Replace the Back of a Denim Jacket

 Hello Readers. This white denim jacket seemed perfect. It was soft and broken in a bit. It was the right size and it was a bargain at a neighbors yard sale. My friend E bought it and took it home and realized it had 2 large unicorns on it. The unicorns were attached with all the power of the universe it seemed. She was not loving the unicorns so... let's fix that by replacing the back of the jacket. 

Old jacket-new back panel.

Someone decorated this jacket with a couple unicorn patches and they were the most secure patches I have ever seen in my sewing career. I thought I could just remove them but I was wrong.

 

I worked on removing these patches for a while and it wasn't going well at all. There was some kind of adhesive as well as stitching and I could not remove it. 

 

After a while I had to give up. I moved on to Plan B because this was messy and sloppy looking. I never like to give up so if things don't work out the first time, there is always a Plan B.

 

 I decided to cut the back of the jacket out. I cut out the three back panels and shoulder/neck panel. You can see my cutting expertise here. I used my sharp scissors to get a clean cut edge. I cut out the fabric inside the seams, leaving the seams in place to keep the structure of the jacket intact.

 

This fabric was in my stash and it was very close to the weight and feel of the white denim. I pressed it nice and flat with a hot iron. I wanted it to be a smooth as possible before I cut it. 

 

I used the piece I cut of the jacket to cut out a new jacket back. I cut around the white denim piece and added about 1/4 inch all around the piece. That would give me enough room to sew it to the jacket. I did not want a big seam allowance because I didn't want to change the size of the jacket at all. 

 

Now I had a piece of the new fabric that was exact shape of the old back of the jacket. I could sew it into the jacket and it would fit right in. 

 

I used my serger to sew all the way around the piece to prevent fraying. If you do not have a serger that is OK. People sewed without sergers for decades. I also sewed without a serger for decades, you can too. Use a zigzag stitch on the edges to prevent the edges from fraying. It will work out just fine. 

 

I pinned the new piece into the jacket. You can see the blue pins here. This would hep keep everything in place while I sewed. 

 

I pinned all around the new piece for the jacket. I did stab myself with a pin, but I persevered.

 

I stitched the edges all around to sew it into the jacket. I tucked the new piece inside the opening I cut from the jacket and sewed right on the edge of the jacket seam with a small zigzag stitch to cover the cut edge of the jacket. It was easy to use the edge of the jacket as a guide for where my stitches should be. 

 

I stitched on the outside of the jacket so I could see where the edges of the jacket and the new back piece overlapped. I wanted to make sure the new piece was tucked into the jacket neatly.

 

The piece I cut out fit into the jacket well. The jacket came together quickly and easily. I liked how the new fabric looked too. 

 

I tried to make the design of the fabric well centered in the jacket, you might not have a design or pattern in your fabric to worry about, a solid block of contrasting color would be fun too. Use whatever fabric you like. Thanks for reading along, now go make something fun for yourself.