enough to not fall into the "cropped' or "baby" genres of style. I prefer drafting all of my patterns to the natural waist, but as this had become fairly uncommon in the RTW segment of the industry, adding even just the extra inch of length to the bodice does wonders for pairing the hoodie with low rise or loose fitting garments without making the jacket look absurdly tiny, which this lane of pairings often causes.

100% cotton terry w/ 100% cotton ribbing.

16 Inch YKK Brass Zipper

Color matching Gutterman poly-cotton thread. (tex50)

Sashiko accessorizing via Gutterman Topstitch poly-cotton thread. (tex100)

Made in house as always.

anywayssss, thanks for reading the rant.  Stay tuned for the next design and new products coming soon.

-Pat