Making of a Leather Jerkin - Part 3

In The Modern Maker book, Gnagy describes only a single type of skirting: a one or two piece skirt for the whole circumference of the waist.  I'm not a huge fan of this and wanted a more traditional tab for the leather jerkin.  We went to another great newish resource, 17th-Century Men's Dress Patterns, to help us get the proportions right.  We drew up a new tab pattern and an separate pattern for the two front tabs (actually we drew up two different ones for the front and decided which one we liked better).  I also wanted a paper pattern for the short sleeve, which was a simple trace of the existing sleeve, just cut off at about 9".

Figure 1 - Tabs and short sleeves

With new patterns in hand, 2 short sleeves, 6 tabs, and 2 front tabs were cut out of the good leather.  In addition, I cut out body, back, sleeve, and collar linings of a white linen; this stuff multiplies in our house, so I honestly have no idea what weight it is or where it came from, but it's not as fine as what we used on the blue cloth doublet.  Lastly, I cut out lining for the tabs from a cinnamon colored leather that had leftover from my previous leather fencing jerkin.  Look for something interesting coming with the tabs.  We'll see if I want to add the linen lining to the tabs later or not.

Figure 2 - Tab interlining layout

Figure 3 - Tab interlinings cut out

Note that I've chosen not to do any interlining or shaping layers on this jerkin.  That is a conscious choice for a couple of reasons.  First, even on the cloth doublet it's hot.  I live in NC and regularly fence in 90+ degree weather, and I just don't need to add heat stroke to my list of chronic injuries.  Second, I think the leather itself will hold the shape well enough, but only time will tell.

This marks the completion of all of the primary cutting.  There may be some minor additions, like a waist lacing strip, extra collar stiffening, etc., but nothing major.  Now on to sewing.

Time: 5 hours 47 minutes (across several days)

Total time: 11 hours 22 minutes