Working with Slopers: How to Use a Sloper to Grade A Skirt Pattern

Amanda Wynn2 Comments

Pattern grading can be done in a variety of ways–slashing and spreading a pattern, shifting points as x,y coordinates on a grid, radially, and I’m sure there are more. If you have a sloper that fits you well, you can use your sloper as a guide when grading patterns to your desired size. Using a sloper to grade is essentially using the slash and spread grading method, but the approach is a little bit more hands on and intuitive than it is mathematically precise.

Someone asked me for advice on how to use a sloper to grade patterns, so I wanted to write out the process as I would approach it. This is only one way among many, but I hope that it might be helpful and maybe help clarify working with slopers to adapt sewing patterns to specific measurements as well.

What is a sloper versus a regular pattern?

A sloper is a basic fitting shell, or a pattern that has been adjusted to fit your body shape very closely, with only the minimum required ease to allow for movement (wearing ease). A sloper represents the minimum amount of fabric required to fit your body. A sloper pattern that has been adjusted to your body is like a two dimensional dress form, a map of mass distribution and fitting adjustments to accommodate them. A fitting shell or sloper pattern that has not been fitted to a specific body is a pattern that fits a generalized ideal body as closely as possible while still allowing for movement.

A pattern is different from a sloper in that it doesn’t follow the body exactly. It almost always adds fullness or additional ease in a variety of ways to the garment in order to create shape. There are places where the garment must anchor to the body or be held in place by clinging close to the body, and in those places, the sloper and the pattern will be almost identical. But in other areas, the pattern will add extra fabric to create volume.

How can a sloper be used to work with patterns?

A sloper provides you with a map of the minimum amount of fabric necessary to fit your body. You can overlay and compare this to the pattern to be sure that the pattern is large enough to encase your body effectively. If there are places in the pattern that are smaller than your sloper, you know that you need to deal with those and add room in some way before you ever cut into your fabric.

A sloper can also help you to make your standard necessary adjustments to the pattern before you test, and can save a lot of repeated steps and fitting processes if you sew a lot of your own garments. If you know that you always need to increase waist circumference to get a good fit, you can incorporate this adjustment into your sloper and know where to add to every pattern you make before you begin.

A sloper can be used to grade a pattern up or down to your desired size as well, though this method may be less precise than grading by more mathematical methods. Essentially, using a sloper to grade is just one way to do a slash and spread grade, and the sloper becomes a guide for moving pattern pieces. It offers a quick and painless way to adjust patterns visually, and it can save some time by incorporating your fitting adjustments and resizing your pattern in a single step.

What is slash and spread grading?

Pattern grading is the process of enlarging or reducing pattern dimensions to create different pattern sizes from an existing pattern. This can get very complicated, because the way the body varies from size to size is a complicated subject that garment makers and manufacturers continue to struggle with. But the idea is simple enough.

Overall grade = the difference between the current pattern measurement and the desired pattern measurement (body measurement plus desired ease).

Distributed grade = the overall grade amount divided by 4, which tells you how much to add or subtract to each quarter panel of the pattern. Pattern pieces generally represent one quarter of the body, unless they’re asymmetrical, so 1/4 of the overall grade amount is distributed to each piece.

This additional space is added to the pattern in specific places to allow for the different amounts the body grows or shrinks from size to size and different places in the body. (For example, when increasing a size, you may add two inches at the waist, but the neckline circumference will increase by much less.) There is a standard set of grid lines representing where to slash and spread or overlap a pattern.

If you’re grading without a sloper, these slash line placements are very precise so that you can grow the pattern a very specific amount exactly where it needs to expand. That’s why there are double lines at center front and back. There’s a really good Threads article that explains this in detail here:

www.threadsmagazine.com/2008/11/01/quick-reference-for-cut-and-spread-pa…

So how do you determine where exactly to slash a pattern for resizing? It depends on your purposes. If you’re grading a pattern to an abstract standard, a generalized pattern to be used by multiple people and body types, you can use the standard grid lines shown above. These do seem to be agreed upon somewhat universally in all the patternmaking sources I’ve seen that use a slash and spread method.

But if you’re grading for your own body measurements or a specific person in mind with specified proportions that may or may not align with sizing standards, then the slash lines positions are more flexible and are determined by the needs of those body dimensions.

The exact slash line placement can vary based on pattern complexity as well. In patterns that aren’t very complicated like a skirt, the cut lines to slash on can be positioned with less precision than a more complicated pattern with crotch curves and scyes to deal with. The multiple slash lines are really just to allow the pattern to be spread or overlapped smaller amounts in more places so that the change in volume is spread out. In a pattern like a skirt with very simple lines, changing it incrementally by adding or subtracting smaller amounts in more places would yield the same results as fewer slashes that add or subtract a greater amount in fewer places.

Sloper Versus Pattern for Grading Purposes

If you’re using a sloper to grade rather than precise mathematically determined slash and spread amounts, this changes your approach in a couple of ways.

In terms of slash line position, if you’re grading with a sloper, especially one that has been adjusted to fit your body specifically, you usually only need to slash and spread where your body needs the space or where the pattern needs to lengthen. For example, if you’re making vertical adjustments and you have a waist to hip length that is shorter than standard, then your sloper hip and waist position are what you should use to determine whether or not you need to adjust the pattern. If the pattern has too little or too much length from waist to hip, then you would slash between the waist and full hip and move the pattern to line up with your sloper. The exact placement of the slash line doesn’t matter as much as the correct positioning of body landmarks.

It’s also slightly different than straightforward slash and spread grading because wearing ease and body measurement increases are already incorporated into the sloper pattern itself. The design ease is what will need to be added to the sloper. The final pattern and the sloper should not match exactly, because the sloper represents minimum fit and the pattern represents style created using volume and seaming. The goal is to preserve the proportions of the pattern while using the sloper to adjust sizing.

It is important to note that while wearing ease (included in the sloper and in patterns already) is somewhat universal, design ease, which is the widely varying amount of extra room added to create volume in garments, is proportional. For a style to have the same overall appearance whether a size 4 or size 16, that amount of additional volume must increase proportionately relative to the body. For example, having 2″ inches gathered in at the waist will appear differently on a waistline that is 24″ than a waistline that is 40″ in circumference. Two inches represents about 8% of the waist circumference in the original pattern. For the style to be graded well, the proportions must be considered where there is fullness added to the pattern. For it to appear proportionately similar, the amount gathered for a 40″ waist would need to be about 8% of the waist circumference, approximately 3.3″.

If you are grading up or down a size or two, especially if the garment design is simple, you may not need to worry about the proportions changing too much and you can probably disregard it without your end result being disproportionate. If the pattern is only going up or down in size by a couple of inches, the additional percentage of design ease to factor in is small enough to be negligible. But for greater size increases or decreases, it’s advisable to consider the proportions of body measurement compared to the pattern measurement and keep that proportional relationship consistent in your graded pattern.

How the Garment Hangs from the Body

When using a sloper to grade a pattern, consider where the pattern aligns most closely to the shape of the body, and where it hangs from or anchors to. For skirts and pants, the place the pattern anchors on the body is usually the waist and hips. The design relies on closeness to and tension against the body to keep it in place. In these places, the pattern should be most similar to the sloper. If the garment has pleats or gathers at the waist, there will be additional volume there, but aside from design elements, the pattern will take the shape of the body there, for the most part, because it anchors there.

Similarly, ignoring the cut away shapes of the neckline and the embellishment of the collar, the area where shoulders, neck, and back intersect at the top of a pattern is usually almost identical to a sloper. This is the part of the body that the garment hangs from, so a smooth, close fit to the body can be expected here (with the exception of shaped collars or funnel necklines, etc).

For the simple flared skirt I will be using as an example, the garment anchors at the waistline, and uses tension against the body here and the size difference between waist and hips to remain in position. So my sloper and my graded skirt pattern will have the same shape here, because there are no design features and no design ease. If there were design features like pleats or gathers, I would figure out the proportions they represent relative to the body, and figure out the amount to add or subtract to the graded pattern in proportion to the desired body measurements.

The Grading Process

To grade a pattern up or down with a sloper, you’ll need a sloper in the desired size, and a pattern that you want to grade, as well some large paper to trace on, sharp or mechanical pencils, a ruler or square, scissors, and probably some scrap paper and tape. It’s best for these purposes if your sloper extends the full desired length of the finished pattern. For my example, I’m grading a skirt pattern, so my skirt sloper should extend to the desired length of my final pattern. If needed, extend the vertical length at the center front, center back, and side seam lines.

Begin by tracing a copy of the pattern you want to grade. For simplicity’s sake, leave off seam allowances. They can be added back later and it’s much less confusing to remove them for now. Markings and grainlines aren’t necessary either, just the pattern shapes and structural features like darts and gathers or pleats. Facings are unnecessary as well, and can be redrafted from the final graded pattern.

Slash and Spread Along Grading Lines

Typically for the slash and spread method of pattern grading, a standard set of gridded lines is used to determine where to slash the pattern and by what percentage of the desired grade the pattern is to be expanded or reduced. With a sloper, the precise distance to move pattern pieces can be determined by just aligning the pieces visually, though for patterns with a lot of additional volume, this just establishes the basic shape.

