Double Welt Pockets and Coats

When you put an exterior pocket in a raincoat, you make a rectangular hole in the part that keeps you dry.

This is a double welt pocket. Peeking!

Helly Hansen rubber raincoat double welt pocket outside. 

The extra outside flap covers the normally directional inside flap, 

making a double door for your hand to go through, preventing water from pouring in.

Also keeps stuff from falling out.

And now that Seattle has downpours more than it has drizzle, staying dry is a key element to consider.

I love that red Helly Hansen jacket. I wore the first one out.

In making a new coat, I stole the pocket idea from the old.

The disembodied hand in a phantom pocket. Or, it's going in and down.

I measured my hand for size of welt. Six inches is not big enough for model hand.

The pocket bag is very big. It got smaller but if I needed to shoplift a couple of goats to go with the cow, I'd need all the pocketry I can get.

Now, it is important to mention that like handbags, the increased size of the container means you will try to carry more stuff. People hand you stuff.

I don't want a bottomless pit. I want to make sure I can touch the bottom of the pocket without leaning into it.

Essentially, I pinned the pattern to me, and put my hand where I expected the pocket to open and how long my arm reached. And that's where I marked the pocket location and it's depth.

G is for green material. Or go. And this is not a double welt pattern. 

Miyake patterns have a billion self welt pockets, it's how I learned to make them.

Since this was going to be a double, I needed to make a paper one to play with

Seven and a half inches opening width. BIG model hand with a wallet in it's grasp. We forget about that aspect, the holding and insertion and removal. 

The red X is the opening. The folds are TWICE the width of the opening (that purple rectangle is the width measurement), plus a touch more for turn of cloth. You can always fudge it back, but it's hard to make the folds cover each other if they aren't wide enough.

Those skinny little grey lines in the flaps represent where the interfacing should have gone. They are grey for failure.

Nevertheless, the great thing about tracing paper is you can see previous lines and trace over them or ignore them, as you need or not need. Grammar much? Anyway, I made a model on the lines I drew on the front pattern piece, goofed around with it,  drew it out and trued it up on the grid board.

Yes, the pocket bag is huge. And it needed an extension to the welt facing to attach the other side of the pocket, thus that longish rectangle with the letters on the side. 

Sewed it down on the long edges of the opening. Not the ends. That happens shortly.

Cut it open

Cut the long triangles

Flipped it inside out and poked those triangles through and folded it up.

This is where the extra flap direction needed attention and a good night's sleep.

It is sewing a car.

Sewed those triangles to the facing to keep the whole little welt accordion together

The welt will stay puffy. I didn't want to punch more holes in it by topstitching, and I did not (IDIOT !) put two sided tape in the folds to keep it. The fabric will not hold a press. This was a mistake, don't do that, put interfacing and doublesided tape in your pocket welts in your raincoats. These are mushy welts. They should be crispy.
And perfect is the enemy of wearing this coat in the season it was intended for.

Now this is where things get fun. This enormous interior pocket is only attached at the welt, and it is going to get heavy stuff put in it. My hands for a couple, probably a phone a wallet whatever junk someone hands me to carry.....

it needs support.

I cut an athletic non stretch mesh piece for each front piece, sewed the top of the pocket to it and attached it at the top seam on the shoulder and the collar. The shoulder will do the heavy lifting as usual.

Yes, that's a chunk of teal colored plastic bendable cutting board from the kitchen. Yes Threads paid me $25 for that hint a few years ago. I can say they are very very useful for working between layers. Irons melt them.

Don't iron them.

And hung inside out on M'damn, there it is.

Winter came back this week. I would like to report that in addition to it's great capacity for cow lifting, I can wear an entire down parka under this coat and have room to spare. And it is very waterproof (so much so that rain drips down and hits the backs of my legs. Hint to self: make the coat hem lean out, not curve in).