Bonnie Cashin Style: How to Sew Leather Binding

Bonnie Cashin has been a fashion influence for generations. Her early career was highlighted by designing costumes for such movies as “Anna and the King of Siam”. It seems that researching this movie led her to the discovery of Asian styling. In that ‘look’ she found the basis for the lean and simple fashions that she is known for, a clean Asian inspired silhouette that was often bound in a flat leather edging.  In this post I'll walk you through the process of making this same type of binding.

Bonnie Cashin: Coat Pattern Draft for Leather and Canvas Coat

Bonnie Cashin coats like this one in leather on canvas for Sills, have a very simple, easy to draft and sew pattern. To help in understanding this 'Noh' silhouette coat, I prepared a draft to scale that shows all details involved in this coat.

You can see in this photo that many of her 'signature' details are present: simple shape with sleeves cut in one with the body, leather bound edges (rather than hems), and brass twist looks (instead of buttons). This coat is lined in a cotton plaid twill. Usually a Cashin coat will have some sort of large and functional side seam pocket. In this case she applied a whimsical mock shoulder bag for each side of the body.

This draft is drawn to scale with one grid square to equal one inch. The leather trim creates mock shoulder straps that are about 1.5" wide. Rather than being straight, these straps do curve a bit at the shoulder. The big zippered 'purse' pocket is 13" across including the strap pieces. It is shifted slightly towards the front.

In this back view, the rest of the bag details are seen. The collar in center back is about 4.5" wide and 20.5" across from point to point. This collar is nearly straight, having only a slight curve to the neckline edge. There is a center back seamline.

This front view shows how the coat appears when worn and the close up view shows more details there.

The pocket has an industrial brazz zipper that is about 8" long. It is set into a slot to fit that is about 5/8" wide. The lower pocket closes with a twist lock. It is nearly 10" wide and 9.5" deep where it is 'framed' by the strap leather edge.

Here is a closer view of the front collar with it's twist lock, and the back view of this coat.

This pocket is inspiring, and I hope it gives you an idea or two for some custom sewing of your own. Don't overlook sewing with leather because it's not that difficult, especially as it is used here. A good used leather skirt could be savaged for leather, if you want to test this pocket for yourself.

For more on Bonnie Cashin Drawings and Photos--follow my Cashin board on Pinterest: Here

I have also published the following articles on Cashin in this blog, click on any title:

Cashin Coat Illustration from Spring 1966

Mohair Blanket Coat

Cashin Turn Locks and HERE

Knits and Girdles advertisement, 1961

Summer Coat, June 1950

1949 Coat Patent, Illustrated

This wonderful coat was purchased from Chelsea Harris, who curates "Femalehysteria"

Bonnie Cashin: 1949 Coat Patent with Design Details

The well known mid-century American fashion designer, Bonnie Cashin, began to find her signature style in the late 1940's, and this design patent from 1949 shows two of her popular design elements together in one garment.

The Noh coat, an Asian inspired garment would be part of her 'look' for decades. In this design we find it in its early stages of development. The silhouette is consistent with her later designs. As this look developed, she would venture further into a timeless cut by excluding the bust dart that starts on the the shoulder seam. That would create a flat pattern, without shaping.

This is a draft taken from a later Noh coat, dated from the early 1970's. Here her classic lines are seen: a flat coat that is cut with the sleeves in one with the body.  Like the coat from 1949, it includes a small mandarin collar and large, roomy pockets.

This helps us to see how Bonnie Cashin refined her early designs to reach a style that she felt was classic and suitable to her range of textiles, colors and layering concepts.

The other design element in the 1949 patent that became part of the Cashin design vocabulary is the concept of using a clasp purse as a pocket. This diagram shows the clasp coin purse open, the full coat draft shows that same purse folded forward. This delightful and quirky detail continued to appear in designs through out her career, including the leather handbags she would design for Coach. An example from 1954 showing a plaid skirt with purse pocket is on the MET website HERE.

So, this coat patent may be of a style that might seem fairly typical for the late 1940's or 1950's, but upon closer inspection it is a key starting point in the signature style of a major American fashion designer, Bonnie Cashin.

Bonnie Cashin: Mohair Blanket Coat, Up Close

This 1960's Bonnie Cashin coat for Sills was found recently by Miss A who shared it with me in an excited text message. My respose: So when do I get to see it in person!. For me, coming across a Cashin coat in a vintage or thrift store is like finding a colorful sea shell on a wide sandy beach. Eureka!

This coat has that classic Cashin silhouette: kimono sleeves attached in one with the body. This allows that bold plaid check to continue out onto the sleeves without breaking up the graphic look.