It’s important to remember that additional volume may be needed where there is a lot of design ease added to the pattern so that you can preserve the proportions. But sliding the pattern to align with the sloper provides a starting point, and for small size changes, the proportions are similar enough that they can sometimes be ignored. For my simple flared skirt example, the flare at the bottom is the only place where the design ease proportions are a consideration. If my original pattern has a bottom hem that is 12″ larger than my sloper hem of 36″, then the design ease is 12 divided by the sloper measure (or body measure plus wearing ease of 36, for a result of 33%. So whether I’m grading up or down, the final pattern should be 33% larger than the body at the bottom edge.

So start with the grid lines. If your pattern has seam lines that divide each quarter into pieces, these grid lines can be moved slightly to position them within pieces. This is more of an eyeballed art than a science. There is less flexibility in locations like the neckline or scye, though. If it helps, patterns can be butted up to one another at the seams, temporarily taped and separated later.

Align the pattern with the sloper at the low hip. (This is my preference, generally – using the unchanging hard skeletal structures of the body at the full hip and the high bust to choose pattern sizing and as a starting point for adjustments.) When sliding pattern pieces, try to keep them aligned with the XY grid formed by the center front and an imaginary line bisecting it at a 90 degree angle. The pieces will be moving vertically and horizontally, but shouldn’t be tilting.

Adjust horizontally first. Cut along the horizontal grid lines and spread or overlap pieces to align to the top and bottom of the sloper. Keep the low hip of the pattern in alignment with the sloper low hip. It can be helpful to tape the pieces in place temporarily and to use scrap paper to tape and stabilize pieces in place when spreading them apart. The new position of the pattern top and bottom will be used to redraw your graded pattern.

Then adjust vertically. Cut along the vertical grid lines and spread or overlap pieces to align them to the inner and outer edge of your sloper pattern. Tape into place. The new position of the pattern pieces will be used to redraw your graded pattern.

Redraw the pattern seams, smoothing and stretching or condensing curving lines as needed. True the front and back by making sure that side seams match up lengthwise. If the original pattern is symmetrical at the front and back side seam, the graded pattern should be as well.

Use the new pattern seamlines as a guide to redraft any attached facings, facings, or waistbands to fit the new pattern shape. Redraw seam allowances if desired.

Grading a Pattern Up Using a Sloper

Here is an example of how I would approach increasing a pattern in size. Let’s say I have a stretch pattern for a flared skirt that is a few sizes too small, but I have a sloper that is my desired size and fits my measurements.

First I trace the pattern onto a new sheet of paper, preserving my original pattern. Then I decide where the lines to slash the pattern will be based on the positioning for these lines in standard grading procedure. I draw these cut lines on the pattern front and back.

Then, I align the pattern and the sloper at the low hip. This is mostly just personal preference – I like to orient my pattern work with the bony structure of the hip and then adjust around the softer, more shapeable parts of the body. Then I make vertical adjustments first by slashing and spreading at the horizontal slash lines.

If my sloper is as long as the desired length of the final pattern, I want to use the top and bottom of the sloper to define the general position of the top and bottom of my graded pattern. I tape the pattern pieces temporarily in position so they don’t slide around while I adjust further.

Then I look at the pattern horizontally. The sloper establishes the general position that I should slide my pattern pieces into. The pattern pieces will probably extend beyond the horizontal edges of the sloper, because the pattern will have additional ease added here to give it its shape.

The new position of the pattern pieces acts as a guide for where to redraw the seam lines for the enlarged pattern. The outer seam shapes should be traced over and smoothed from the pattern position after spreading apart, as shown by the red dotted lines above. The position of the inner seams can be determined mathematically if you choose by determining the proportions of the original and maintaining that proportion in the enlarged pattern. (I’m pretty comfortable with eyeballing it for simple patterns, though.)

Where there is design ease included in the pattern, it may be necessary to adjust to match the proportions of the original pattern. In this case, if I’m enlarging the pattern significantly, the amount of design ease at the bottom may need to be increased slightly to match the proportions of design ease to the body measurement of the original. I might add a bit more volume to the bottom flare to keep the look of the pattern consistent, as shown in the red lines above. If I’ve only graded up a size or two, this may not be necessary, though, since the difference in proportion would be relatively small.

Then I true the seams by comparing the seamlines to make sure the lengths of all of my seams match up, redraft any facings or waistbands using the new pattern pieces as my guide, and add back seam allowances. My final results would look something like the yellow pattern pieces below:

Grading a Pattern Down Using a Sloper

Decreasing pattern size is a similar process, but pieces will be overlapped instead of spread apart. In this case, I have a pattern that is too large, and a sloper that is my desired size.

First I trace the pattern onto a new sheet of paper, preserving my original pattern. Then I decide where the lines to slash the pattern will be based on the positioning for these lines in standard grading procedure. I draw these cut lines on the pattern front and back.

Then, I align the pattern and the sloper at the low hip. Then I make vertical adjustments first by slashing the pattern at the horizontal slash lines and overlapping to align it with the top and bottom of the sloper. I tape the pattern pieces temporarily in position so they don’t slide around while I adjust further.

Then I look at the pattern horizontally. The sloper establishes the general position that I should slide my pattern pieces into. The pattern pieces will probably extend beyond the horizontal edges of the sloper, because the pattern will have additional ease added here to give it its shape.

The new position of the pattern pieces acts as a guide for where to redraw the seam lines for the enlarged pattern. The outer seam shapes should be traced over and smoothed from the pattern position after overlapping, as shown by the red dotted lines below. The position of the inner seams can be determined mathematically if you choose by determining the proportions of the original and maintaining that proportion in the enlarged pattern. (I’m pretty comfortable with eyeballing it for simple patterns, though.)

Where there is design ease included in the pattern, it may be necessary to adjust to match the proportions of the original pattern. In this case, if I’m reducing the pattern significantly, the amount of design ease at the bottom may need to be reduced slightly to match the proportions of design ease to the body measurement of the original. I might remove some volume to the bottom flare to keep the look of the pattern consistent, as shown in the red lines above. If I’ve only graded down a size or two, this may not be necessary, though, since the difference in proportion would be relatively small.

Then I true the seams by comparing the seamlines to make sure the lengths of all of my seams match up, redraft any facings or waistbands using the new pattern pieces as my guide, and add back seam allowances. My final results would look something like the yellow pattern pieces below:

And that’s pretty much it for grading up and down with a skirt sloper. I hope this was helpful! Thanks again to the person who asked me about this process. If you have any questions about working with slopers, feel free to ask! And If you need a skirt sloper, I have several available at my Etsy shop here, including the stretch sloper pictured in the examples above. I hope everyone is safe and well and as contented as can be, given the craziness in the world at the moment.

Using Slopers: Full Abdomen Adjustments 

Amanda WynnLeave a comment

WHAT IS A FULL ABDOMEN ADJUSTMENT?

Ever struggled with getting patterns to fit a fuller abdomen/thicker waistline than patterns usually are drafted for? The full abdomen pattern adjustment (or, in my case, postpartum tummy adjustment!) adds more fabric to your pattern to cover the stomach area more comfortably. It adds volume for smoother fit to the body’s contours and more comfort.

I always have struggled with waistlines and the front abdominal area, and since my second pregnancy, my mommy tummy is more pronounced than it used to be. I really struggle with ready to wear sizing for the same reason – they just aren’t made for my body type, which is more like this (on my shiny new fancy croquis I painted!):

pronounced curvature of abdomen at high hip
fabric is pulled forward by full abdomen, shifting side seams forward and causing drag lines

My body proportions lack waistline definition but also have a somewhat narrow hip structure, which causes a few special fitting issues that might be familiar to anyone with a full tummy area:

-waistbands dig in or won’t close if pants or skirts fit at the hip
-the belly pushes the front of clothing downward to settle below the belly, where it cuts in and exaggerates the curve of the belly in an unflattering way
-waistbands ride up or fall down if the garment fits at the waist because the lower body doesn’t fill out and provide resistance against the fabric at the high hip and full hip to help hold it in place.

To show this from the side view:

Hem may hang unevenly from being pulled up to cover full abdomen.

If you have similar fitting issues when sewing and/or discomfort in ready to wear, you might find that a full abdomen adjustment really helps. What follows is what works for me, and is kind of a Frankenstein method using bits and pieces from all the tutorials I’ve tried. So far, this combination of approaches has been the most successful for me and I’ll be doing a future blog to document how I apply it to a pants sloper, too. I claim no expertise on fitting, but am sharing this in the hope that it will help other sewists to get a better fit with less trial and error and less wasted sewing time and fabric.

So where to begin?

START WITH BODY MEASUREMENTS

At a minimum, you need your waist measurement (taken at the narrowest point of your torso, usually even with the elbow) and your low hip (sometimes called full hip) measurement, which measures your hips and buttocks at the fullest point. Usually the low hip is 8.5″ below the waist.

The usual approaches are to choose the pattern based on at least one of these measurements, adjusting to fit the other measurement if needed, but this doesn’t work as well with a full abdomen. Simply choosing a larger size adds to the front and back waistline evenly, which misaligns the side seam and loses waist shaping in back.

If you choose the size that fits your body at the waist and then reduce the pattern width to fit at the hips, you then lose the darted fit of the back pattern and will require adjustments there. Also with skirts this reduction at the hips strategy may work fine, but for pants it becomes more complicated. If you choose a size to fit the waist, then the proportions at the hip are going to be larger than your body. The leg proportions are probably smaller than those of the pattern, and then the complicated intersection of body segments happening at the crotch is going to be thrown off.

