A linen three piece suit

This three piece suit is a great summer outfit when relaxed smart dressing is required, but you don’t want to wear a dress. 

The Jacket is an unlined version of The Blazer, the trousers are a variation of The Wide-legged Trouser and the top is a version of The Vest Top. All have been made in the same grey linen fabric. 

For the detail, starting with The Blazer, it is the unlined version from the pattern with the addition of a back vent. On the back pattern piece simply add a vent 18cm x 3.5cm as shown above. All the cut pattern pieces are overlocked and made up as instructed in the pattern. 

However when it comes to stitching the back seam, simply stitch down to 1cm after the top of the vent, then stitch across, stopping 1cm from the edge. Lengthen the machine stitch length and stitch from the back seam just before the vent straight down to the hem. Press the vent to one side, snipping the seam allowance at the top of the vent to allow this. Turn back the edge of the vent by 0.5cm press and stitch in place. Stitch across the top of the vent to hold in place. Remove the long stitches made from the back seam.

For the top - this is The Vest Top from Issue 5 of the magazine, which comes with instructions to fully line. However here it is left unlined and raw-edged, with the front and back pieces placed with the hem on the selvedge.

The darts are stitched first then front and back are stitched together at the shoulder and side seam. Around the armholes a line of stay stitching is stitched 1cm from the edge.

At the neck the stay stitching is extended by 3cm past the V – as shown above.

The trousers are made without a zip following the instructions in this Journal Post but using 22mm elastic in place of the drawstring.

Each of these garments can be worn on their own or together and dressed up with sandals or dressed down with sneakers.