While exploring the Milton Markets I met met a stall runner, Andrew, who had a collection of some of the most beautiful canvas and leather shop aprons I've had the pleasure of seeing in person. We chatted away while I dreamt of toying in my shop with such a beautiful and practical garment. I sadly could not afford the extremely reasonable price for the luxury objects, but the encounter got me further contemplating shop aprons.
I've explored working with tools on my body in the past. I had a very cheap and nasty toolbelt I bought second hand that was very good at dropping drivers on the floor through its worn holes. I also own several overalls that have extremely useful chest pockets however are not all seasons wearing in Brisbane, no matter how cute I look in them. All of these garments made me want more for a comfortable way to keep tools on my body for either working on bikes or my woodworking.
Inspired and excited I explored Pinterest for inspiration and started sketching ideas and pocket layouts that I liked.
Eventually in my exploration I rediscovered Adam Savage's videos documenting a split leg design he made himself and subsequently manufactured for a small run. Split leg makes a lot of sense for the things I'm likely to do and gives me more of an excuse to make my own. The pocket setup also made a lot of sense to me and seemed very practical and versatile. Although I had intended to make my very own design, mixing features I liked from different designs, this one simply ticked too many boxes and would be a great first apron to explore what kind of special pockets or weird attachments I require.
After spending an hour creating my very own rough sketched pattern by constantly referencing every screenshot I had of his apron, I found that he sells the pattern for only ~$15 (in S, M and L too), doh! So after printing, taping and cutting my new pattern, I got to work exploring my sewing materials and I mostly figured it out as I went along but I found a large amount of navy-blue canvas and so really tough red webbing and my colour pallet was pretty much all there.
Sewing this apron took longer than I expected and I encountered some really exciting problems and excuses to learn new sewing skills. Firstly, when working with such thick material and thick durable top thread forced me to learn more about tension in my machine and after coming out of that I am much more confident working with thicker materials.
I am immensely glad I ditched using leather for most of the pockets (as Adam's pattern asks for) as I believe this amount of complex leather working would have been one step too far outside my comfort zone and would have stalled this project.
Learning how to use bar tacks and work with heavy duty thread was also very critical to ensuring that the pockets will be able to withstand the abuse from heavy tools. Speaking of thread, look how good the red stitching came out!
I need you to trust me that the primary red thread on navy canvas pops so much more in person, and frankly I love it. It looks nothing like much else I've seen and it further makes it mine.
I'm considering embroidering my initials into the breast but I decided that this project needed to be done and if I felt like, I could always do that another time. There is no need to make this project go on forever.
This apron has not seen major shop time yet but gosh, I am eager to poor love and wear into this apron. I want to repair it, add to it, adjust it and further make it mine. I want it oozing with personality and I want to let it serve me well.
This project has been a complete success, I used all recycled materials, I furthered my confidence and abilities as a sewer and I now have what I assume is about to become my favourite tool in my shop. Anyway, here's me excitedly trying it on for the first time.
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