The other usual approach is to fit the body at hip, then slash and spread to expand at waist. While this works better, and fitting the bone structures (hip) and modifying to fit the soft tissue areas (the waist) is my preferred way to fit, this involves trial and error from the very start. I hate sewing more toiles/muslins than I have to.

The best approach, i think, is to measure the body in halves. Doing this allows you to analyze the distribution of mass on your figure more accurately, and to adjust only where needed.

One way to do this is to mark your side seam on the body on both sides, using something that won’t shift like tape or eyeliner pencil, and measure the back and front halves of the body separately. While the conventional pattern selection wisdom would have you choose the pattern based on your whole body measurement, but this approach to a full abdomen Then choose the size that fits each best, matching them at the the low hip and adjusting the side seam lengths to match. This preserves the fit of the back pattern and allows for more isolated adjustments where they are needed on the body.

With a full abdomen adjustment, there is another consideration when adapting the pattern to your measurements: the high hip (4-4.5″ below the waistline, approximately midway between your narrowest point at the waist and the low hip). This measurement can be fuller than the low hip, especially if you have narrow hips, as I do. For a sloper, which you want to fit closely to the body, it may seem desirable to match the body measurements exactly at the low hip to hug the body.

However, this is not flattering in actual garments unless the design is intended to emphasize the curvature of the lower stomach. For skirts and pants, it is usually far more flattering to skim over this curve rather than hugging it with fabric. so you’ll want to measure straight down from the low belly. Maria Denmark has a tutorial that illustrates how to do this beautifully (here).

Another trick to do this without a toile  or slashing and spreading the pattern is to take measurements differently at the full hip. Hold a ruler vertically flat against the lower belly, to extend a smooth line down to the full hip area to show you where to measure. It adds a little extra ease at the front full hip to skim the body instead of hugging up into the curve.

CHOOSE TWO PATTERN SIZES TO FIT FRONT AND BACK SEPARATELY

To choose sizes will require measuring the flat pattern or some math to figure out which size best matches each half of the body.  Skirt and pants have very little ease at the waist, since they rely on a tight fit here to anchor the garment in place. So you’ll be choosing the pattern pieces that come closest to your body measurements plus approximately 1/2″ of ease for movement. If you’re measuring a pattern piece, remember not to include seam allowances, omit the dart intake, and remember to double the measurement if you have to cut two of the piece. (For example, if your front pattern piece says cut two on the fold, measure the piece (leaving out the seam allowance and space inside the dart legs) and multiply it by two, then compare to your body measurement plus half the pattern ease.)

To give an example, here’s how pattern selection worked for me and my measurements (approx. 31″ waist, 39″ high hip, 37.5″ low hip):

My sloper pattern had half an inch of ease included and the side seam shifted 1/2” total toward the back. This seam shift isn’t terribly crucial, but is in theory the industry standard; if I were doing this again, I’d feel free to ignore it, but in this experiment, I was being as precise as I could.

So I chose the size equal to my back waist measurement minus the seam shift (-1/2”) plus half the pattern’s ease (+1/4”), so body measurement minus 1/4”. This worked out to be the 37.5” size, which matched up to the size I needed at the low hip in back as well. So my back proportions matched the standard pattern almost exactly.

In the front, though, my proportions are very different than the pattern proportions. My waist and high hip measurement aligns best to the 43″ size. The low hip doesn’t match up to my body measurement but is pretty close to my measurement taken with a ruler held straight down from my abdomen (as discussed above, wanting to skim rather than encase that curve).

full abdomen sloper adjustment unaltered skirt pieces
My unaltered pieces are a 37.5″ back and a 43″ front. (My sloper pattern is labeled using the low hip measurement instead of the imprecise numbering conventions of women’s clothing.)

 

ADJUSTING THE PATTERN

If this had been a typical pattern, the side seams of the front would be longer than the back. to fix this, i would align them at the low hip and trim away the excess from the top and bottom, also curving the waist slightly upward at the center if needed to give a little more vertical coverage over my belly.

To test the fit, I did a pin fitting first. I pinned the darts closed, pinned the side seams, slipped the garment on, then pinned the garment closed at what would be the zipper at the center back seam to simulate wearing it, so that if I need to adjust, I don’t have to seam rip and can adjust as I wear it.

By doing the math and measurements of body front and back separately first instead of slashing and spreading a muslin/toile version, I have a much better fit from the beginning with less work. the fit works perfectly at the waist and high hip. I have the close fit I want in back and my side seam hangs evenly at waist and high hip.

There is one further adjustment needed, though. since the front of my actual body is only wider than the back at the high hip. Since my back and front are the same size at the mid thigh or knee, the extra room isn’t needed there, and this extra space in the bottom of the skirt really throws off the hang and the side seams at the hem.

full abdomen sloper adjustment comparing front to back sizes align at hip and bottom edge
Align the pattern pieces along the center front and center back seams. Lay the back over the front. Starting at the low hip, taper the front pattern to be in proportion to the back pattern at the hemline.

To fix it, I laid the back pattern piece on the front, matching them up at the vertical line of center front/center back. At the low thigh/just above the knee I marked the width of the back piece. I want them to match here, approximately, remembering the slight seam shift adds 1/4” of width to each side of the front pattern piece. Then I use the pattern piece to redraw a smooth curve all the way up to the full hip of the front pattern.

full abdomen postpartum sewing pattern adjustment fix side seam
Blend the pattern to the smaller size at the hemline.

 

This isn’t perfect, because the grain line of the outer seam of the front is now more on the bias than the back, but this could be dealt with by cutting the front in two pieces and realigning the grain to the side seam for future garments.

Here are my final sloper pieces after all adjustments:

full abdomen postpartum sewing pattern adjustment sloper final

And that’s it! I hope this is helpful, and I’d love to hear  your tips and tricks and experiences dealing with this fit issue. Please forgive my wrinkly fabric. It’s cotton, and though it was pressed prior to shooting these pictures, my kiddos Godzilla anything on the floor:

my house is glorious chaos

I’ll be posting lots more on fitting issues, body proportions, and sloper adjustments as part of a wardrobe overhaul project I’m undertaking as we launch headlong into a new decade. 🙂 Happy New Year! Hope your holiday season was joyous and that Santa brought you all the pretty fabric,

-Amanda

Woven and Knit Sloper Patterns for Women’s Skirts

Amanda WynnLeave a comment
women's woven skirt sloper pattern PDF download

I have two new sloper patterns to share, a women’s skirt sloper for woven fabrics and a women’s skirt sloper for knits, both in 12 sizes. (Available through Etsy for instant download and in large format pdf for copy shop printing, too.) Drafted my first digital fashion flats and created a new logo, too! I’m *really* excited, because my efforts to work out all my sizing and grading standards consistently is starting to come together. From a pattern drafting standpoint, it’s important to me to develop a solid, consistent basis to draft from going forward, but also from a personal standpoint, I’m excited to be creating a full library of personalized slopers so that I can get the fit I want, consistently and easily. If I know exactly the baseline I need, I won’t have to sew muslins or toiles. So there will be more of these in the future, and more to come on how to use them, because although sewing is an excellent move for less waste and better consumption habits and putting quality over quantity, sewing muslins of everything is a waste of time and fabric that I hate, and probably lots of other sewers do, too.

So what is a sloper, generally speaking? A sloper is the basic starting point for pattern design, also known as a fitting shell. It’s a baseline with enough wearing ease to allow for movement and breathing, but no design ease and no details, and usually it doesn’t include seam allowances, since they complicate the process of altering the sloper.

Why use a sloper? Patterns almost never fit as is, because all patterns are drafted to fit an average set of measurements. Since there is so much variety in human body proportions, the designer has to choose an average to work from, in the hope that these body dimensions will be a good starting point for their customers. Unless your measurements match this set of baseline measurements, the pattern will need adjustment to better fit your body. Getting a great fit with a sloper allows you to do this process once and be able to replicate it again and again, rather than having to sew a test garment to fit each new pattern you sew.

The sloper is meant to be a two dimensional dress form. When you sew a sloper, the intent is to establish a great fit, and to then use this as a template to modify other garments. Since the sloper has no details and no design ease, it represents the minimum amount of fabric you require for a garment to comfortably cover your body and allow for movement. The sloper is the baseline, where the pattern contains design ease and detail to add style, structure, and movement to garments.

These slopers are drafted for a hip that’s 9” larger than the waist, which is the amount I settled on when I looked at ASTM sizing charts and studies of actual bodies. It’s a good starting place for a lot of people, though I have a more rectangularly proportioned figure, so I’ll have to add about 2-3” to the waist for a correct fit. When I made my size chart and grading rules, I looked at the somewhat idealized proportions some of the big pattern companies use and tried to use measurements that were based more on real bodies than their dress form proportions. My hope is that my sizing will fit more rectangular/apple shaped/pear shaped figures better, since statistically it seems to be more the norm than the hourglass in the real human population.

I have never been a big wearer of skirts for my own wardrobe, but between sweltering humid Missouri summer, being on a 50s/60s movie kick when baby wakes me up in the middle of the night and discovering the wonderful drama that is the tango skirt, I think I need to add some to my wardrobe. (Last night’s 3am insomnia feature was Cat on a Hot Tin Roof with Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor. Made a boring old pencil skirt look downright savage.) I also wanted to draft them because the skirt is really the bottom half of so many full body patterns like robes and coats that I felt like I should expand my knowledge of that type of lower body garment to better draft the full body ones.

