My Woodland Stroll Cape

I’ve been wanting to make Liesl Gibson’s (of Liesl & Co., Oliver + S, Lisette, etc.) Woodland Stroll Cape since I first saw it, but I never got around to buying the fabric for it. A few weeks ago, I got an email form Fabric.com saying that all of their wool was extremely discounted. Well, that’s where it all started.

This cape went together super fast. I didn’t follow a few of the instructions and I would probably leave out at least one other thing if I did it again.

Liesl’s instructions were well done, but I made this while at a retreat and I think I got distracted a bit so I ended up ripping A LOT!

I would forgo adding the main fabric neck facing. If you’re using wool, I think it creates too much bulk. I would just fuse the interfacing to the lining or right to the wool. I didn’t sew the shoulder seams to the lining. I started to, but it’s nearly impossible to sew in the ditch of the seam on each side of the garment and  I wasn’t going to go to that trouble. I did do some top stitching along the neckline, but not anywhere else.

If I made this again, I would definitely use wool again, but I would probably skip a silk lining and use a voile. I like the idea of a cotton fabric better and voile would provide the softness like the silk.

Additionally, my buttonhole would work on a scrap of wool, but adding in the weight of the entire cape and the layer of lining and wool made it not work. Therefore, I kind of made my own buttonhole using a small zig zag stitch. It worked, but I was slightly disappointed in my machine.

I made this cape sound like a lot more trouble than it actually was. I’m extremely pleased with it and it goes together easily and quickly. I definitely recommend it.