I’ve just finished step 50 of 67 on Vogue 1239. My last couple of sewing sessions have been all about the lining. I don’t know about most people, but personally I find sewing linings tricky. The stuff is hard to cut out accurately in the first place, and then you have the problem of your slightly misshapen pieces sliding everywhere and occasionally making a break for it down the side of the sewing table. This particular lining is a mystery one bought on Karen’s trip to Goldhawk Road. It has a lovely soft hand, is a dramatic flame colour, and most importantly is 60″ wide because that’s what the pattern called for. It’s not too bad to sew with as lining fabric goes, but it has an exciting feature all of its own which that it changes colour dramatically when pressed. It goes orange, and then when it cools it goes back to the original, much redder, colour. Wikipedia informs me this is called thermochromism and has much to say on the subject. Although I don’t think in this case it was intentional.

I normally buy lining fabric from John Lewis as they have a range of cupro, aka bemberg, linings that are about as easy to sew with as lining fabric gets, although they don’t have as good a range of colours as I’d like. But those only come in 45″ widths, hence the need to look further afield. I was hoping to find silk habotai in 60″ on Goldhawk Road but all the ones I saw were 45″. Mind you, it’s easy to miss things in those shops so I’m not saying there wasn’t any. I’m still looking for a good source of regular cupro linings in lots of colours though. This website http://www.theliningcompany.co.uk/ looks very promising. Anyone used them?