I’m thinking of posting some step by step photos of the process of sloper sewing, fitting, and then adjusting patterns with them, because examples of actually using a personal sloper aren’t all that easy to find. It’s also a good way to start on the capsule wardrobe I’ve been wanting to sew when I Marie Kondo declutter the rest of my clothes again. The transition from pregnant body to postpartum body has complicated it a bit, too, since my figure isn’t quite the same as it was before and everything is trending lower and squishier than it used to. So I’m resolving to sew for the body I have, discard anything that doesn’t fit or can’t be altered to fit, and then take in as needed in the future. Clothing that just sort of fits is such a big part of the clutter in my house it’s silly, especially for someone with sewing/fitting on the brain so much.

Lots of lingerie and other sewing and crafting stuff to share, but I’ll save it for another day. My personal life is a fog of sleep deprivation and coffee but also baby giggles and summer vacation with my big kiddo, too. Hope summer finds you well, too, Gentle Reader.

 

 

 

 

Lingerie of 1915 and the Questionable Invention of the Brassiere

Amanda Wynn4 Comments

Lingerie is always one of my favorite parts of pattern catalogs. The Butterick 1915 pattern catalog I recently let go from my collection had some great examples of the lingerie styles of the era, which included chemises, corset covers, brassieres, drawers, slips, and combinations.

The Brassiere of 1915

This catalog was of particular interest, though, for the brassieres. Every now and then there seems to be a mainstream cultural piece gushing about the 1914 invention of the “brassiere” and the supposed liberation from the oppression of corsets it provided, etc. This narrative defines brassiere in an extremely narrow way, ignoring breast bands that go back to Greece and are depicted in 4th century mosaics, medieval finds from Lengburg Castle dating to the 15th century that resemble modern lingerie design, and the many kinds of bust support patented during the 19th century. The Mary Phelps Jacob patent of 1914 is more of a backless bralette, which is a unique design, but far from the first bra available. (To me, it’s another example of the way that we view our historical predecessors as dramatically different from us or somehow more ignorant, confined by uncomfortable corsetry because propriety demanded it, conveniently ignoring our own modern excesses such as plastic surgery.) As long as women have had fabric, I suspect there have been ways we’ve used it to provide breast support while working or engaging in sports.

Brassiere Patent

In the 1915 Butterick catalog, there are many examples of brassieres and bust support in the form of fitted corset covers. (This contradicts the “the brassiere was invented in 1914” narrative as well, since if it had just been invented a few months before, DeBevoise probably wouldn’t have been mass producing the “brassiere” in the spring of 1915.) There is an ad for DeBevoise brassieres that have the monobosom shape of the 1915 silhouette. These would have been made of mostly nonstretch fabric, and patterns for them have always seemed very plain and utilitarian to me, but I think I may have underestimated the possibilities there. Some of the lace and sheer versions are very pretty, and I’m curious enough about what kind of support they could provide that I might have to give making one of these a try.

lingerie of 1915 brassiere ad

There were patterns available from Butterick for similar styles:

The 1915 Corset Silhouette

The brassiere seemed to be gaining momentum as the corset shifted lower to give the straight, thin hipped look that was fashionable then. The brassiere or fitted corset cover would support the bust while the corset gave shaping to the lower torso. There’s a great ad for corsets in the catalog that illustrates the corset style in 1915:

lingerie of 1915 corset ad

I’ve seen discussions of corsetry that describe this garment as oppressive and claiming that this kind of corset made sitting difficult, but it’s clear from surviving garments from the period and patterns for this type of corset that the boning didn’t extend all the way to the bottom of this type of corset. The boning in most examples I’ve seen stops at the high hip, as a typical higher corset’s bones would. This kind of corset often included elastic panels at the hip, too. I doubt moving or sitting in it would be much different than trying to move or sit in a contemporary girdle or Spanx type control garment.

The Corset Covers, Slips and Chemises of 1915

The corset cover is a type of delicate undershirt that if made to fit closely would have provided bust support, but looser styles could be worn with other foundation pieces like corsets or boned brassieres to smooth the silhouette, too. Corset covers typically ended at the waistline or high hip while chemises usually were full body length.
There are several styles for these kinds of garments in the Butterick catalog:

 

Drawers of 1915

Panties or knickers as we currently know them don’t seem to have really been a thing yet as of 1915. The lower body styles featured in this pattern catalog are drawers, and they are for *open* drawers, so they were definitely still being worn in this era. For the most part they seem to still be being worn down to the knee as well.

Combination Undergarments

Judging from the amount of patterns offered for combination undergarments, they seem to have been extremely popular in this era. There are also several envelope chemises, which is the closest thing to the closed crotch kind of undergarment we’re used to today:

lingerie of 1915 butterick 6957 combination 8

The combination combined the corset cover or chemise with open drawers:

This simple garment could be somewhat fitted or looser fit, simple and utilitarian or embellished with embroidery and lace, gathered at the neckline or suspended from shoulder straps, gathered and trimmed at the leg or loose.

I think I need to give these a try, too. In a suitable fabric and with a close fit, these would be basically the same thing as a summery jumpsuit, and they’d have a bit of vintage elegance to them. Maybe when I’m not sleep deprived I’ll give them a go. 🙂

I’ll end this screed with just some advertising gorgeousness for its own sake from another brassiere ad. The illustrations of the time are so beautiful.

Happy Sunday! Have you ever worn or sewn undergarments in the style of this era? I’d love to hear your opinions / experiences / general thoughts on vintage styles being done with contemporary styling.

Butterick 1915 Fashions (and thoughts on trying to KonMari myself out of being a hoarder).

Amanda WynnLeave a comment

I’ve officially started cleaning out my sewing room / having a full blown not-quite-midlife decluttering crisis and ebay-ing some of my old collected treasures. It’s funny the way my compulsions come full circle given enough time. About five years ago, I was interested in minimalism and simple living and trying to clear out my possessions to have time and space for what mattered most to me. Then I got interested in sewing ephemera and collecting sewing machines, and somehow my sewing room / sanctuary space became overrun with treasures.

Some of this is Asperger’s-esque, my learning style. When I become interested in something, it becomes obsessive, and I learn by immersing myself completely in the subject. I have enjoyed the process immensely, and pattern catalogs and sewing manuals and correspondence courses appeal to so many of my interests – visual art, graphic design, antiques, cultural history, gender history, material culture, crafting – that collecting them has engaged me as little else has.

But now, the cycle of my interests is shifting back to simplicity, and with a new baby and a desire to really move into patternmaking as an action and not just a study, I find that owning all of these delicate historical things is not providing me the same pleasure that hunting and studying it initially did. We don’t have enough room for me to store these things anymore, really. The sheer volume of kids toys we’ve accumulated with one kiddo who shares my hoarder tendencies is unbelievable, so with two, there’s just not room for boxes of books.

And what I want has changed. I want a crafting room or studio space that I can share with my kids without the worry that they might accidentally get ink on some antique irreplaceable thing that I paid a huge amount of money for. (Not to mention life in tornado alley makes a girl a bit nervous about all those 19th century leaflets upstairs when the sirens go off and we all pile in the basement.) I’d rather use the money from selling them to buy fabrics and art materials to engage with. So I’m finding new homes for some of the treasures I’ve accumulated over the years.

I keep reading Marie Kondo and hoping it will stick. There’s a passage in The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up that I keep coming back to:

When you come across something that you cannot part with, think carefully about its true purpose in your life. You’ll be surprised at how many of the things you possess have already fulfilled their role. By acknowledging their contribution and letting them go with gratitude, you will be able to truly put the things you own, and your life, in order. In the end, all that will remain are the things that you really treasure. To truly cherish the things that are important to you, you must first discard those that have outlived their purpose.

Most of the things I’ve collected have served their purpose in my life, in that they’ve provided an education and a great deal of inspiration. I scan and reproduce some of my favorites as a history nerd / design passion project, so have the ability to return to the information they contain. So I think I’m ready to clear out the physical bulk and work toward having space and materials to put what they’ve taught me to use in making new designs, doing my own sketches, writing about what I’ve learned about fashion history.

So, if you are a collector of fashion ephemera, feel free to watch my ebay (here). I have so many things to clear out over the next few months. I’ll try to post about some of the things I send back out into the world as I go through the process, because some of the designs and information in them is really fantastic.

I put up a Butterick catalog from 1915 this weekend that has some fantastic illustrations and unique details in it that I figured I’d share here, just as fashion inspiration. I love the influence of the kimono on this era (and have been very into researching kimono inspired garments lately) that started with Poiret a few years earlier but can still be seen in the girdles and sashes and surplice necklines.

 

Some of these designs and silhouettes seem very dated but even the dated designs have details that could be incorporated to give personality to contemporary designs or simple garments. Others, though, if they were done in contemporary colors and fabrics and with a modern hairstyle, you’d never know they were hundred year old designs. The dress with a deep neckline, a sash and the midsection, and the ruffle detail low on the sleeve and skirt would be gorgeous in a light chiffon outer layer and a satin sash in the same color for subtlety or a bright contrasting one for drama, something like cream chiffon with a scarlet sash and maybe some scarlet ribbon detailing at the neckline.

