Adventures in sleeve drafting

[guenievre]

So I've never *truly* gotten a sleeve to fit to my satisfaction on a gothic fitted gown (1410 France, middle layer). I want skin tight...and while I've achieved that, I usually achieve it at the cost of some mobility (I'm a noblewoman, why should I need to lift my arms over my head... or forward more than a few inches... darn, I guess I do). So for Pennsic, I decided to make a new pattern.

Unfortunately, I can't drape a sleeve pattern on myself, for obvious reasons, and while I was confident enough about fitting a GFD to get Nick to make me a pattern (I have enough linen of the same kind to make several dresses off one fitting... woot), sleeves are a mystery to me. SO... thus I decided drafting the sleeve was necessary.

The catch? I don't own a drafting book (yet) and B&N just doesn't carry one for me to randomly pick up. And Pennsic is in 2 weeks! So I turned to my bookmark collection, and found this:
Modern Pattern Design, by Harriet Pepin. Now, obviously this is going to make a modern pattern, but it might be adjustable. Turning to the sleeve page, I drafted a pattern (after much cursing) for a basic sleeve toile.

I then used the instructions for modifying it to wrist control, rather than a dart, and snipped a bit here and there
until I had a back-seam sleeve muslin

Then I pinned it and slipped it on - RATS. It's too big. So I go back and look at the instructions - bingo! modern concepts of ease - 2 inches around the bicep! (Why I thought that was a good idea the first time, I don't know). OK, let's try this again from the top...well... it's smaller this time, so it should fit, but I can't for love nor money figure out how to make the dart go away... when I try, I get this THING that obviously isn't right...::sigh:: (before and after below)



Laurel intervention! luckily I snagged Keilyn away from doing her homework... discussion and sending-back-and-forth of pictures ensued. Aha! the dart works much like the elbow hinge Tasha has done work on - and I just figured out how to fit one of those last week. (THAT was definitely a eureka moment). Haven't got either of the dresses done yet, but I might get one at least sewn together tonight...

And thus you see the excitement that was my Friday night. Saturday and Sunday were much of the same, interspersed with a lot of WarCrack - I'm up to lvl 54, btw! woot for me - 'course, half my server is level 60's, or thereabout...but then, there's 10 zillion things to do AFTER you hit 60, so that's ok. Just no more XP grinding...

Comments

[melaniesuzanne.livejournal.com]

Most excellent. I love those a-ha! moments.

[lady-guenievre.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they're fabulous (entry edited to see pictures of just how much WIERDNESS I had going before the intervention...).