But what stops the show here is a great, dramatic cape like collar. On closer study, it seems to have been inspired by a triangle shawl shape. Imagine folding a large square wool shawl into a triangle then draping it around your shoulders, over a coat. This has that same effect.

What pushes it over the top is that this shawl collar is cut from a wildly colored double cloth: fuzzy amber, orange and red colors on the outer mohair textured side with a blinding magenta pink and red on the other smooth surfaced side. That contrast is used to its advantage with this collar design since how its worn or draped can effect whether that contrast is seen or not.

Narrow suede trim binds off all edges. The coat is not lined, so that bright pink and red side is clearly seen when worn. Like so many Cashin wool coats, this one has roomy pockets in the side seams. It was designed with a very wide hook fastening at the neckline that at one time were covered in suede. The center front would hang loose and unfastened.

I will share the inner workings of this design and the technologies she used to create the look in my next post on this great coat.

If you are interested in seeing more designs from Bonnie Cashin, you will want to check out the links below:
Bonnie Cashin Online Resource, UCLA, Biography with Photo Archive
Bonnie Cashin, my Pinterest Board (a growing collection of images)

Cashin Coat for Spring: 1966

Bonnie Cashin's vision for Spring 1966 shows her love of texture and inventive silhouettes.  This kimono inspired coat has unique angled sleeve lines, with a diagonal wrap closure that ends in an upswing hemline.  All edges are bound in leather, which would have been colored to compliment her custom wool textiles. Doesn't it have an exciting look?  I think it could be adapted and worn today, which is one of the amazing elements about a Cashin design.

Cashin: Knits and Girdles in 1961

Bonnie Cashin's fashion style seems so natural, easy fit and easy to wear. But the illusion is often easier to achieve than the reality, as we can see in the foundation garment advertisement from the spring of 1961.

The dress is described as a green and gold striped knit on bright red which is such a modern, 1960's color concept. The knit has a 'natural' fit in the shoulder and body torso. This ad suggests wearing a Maidenform girdle to achieve that slender, effortless looking silhouette. It was promising a newer, more natural girdle of power mesh that would do the job. Where the previous decade had seen a stronger, boned waistline, the early 1960's would lead into a silhouette where natural was the newest look, and Bonnie Cashin was a leader in that field.

Bonnie Cashin: Brass Twist Locks on Vintage Coats and Jackets

This 1970's kid skin leather short coat by Bonnie Cashin sports her signature twist locks that she adapted from canvas boat fastenings in the 1950's. This illustration is from a brochure published by Gene Burton shop on Lake Ave. in Pasadena, CA during the 1970's. From it we find that this leather coat retailed for $200 and came in white, sand, redwing red, navy, lemon yellow or sandstone.

Shown below are some examples of the twist locks used on many of her coat designs. You will also notice the extensive use of leathers in her fabrications.





Here's a peak at the inside:

Asian Inspired: Bonnie Cashin Coat, June 1950

This Asian inspired coat is a very early example of the direction that Bonnie Cashin would explore in the decades to come: simple "T" shaped coat with narrow mandarin collar. Here she uses linen and embellishes it with frog closures in a design for Adler and Adler. Later those frogs would become her signature brass twist locks.

description from "Vogue", June, 1950:
"Sawed-off Chinese coolie coat--new length: white Irish linen, frog closings: three-quarter length sleeves. A summer coat with more than one life to share. First and foremost, a life with a bathing suit; then, perhaps, over a slender skirt in town, slacks at home. Coat by Bonnie Cashin, $30, At Lord & Taylor; Garfinckel's; Neiman-Marcus."


This photo of Bonnie Cashin shows her wearing the same coat, worn casually with pushed up sleeves (a style she favored).



The second image shown here is from the UCLA Special Collections website on Bonnie Cashin

Bonnie Cashin: Turn locks

Bonnie Cashin turn locks are enough to make you want fall weather year round. There's something in that nifty brass setting that really gives her luxurious jackets and coats a bit of down to earth practicality. I can't begin to imagine the "Eureka" moment when she realized she could apply them to her jackets, after seeing the twist locks in a more utilitarian application.

Soft pastel suede? Sounds nice, now pop in a twist lock. It's better than a button any day. Zipper? you ask. That's an abutted front seam, but our dear twist locks allow us our overlapped front closure. Casual and elegant at the same time.

Signature loopy wool with leather binding frames a brass twister at the neckline. It seems so logical, this industrial fastening. Without it, we would have gotten bored years ago.

Now you get the picture! Sporty and simple, with a twist of fun. How brilliant, how logical. A master invention for the 20th century.


All Bonnie Cashin jackets featured are part of a private collection and are not offered for sale.
This is the first part of a series on the 20th century American fashion designer, Bonnie Cashin.
Please do not reprint these images without prior permission, thank you.