Fashion magazines always appeal to my inner 15 year old art nerd, too. The way these illustrations are done is both pretty and illustrative in a way some eras aren’t. Personally, I like this better than some of the line drawing qualities of illustration in the 1920s and the harsher femininity sometimes illustrated in the 1930s. It’s interesting, too, because these illustrations seem to depict female faces as they would look with heavy cosmetic applications, though women would probably still have tried to keep their makeup applications looking very natural at this point in history, using maybe just a face powder, light rouge, eyebrow pencil, and a tonic on lashes.

The shift of silhouette from the heavily corseted, tiny waistline of the first decade of the 1900s is fascinating. From what I understand this was probably partly due to the popularity of Titanic era designs by Poiret, Fortuny, and others that were inspired by other cultures with a more natural silhouette, but also due to necessity as World War I changed everyone’s lives so dramatically from 1914 onward, changing the daily activities of women, causing material shortages such that designs had to use less fabric, and so many other changes.

The corsets and undergarments really deserve an in-depth post of their own, so more on that later.

Happy Sunday!

Adjusting to life with a newborn, and working on a new pattern.

Amanda Wynn5 Comments

I’m excited to say I finally had my baby girl, a little more than three weeks ago now. Requisite retelling of the birth (feel free to skip): I spent a lot of time worried about preeclampsia and platelet counts, but that ended up being for nothing as that wasn’t a problem, though labor ended up being awful for other reasons (infection after my water broke, low blood pressure, fever, crappy anatomy) and I ended up having a c-section after 24 hours of labor because my poor baby wasn’t tolerating it and after five hours of pushing and a room full of nurses cheerleading at your junk, well, a c-section starts sounding pretty good. Poor kiddo had some scary complications after the stressful birth and ended up in the NICU for about five days, and I couldn’t even touch her for about two days, so that was an emotional nightmare, but I’m happy to say everything resolved and we’re all home now and  healthy and happy(ish – let’s be real, I have some emotional wobbliness while pregnant / after birth that check a lot of antenatal/postpartum depression boxes, but luckily I am able to caretake and enjoy the moments with my kids despite it).  Sleep deprived, of course, but content. The whole experience was identity-jarring, which has left me with an even more intense minimalism/decluttering urge for convoluted psychological reasons better left explored over coffee with a sister or bff, but eh. Despite my aspirations and birth plans and idealism and well-intentioned attempt at unmedicated labor (HAAAAAHHAHAHA. NOPE), birth is intense and sometimes horrible and sort of existentially traumatizing, at least for me, but I seem to have bad luck in that department. She’s wonderful, and worth it all, and her brother, too, who has been amazing adapting to everything, too. I’m so blessed in that.

Funny, though, that most of the women I know told me that you’ll know labor is imminent when you get a burst of energy and want to clean the house. That sensation is utterly unknown to me. I did get zoned in on working on a pattern for about 12 hours straight, though, which I’m still grading and testing, but hope to release very soon. The world is full of good bra patterns, especially in the boom of interest over the last 3 or so years, but it makes me feel better to work on something I enjoy and I feel much less isolated when I engage with the world via a craft I care immensely about. It’s helping me to really systematize my understanding of stretch reductions, cup sizing, grading different bra parts, and using Illustrator, so that feels like an accomplishment. Once I’m satisfied with the nuts and bolts of this one, I have quite a few ideas for less common, more vintage inspired pattern styles in the future. It’s a simple demi style bralette with slightly angled seam lines and an angled center front band, which works well with the lines of rectangular torsos like mine to imply a little curvaceousness, worked well with the belly I had when pregnant, and allows for a front of bra lace longline detail:

More to come as that comes into shape. 🙂

Working with Ease Amounts in Commercial Patterns

Amanda Wynn3 Comments
The amount of ease in commercial sewing patterns can be a source of sizing confusion and fitting frustration. In this blog entry, I look at types of ease, industry standard amounts for different garment types, and actual ease amounts in a selection of corset, lingerie, and loose fitting commercial patterns from a range of eras. Click through to read more.

Ease amounts in commercial patterns are one of the eternally frustrating problems of contemporary sewing. The amount of ease included in designs seems to vary wildly from pattern to pattern, even from the same company, so that the home sewer finds her or himself needing to sew a muslin/toile for each pattern. It adds yet another layer of complication to the puzzle that is pattern size selection. But where does the confusion come from, exactly? I’m thinking there are a few main culprits: patterns drafted with ease amounts that don’t fit the actual garment type, inaccurate pattern photographs, and lack of finished garment measurements to give an objective way to analyze final fit. (For simplicity’s sake, I’m only going to consider patterns for woven fabrics at the moment.)

What exactly is ease?

It’s the amount of extra space added to a pattern in excess of actual body measurements to allow for movement and style. Wearing or fitting ease refers to a necessary small amount of space included in slopers and almost every pattern type (with the exception of corsets, some foundation garments, and stretch fabric patterns) that allow the wearer to breathe, sit, bend, and reach in the garment. This is usually around 2″ of additional space at the bust, 1″ at the waist, and 1.5″ at the hip, no matter what the pattern size.

Design ease is a more variable amount of space added to patterns to create different style types, create silhouettes, and to give movement to the garment. Design ease amounts are proportional and depend to some extent on the size of the garment, though there are general industry standards for different fits that are the approximately the same from pattern company to pattern company.

Ease Standards for Different Garment Types

Ease amounts and garment fit drawn to scale as a fashion flat.. Ease amounts in commercial patterns are a consistent source of fitting confusion and sewing frustration. For tips on understanding industry standard ease amounts and what is meant by different fits, click through for the full blog entry.
Ease amounts and garment fit shown to scale as a fashion flat..

There are about five different categories of fit that pattern companies generally use to describe their patterns. Though there is a lot of variation from garment style to garment style, and the top of the pattern may have one fit and the bottom have another, this can be helpful in understanding how much ease to expect the garment to have. The McCall website here offers a chart of ease amounts for various fits. This chart doesn’t differentiate between design and wearing ease, so my assumption is that this is the total amount added to the body measurement.

Close Fitting (includes 0-2 7/8 inches of design ease at the bust)
Fitted (includes 3-4 inches of design ease at the bust)
Semi Fitted (includes 4 1/8-5 inches of design ease at the bust)
Loose Fitting (includes 5 1/8-8 inches of design ease at the bust)
Very Loose (over 8 inches of design ease at the bust)

Slightly more design ease is added for garments that are layered on top of other garments, such as jackets and coats. The design ease included at the waist and hip varies depending on whether the garment has a waistband or where the garment hangs from the body.

There’s a great piece that goes more in depth on the subject (here), though I’m unsure about the exact design ease amounts it lists. (That chart matches the McCall chart, which I think includes wearing ease and design ease in its amounts, so the amounts of *design* ease added to body measurements are probably smaller than it describes.) It has some very helpful visual guides to what different fit styles look like on the body.

Wearing and design ease standards seem formulaic enough that it’s odd there’s so much inconsistency. So many people on sewing forums and doing pattern reviews describe problems with way too much ease for their size. So where does the confusion come in? Do pattern companies not stick to their described standards? Does grading add excessive ease for certain sizes? I examined a set of patterns to see how this works out for a few different garment fit types from different eras (because I have strange ideas about what constitutes a good time) and found a few issues I’ll examine in detail.

Grading Inconsistency and Wrong Ease Amounts for the Garment Type: Corset Patterns

Some of the problem may come from using the wrong pattern block or wrong design ease for the garment type, though this seems likely only for certain kinds of close-fitting garments like corsets and strapless bodices that require a very close fit to stay in place.

Butterick 4254 corset and stays pattern. Click through for a blog entry on garment ease and amounts in commercial patterns, including two contemporary corset patterns and issues with sizing and ease amount discrepancies.
Butterick 4254 corset and stays pattern.

I looked at Butterick 4254 View C, sizes 12, 14, and 16, which is a historically based late 19th century style corset with a front busk and a laced up back. At the bustline, the finished garment measurements printed on the pattern match the body exactly at the bust. At the waist, for size 12, the pattern matches the body exactly. For sizes 14 and 16, the pattern is 1/2 inch smaller than the waist. So for this particular pattern, there are two fit problems. First, the ease seems to vary irregularly by size at the waist, which is problematic for predicting fit. Second, the lacing gap for most corsets is usually about 2″, so if we add that, the final corset is not going to fit as a sewist would expect it to fit. If the sewist is wanting a garment that fits something like a Victorian corset, they’re going to be disappointed, because there’s no way a period garment included 2″ of ease, and a corset would have nipped in at least an inch or two at the waist as well. Sewists using this pattern on various boards usually recommend sizing down about two sizes, sometimes more, in order to get the fit that one would want in a corset.

Butterick 5797 corset pattern.

I also looked at Butterick 5797, View A, sizes 12, 14, and 16. It’s described as a corset, close fitting, and labeled with “Making History” (though, alas, there’s no info on the specifics of that history included). This one closes with a zipper in front and has no lacing. I found that based on the final garment sizes given, at the bust there is a consistent 2″ of ease for all sizes. At the waist, for size 12 and 14, there is 2 1/2″ of ease, and for size 16, there is 3″ of ease. At the high hip, there was approximately 1 1/2″ for all sizes. For this pattern as with the other corset pattern, it isn’t going to fit like an actual corset at all, so a sewist expecting that is going to be disappointed, though they might suspect that from the zipper. (Without lacing to allow movement with breathing, the zero ease typical of a corset isn’t really desirable or comfortable). An argument could be made for having more design ease at the waist for larger sizes since design ease is proportional, but if that were the case, the ease amount should increase between size 12 and 14 by some increment as well, but a corset is usually expected to nip in at the waistline.

What’s frustrating is that two “historical” corset patterns from the same company seem to vary in the amount of ease they use for similar garments in a way that is not transparent. Even if you give them the benefit of the doubt on 4254 and pretend that 2″ that should be indicated for the lacing gap are part of the pattern ease, when you compare the two patterns, the ease amount doesn’t change in the same way between sizes, so how can you predict the fit accurately? If you know the best size for you in one pattern, that same size may not work in the other pattern. Looking at the pattern envelope raises another issue as well.

Is Pattern Envelope Photography Realistic?

The photo on the envelope of Butterick 5797 seems to fit the model as a contemporary corset might, if worn without the intention to nip the waist. But if the model were wearing the size indicated for her on the size chart, it’s very unlikely it would fit this way. If a strapless boned bodice had 2″ of ease at the bust, it probably wouldn’t stay in place. If the model’s garment had 2 1/2″-3″ of ease at the waist, it probably wouldn’t appear this form flattering on her.

My suspicion is that models on pattern envelopes almost never wear the sizes of the garment they would be told to select on the pattern envelope, and during the photo shoot, clothing is probably pinned with clips to flatter body curves and hang just right. The photos of this particular pattern look lovely, but what’s the point of great product photos that don’t accurately depict the fit of the product? It creates an expectation that’s going to be disappointed.

Ease Amounts in Commercial Patterns over Various Eras

1930s

I was curious about ease amounts and silhouettes in other commercial patterns and over different eras, so I looked at several more examples of different garment styles for the sake of comparison.

The oldest pattern I looked at was a dress from 1934 from Mabs Weekly, one of the fashion magazines of the era that often included a free pattern. This one would have been a fitted bodice style. I don’t have the original illustration of the garment, but the pattern is for a 36” bust. The final garment measurements weren’t listed on the pattern, so I measured the pieces themselves and subtracted the seam allowances to find the finished measurements. The finished measurement of the garment at the bustline is 39.5″, for 3.5″ total ease.

1940s Lingerie Pattern Ease

Advance 3067 slip pattern. Click through for a blog entry on garment ease and amounts in commercial patterns, including vintage and contemporary lingerie patterns and ease amount discrepancies.
Advance 3067 slip pattern.

I looked at another pattern, Advance 3067, for a slip from what I’d guess is the 40s from the envelope design and the lines. The slip doesn’t have a placket or closure and isn’t cut on the bias, so it’s close fitting but probably not as close to the body as some lingerie. (This image is borrowed from an Etsy listing here). I found that for a size listed as 32″ breast, the finished measurement (which I had to take from the pieces themselves) was 36″ after seam allowances were removed. At the waist, the garment had approximately 6.75″ of ease when darts and seam allowances were removed, which makes sense for a pullover style garment.

1950s Lingerie Pattern Ease

Simplicity 1426 bra pattern.

For this example, I examined a contemporary reissue of a 50’s era Simplicity bra pattern (Simplicity 4333). The contemporary version of the pattern is numbered 1426, and I looked at view C. *Represses rant about ugly contemporary pattern envelope design with all her might* But seriously, the 1980s wood stain exterior paint green of the Simplicity logo and the weird way the elements are balanced is just…no. NO.

There is some confusion with using the finished garment measurements in some reviews, as it’s unclear if the size represents the full bust. (My guess is probably yes, since that’s where the Simplicity site suggests measuring to select your pattern size. Personally, I think the high bust is the better starting point for accurate pattern selection, since it measures your frame rather than your breast fullness.) According to the size chart, the finished measurement matches the body measurement exactly at the bust.

Out of curiosity, I measured the pattern pieces for my likely size as well. For the size 12 pattern, the finished measurement is listed as 34″. But there is a button placket at the center back, and it’s unclear if those finished garment measurements include the amount that the band overlaps at the placket or not. I measured to the center line of that placket, essentially measuring the circumference of the garment when closed for wearing, and found that when seam allowances were removed, that size would actually be 33″, an inch smaller than the body, which isn’t going to be workable for a garment with no stretch. (Counting the overlap in the finished measurement would have given me a measurement of approximately 34 and 1/4″ full circumference.)

While there’s definitely some room for error on the part of my measuring, a lack of any ease for breathing and the lack of clarity in what the finished garment measurements actually mean are a problem. While the contemporary formulation of band size/cup size wasn’t being used in the ’50s, it seems odd to me that one of the Big 4 pattern companies couldn’t examine the pattern measurements and explain their sizing in a way that takes band size/cup size into account to better serve the needs of their current customers for the reissued version. If I could find the original pattern, I’d love to compare the ease standards and grading used in the original to the ones used in the reissue. I’m also curious how accurate the finished garment measurements printed on patterns usually are.

Contemporary Lingerie Pattern Ease

Vogue 8888 lingerie pattern.

I looked at Vogue 8888 to get an idea of how much ease is used in contemporary lingerie pattern making as well. View A is a loose-fitting surplice robe. View C is a close fitting, bias cut pull over camisole. View F is a semi fitted pair of bias cut shorts.

What I found was that for the robe (View A), the bust included 6.5″ ease and the hip had 7.5″ of ease for all sizes. For the camisole, there was 3″ of ease at the bust for all sizes I checked, which might be just slightly above what the Big 4 ease charts describe as “close” fit by about 5/8″, but which makes sense given the lack of a closure and need to be able to pull it over the shoulders. For the shorts (View F), the hip had 3.5″ of ease. (I checked the actual pattern pieces for this view and found this measure to be accurate, too.) The waist had 8″ of ease, which, along with the stretch of the bias cut, would allow for them to be pulled over the hip without a placket or opening. These ease amounts aligned pretty accurately with the stated total ease amounts for the major pattern companies for different fits, and the ease amounts were the same for all sizes I looked at.

Contemporary Pattern Ease in Loose Fitting Garments

McCall 6649 loose fitting shirt pattern.
McCall 6465 loose fitting dress pattern.

I looked at McCall 6649, a loose-fitting button up menswear style shirt in a B cup size, and found that the bust had 5 1/2″ of total ease, the waist had 6″ of total ease, and the hip had 6″ of total ease for all sizes I looked at (16, 18, and 20 for this pattern). So ease amounts were consistent, and matched the given ease chart amounts for a loose fit. I was curious, though, if the final garment actually fit as it’s depicted on the envelope or if it might be looser, especially at the waist. The model may be wearing a smaller size than the envelope would recommend for her body measurements, or it might be styled to be flattering, or maybe it’s just me.

I looked at one more “loose-fitting” pattern, the McCall 6465 loose tunic dress. For sizes 16, 18, and 20, ease amounts were consistent. It had 5.5″ of ease at the bust, 13.5″ of ease at the waist, and 8.5″ of ease at the hip. The ease amount at the waist seems large, but if the dress is pulled over either the shoulder or the hip, it would make sense for the narrowest part of the body to require more ease here. This one was a looser fit than the other pattern, so if a person was expecting “loose fit” to mean the same thing on both without pulling the patterns out to check the finished measurements, there might be some frustration with the results.

Conclusions

The patterns I looked at seemed mostly consistent with ease amounts described as “industry standard.” I can’t find much information on ease standards in ready to wear, so I’m curious how those industry standards are applied outside of patternmaking for home sewing.

If ease amounts in patterns are relatively standard, then where does the confusion and frustration come in? I’m thinking some of it is the stylized photography of pattern envelope photos. When we see a photo of a finished garment, there is a certain automatic assumption that the photo is more realistic than the highly stylized, exaggerated silhouettes of vintage pattern envelope fashion illustration. But the photos aren’t as realistic as they seem if the samples are potentially being selected to flatter the model and the garment rather than depicting the actual fit of the pattern if it were sewn to the model’s body size. This is compounded by the possibility that clothes are pinned in place or pinned closer to the body and that photo editing might be creating the illusion of closer waistlines or trimmer leg silhouettes than the garment really gives.

So what’s a sewist to do to avoid pulling her/his hair out? The best indicator of final fit is the finished garment measurements. You can check the total ease amount by subtracting actual body measurements on the measurement chart from the finished garment measurements printed on the tissue, if they’re present. If not, it’s worthwhile to measure the pieces at least at the bustline to get an idea of whether the fit the pattern is said to be is the fit you’re expecting, and the waist and hip measurements are helpful as well. If you have a sloper that you work with for pattern fitting, you can rotate the darts to the approximate position of the sewing pattern you’re comparing it to to see how much the additional space the sewing pattern has, and whether this works for you for the fit you’re seeking.

Finally, it’s a good idea to know what kind of ease you prefer in your garments, and a great way to do this is to measure ready to wear clothing you already have that fits the way you’re wanting your sewn garment to fit. For example, if you have a skirt that is just long enough and has the amount of ease you want in a close fit, measure its actual dimensions and compare with your body measurements to get an idea of what desirable fit is for you. I’m incredibly picky about how pants fit, so as soon as my pregnancy belly resumes a more semi-permanent, somewhat back to normal state, I will be measuring a few of my favorite pairs of jeans for exact inseam length, favorite boot cut flare amount, and crotch depth that is tight enough to give some curvy definition to my back end without being pinchy or uncomfortable. In my own patternmaking future, I hope to help with the ease confusion issue by listing final garment measurements clearly and offering consistent descriptions of fit or an explanation of the amount of ease so that, hopefully, the sewist can know what they are getting into without having to sew muslins of every pattern.

If you have frustrations with pattern fitting because of excess ease, I hope that this was helpful. Do you have any tips or strategies that help you to get consistent fitting results from commercial patterns? I’d love to hear them!

Adapting a Sloper to Your Measurements – The Maternity Sloper

Amanda WynnLeave a comment

I thought it might be useful to share the process of adapting a sloper pattern to actual body measurements, and what more extreme sport version of this could I do than showing how I adjusted my usual sloper size to fit the ever shifting, radical transformations of the pregnant bod? Things have shifted, swollen, and rapidly expanded in ways that I have never drafted for before. These changes are specific to certain body parts, so simply sizing up till something fits wouldn’t give me anything that fits my actual skeletal structure. I have to bust out the scissors, tape, scrap paper, and all the best swear words I learned from my time in the restaurant industry for this transformation.

I’m starting with my high bust measurement, which pre-pregnancy was 36″. (With swelling and rib cage expansion as everything gets displaced upward, my current measurement is *slightly* larger, but I’m choosing to disregard the slight discrepancy since the bones of my neck, shoulders, and upper chest are still basically the same. These bony structures are the place that most garments will hang from, so I’m choosing to prioritize this over the softer fleshy areas that have slightly swollen (or vastly expanded) where adjustments are easier to make because fewer planes of the body are intersecting.

After printing and assembling the sloper, I’m using my Body Measurements for Sloper Comparison worksheet to record the sloper measurements and my own body measurements.

front-and-back-waist-length-measurement
First, I check the vertical positioning of my front waist length, back waist length, and bust position. For my size, the front waist length of the sloper (taken from the high point of the shoulder to the waistline) is approximately 16.25.” My body measurement from high point shoulder to the area previously known as my waistline is approximately 15″. Since this is imprecise at best given my current shape, and because I know I’ll need additional length in the bodice front to cover my baby bump, I’m choosing not to adjust the waist position.

For the back waist length, the sloper measurement is approximately 16.75″ and my body measurement is 17″, so I’m not going to make any adjustments here.

bust-position-sloper-measurementFor the bust position, I measure the pattern from the high point shoulder to the bust point/apex/nipple, and the measurement is 9.5″. My actual body measurement is 10.5″, so for this area, I’m cutting the entire dart area out and shifting it 1″ lower and redrawing the side seam, and comparing to make sure the length still matches the back side seam length.

bust-position-sloper-adjustment

bust-position-sloper-adjustment-redrawn

vertical-adjustments-completed

Then I move on to the horizontal girth measurements, where things get really intense. The total waist circumference of my sloper is approximately 30.5″. My body measurement is about 41.5″ right now. The sloper measurement includes .5″ total ease at the waist for this size, so my total desired waist circumference in my adjusted sloper should include .5″ over my body measurement as well, so the total width of my personal sloper after adjustment should be 42″ total. The majority of that difference is in the front of my body, so when adjusting the sloper, most of the adjusting will be taking place in the front. From previous pattern work, though, I do know that my waist is proportionately larger than most patterns’ standard sizing, so for the sake of balanced distribution, I will add a bit to the back waist width as well.

The front waist measurement of the sloper is 16″, .25″ of which is ease, and my body measurement is 23.75″, which is 7.75″ of difference. If I add .25″ of ease, the total front adjustment I need is 8″. (I want to maintain at least about a half inch of wearing ease in my pattern, I want to be sure to add about a half inch over my total body measurement at the waist.)

24″ actual body and ease – 16″ sloper measurement = 8″ adjustment needed to full front bodice at the waist.

So I’ll be adding 8″ of extra width to the front waist, total. Since I’m working with the pattern piece that covers a quarter of the body, I’ll only be adding 4″ to the actual pattern piece. (All of these changes will be doubled in the actual fabric since this piece is cut out twice.)

For the pregnancy shape, the front waist darts are definitely not needed, (unless you’re going for something super fitted at the underbust, in which case you could shorten the dart to the length needed and end it higher, well above the waist). For my current purposes, I don’t need the dart at all. It’s 1″ wide at the waistline, so eliminating this dart adds 2″ of total width to the front bodice, or 1″ of the needed 4″ width in the quarter body pattern piece.

I still need to add 3″ to the quarter body front bodice piece, or 6″ to the full front bodice, at the waist. To determine where and how to add this extra width, I’m going to consider what amount I need for the back as well. The sloper measurement is 14.5″ in back, which is .25″ ease. My body measurement at the back waist is 17.75″. If I add .25″ to that body measurement for ease, the width I want the back waist to be is 18″. So for the back, the total adjustment I need is going to be:

18″ actual body and ease – 14.5″ sloper measurement = 3.5″ adjustment needed to full back bodice at the waist.

This means I’ll need 1.75″ added to the quarter body back pattern piece. The back dart is 1.25″ wide at the waist line, so one possibility would be to eliminate it, but I don’t want to do that and entirely lose the shaping it provides. Though my waist is wider than typical proportions, my back definitely does have curvature there that a dart allows the fabric to follow. I may narrow it slightly to add some width, but I’ll wait to see how much. Another possibility would be to slash and spread the pattern along something like a princess line hinged at the underarm area, but this is probably more complicated than what I need, and would involve changing the hip, too.

For the sake of simplicity and trying to add girth to the pattern in a way similar to the rectangular body shape I actually have, I’m going to reduce the waistline at the side seam by straightening it, making the same adjustment to the front bodice side seam, because those pieces must match in length and their alignment is crucial to the balance of the final pattern. This adjustment adds 1.25″ width to my quarter body pattern pieces in back and front. The remaining amount I need to add at the waist is .5″ to the quarter body back piece and 1.75″ to the quarter body front piece.

side-seam-adjustment

To finish the waist adjustment to the back, I’m going to narrow my back dart width by .5″, leaving me with a .75″ back dart for shaping. To finish the waist adjustment to the front, I’m going to add to the center front by essentially slashing and spreading along the line where the dart was to add space for the additional body volume here.
I want to slash and spread enough to make the waistline 1.75″ larger. (Interestingly, in historical patterns, the center front seam often was curved along this line. To me, this seems like a potentially more accurate two dimensional depiction of the actual body shape in the front of the torso, which is rarely flat, unless you’re very athletic and far more disciplined about food than I.) Another benefit to this pattern adjustment is that in the future, when/if/to whatever extent my body does return to normal, having a center front bodice seam will allow for easy repeat alterations, so my maternity wear isn’t necessarily going to be relegated to the back of the closet for the rest of time, but can shrink back down with me as needed.

all-waistline-adjustments

Next, I want to look at the high hip. The industry standard for this measurement is approximately 4″ below the waistline, with the full hip approximately 8″ below the waist, though of course this varies from person to person and between different figure types. I want to compare the high hip of the sloper (36″, .5″ of which is ease) to my high hip body measurement (39″), remembering to add .5″ of ease to my body measurement. I know from previous pattern work and from my belly bump that the entirety of this discrepancy is in the front of the pattern.

39.5″ actual body and ease – 36″ sloper measurement = 3.5″ adjustment needed to full front bodice at the high hip.

This will be 1.75″ needed in the quarter body front pattern piece. If I weren’t pregnant, I would probably slash and spread outward at the side seam to add the needed amount, but since the protrusion of my figure is along the center line, I’m going to add it to the center instead. Since I already slashed and spread at the waist to angle the sloper pattern outward and didn’t yet adjust the hip area, I can just measure this amount and alter the center front curvature to add or reduce as needed here. The amount that was already added at the hip by my previous waist adjustments works just fine here.

high-hip-adjusted

Then I want to look at the low hip measurement, which is approximately 8″ below the waist, give or take based on height and figure type. In my case, and in the case of any full abdomen to some extent, since the belly bump expands both vertically and horizontally, it will be a bit lower than this, especially in the center front. I’ll be adding extra length to the bottom center front to cover everything. The sloper measures 39.5″ here, with .5″ of that being ease. My body measurement is 41″ here. So I’ll add ease to the body measurement and then calculate to find my needed adjustment:

41.5″ actual body and ease – 39.5″ sloper measurement = 2″ adjustment needed to full front bodice.

So I only need to add 1″ horizontally to the quarter body front pattern piece at the low hip. My previous waist slash and spread adjustment angled the low hip line outward more than this, so I’m going to curve that line back in towards the original center front line a bit. I’m also going to add length here, too. My sloper measures vertically about 9.75″ from waistline to low hip, but my current body measurement is 12.75″ here. I’m going to add about 3″ vertically to cover this.

low-hip-and-full-abdomen-adjustment

And that’s it for the major adjustments for the pregnancy belly. I’ll have to add more to the center front as I continue to expand, but the principle is the same. This is by no means the definitive way or the only way to do this in the flat pattern. Most patterns I’ve seen for maternity tend to add extra room/ease at the side seams, which works too, but in a much more drapey way that feels a bit too much like a shower curtain to me. The shape here hugs the curve, much like the cup of a bra pattern curves to encase the shape, rather than just draping over it. The downside of a center front curve like this, though, is that if the curve is bigger than the actual body shape, there will be sagging and wrinkling like a sagging bra cup. But that center seam allows a lot of adjusting as needed to happen during fitting, and changes made there are more independent of the rest of the garment than altering at the side seam might be.

Tutorial on flat pattern adjustments for maternity by Blue Hours Atelier. Click through for more on how to adjust a bodice sloper for maternity.

I hope this was helpful, and I hope that my hormone addled brain didn’t make any blatantly obvious, embarrassing simple math errors. 🙂 There are some other adjustments I do to my own sloper for a forward shoulder and broad back that I’ll probably cover in a different post soon. Happy Friday!

Free Downloadable Sloper Patterns and a Website for Free Resources (!!!)

Amanda Wynn9 Comments

woven-bodice-sloper-cup-size-variations

I’m super excited to say that I have FINALLY designed and fleshed out a website that I feel good about. And on this website, you will find the *free downloadable sloper patterns* that I have been working on for approximately a year and a half. Why so long? Let’s just say that there are a lot of opportunities for screwing up some seemingly minor thing in the process of choosing sizing, developing grade rules, drafting, applying said grade rules, and modifying for cup sizes, not realizing it for a very long time, and then having to go back and start completely over because one thing affects 37 other things! 🙂 Which is not to say that I can guarantee these are perfect, but I’ve learned so much in the process of creating them that it has been time well spent, and I hope they can be useful.

These are the starting point for my pattern line, and I’m making them available as a potential fitting aid for my future patterns for anyone that chooses to use them, but mostly as my way of trying to contribute something that I hope can be useful to the online sewing community. The online crafting/sewing crowd is so inspiring and generous with encouragement and help and tips and tricks that it’s been a huge part of making this craft what it has become for me. So thank you, friends!

I’ve put every single size in my range up on my website as separate pdf files, and there are B, C, and D cup size variations for each one. They can be used for determining sizes and fit for my (upcoming) patterns, or they can be used as a sort of two dimensional dress form for working out exactly the fit you need for any pattern, or they can be used as a base for your own pattern drafting. I have some resources like a finished measurement sheet, a body measurement worksheet printable, and a tutorial on measuring yourself and adapting the sloper to your measurements on my website here. Feel free to share them with anyone that might find them helpful!

A nested version of the pattern that includes all sizes is available on my Etsy shop here, if you’d prefer it for grading between sizes or your own drafting purposes.
WHAT IS A SLOPER?
A sloper is the basic starting point for pattern design. Also known as a fitting shell, it is a baseline with enough wearing ease to allow for movement and breathing, but no design ease and no details. (It isn’t quite the same as a moulage, which fits even tighter, like a second skin, and it isn’t the same thing as a block, which is a basic pattern for a specified style, with design ease included, that can then be elaborated with details.) Slopers don’t include seam allowances.

WHAT IS A SLOPER USED FOR?
Patterns almost never fit right out of the envelope. This isn’t a failure of the pattern. All patterns (except bespoke ones) are drafted to an average set of measurements that falls somewhere in the middle of the vast spectrum of human shapes and sizes and body types. Unless your body dimensions happen to be very close to that average set of measurements used in drafting, your pattern will need adjusting to better fit your body. A sloper or fitting shell can help you to work out and keep a physical record of those adjustments.

A sloper is like a two dimensional dress form. You can use a sloper as a basis for designing your own patterns, or you can use it as a fitting aid to adjust patterns to your body measurements and preferred fit. In adapting a sloper to your own measurements, you establish a known minimum requirement for garments to fit, and you can establish the fit adjustments that you know you need to apply to every garment, instead of figuring them out anew for each pattern. The sloper provides a baseline for fit, where the pattern uses additional design ease, design lines, and detailing to give style, structure and movement to garments.

I wanted to draft my own set of slopers as a starting point for a few reasons. First, I wanted to start from a more realistic shape than the body model commercial companies usually assume. The industry standard body model is usually hourglass shaped, though statistically, most women do not have this shape. I wanted to use as a starting point a somewhat fuller waist and hip measurement than the Big 4 for a more rectangular body type, which statistically is more common, at least in certain European population samples. In developing grade rules, I tried to incorporate statistical measures of actual bodies rather than dress form increments or standard grades for tricky areas like shoulder length. My hope is that this will yield a better, more realistic fit, but the downside is that finding the right one for you will probably require taking your measurements and may not translate directly from what you’re used to using in a pattern from one of the Big 4 companies.

I also wanted to draft my own slopers to start with a very fitted baseline, and going forward, I want to offer patterns that are very clear about the amount of ease they include. Mostly this is because one of my recurring struggles in sewing from commercial patterns, especially trying to sew a historical range from late 19th century to 30s and 50s patterns to contemporary ones, is that the amounts of ease change so much over time and between manufacturers that it’s hard to know how something will fit without making a muslin of everything. And making muslins isn’t the best use of fabric and to me is the. most. boring. thing. ever. Personally, I prefer patterns that don’t include a ton of ease, and patterns from the Big 4 almost always have too much for my liking. So in my future drafts, I expect to use ease standards closer to the lower end of the industry standard range, and I intend to be super clear about that ease so that sewers know what to expect without having to try it and see quite so much.

demeter-nursing-bralette-burgundy-lace-gothic-lingerie

In other news, I added my first underwired and nursing bras to my etsy shop, because holy manic nesting impulses channeled into my creative pursuits instead of my godforsaken hoarder house, Batman! Pregnancy makes me feel like a crazy woman, but throwing myself into work is extremely therapeutic right now.

Coming soon to the blog: how to adapt a sloper for maternity, in which yours truly shall snarkily narrate an exploration of the changes pregnancy has wrought upon this physical form and how I deal with them in the flat pattern format. It will also serve as an extreme example of how to adapt a sloper to your body measurements. 🙂

Have you used slopers in your sewing? Have very strong opinions on the amount of ease one way or the other included in commercial patterns? I’d love to hear your experiences! 🙂

lazy saturday, sewing and self-soothing.

Amanda Wynn2 Comments

pretty-in-pink-lace-tulle-sheer-underwired-bra-blush-lace-1

made this today, out of nylon bra tulle, a blush floral lace, and a self drafted pattern drafted around a demi wire. I wasn’t really thinking about proportions when I altered it for the wider wires I’m using now (thanks, pregnancy body), but could have expanded the cradle / reduced the back band for a little more front band real estate, but the fit is good. My wire size is significantly larger than what would be typical of my cup size, so the proportions aren’t standard. *shrug*

Here’s an internal view:

pretty-in-pink-lace-tulle-sheer-underwired-bra-blush-lace-2

making this one is complicated! I do the band and cup separately, leaving the underarm elastic for almost the very end of the process. For the band, since doing the gothic arch in the center requires flipping the elastic, but you want to preserve the scallop edge of the lace and still enclose the seams, i find it’s easiest to work with the tulle layer separately from the lace overlay for most of the construction process. I sew the tulle cradle and lace cradle separately, only joining at the center front top edge between the cups. Then I add the elastic to the bottom edge. Once the first pass of elastic is finished on the outward facing side of the tulle, I turn it to the inside and then pin the ever loving crap out of everything to keep it in place, using the second pass to secure the lace in place. Then I baste the edges that I’ll be adding elastic to or setting cups into, because it’s easier than dealing with multiple translucent layers slipping around.

For the cups, I didn’t want to split the lace in two and then have to match up the patterns in the lace, so the lace is a darted single piece cup over a two piece tulle cup, and the lace has stretch that the tulle doesn’t. So I treat each separately, join at the top edge, and then pull and stretch the lace just slightly over the rigid tulle to align the shapes and seams as much as possible, pinning it like something from a Hellraiser movie, and basting. A lot. 🙂 From that point, setting the cups in and everything is pretty typical.

these complicated tulle/lace underwired pieces have been a great distraction. i’ve spent a few days working at being mellow. I’m in my third trimester now, which is both good and bad. i will be happy to have my body back as a sole proprietorship, and yet am keenly aware of creeping ever closer to delivery, which sucks any way you slice it, especially for a doctor/hospital/needle/invasive body procedure-phobe. not helping that my first birth experience was so terrible I swore I’d never do it again (pre-eclampsia, induced labor for 53 hours before giving up and having a c-section, endless throngs of well intentioned visitors in my room while i had no pants and no sleep, and a kiddo who refused to nurse or take a bottle and had jaundice, etc). but as al swearengen says, announcing your plans is a good way to hear God laugh. (I may soon be the first person in human history to whip out her phone and loop Deadwood clips on YouTube to get through labor.)

this time around, i have a doctor i have more confidence in, and she’s been monitoring things pretty closely. my labs in earlier months have been good, except protein in the urine, which means i won’t be surprised if another bout of pre-eclampsia is in store for me a bit further down the road. this week’s labs also showed low platelets, which is a horrifying thing to google. If it continues to trend downward it probably means no epidural because of the risk of spinal hematoma and an elevated risk of bleeding problems with delivery that make a c-section less ideal. (but really, the epidural was useless the first time anyway.) it can also be a symptom of a particularly dangerous variety of pre-eclampsia called HELLP syndrome. UGH.  So I’m trying to balance wanting to be an educated patient aware of symptoms and things to act on if they happen, and trying to stay the f**k off of google because, ummm, holy hell, I don’t need to raise my blood pressure worrying about all that. my doctor plans on watching all the physical stuff closely, and I see her in a few days, so there will be quite a barrage of questions for her. my nesting instinct is shit, but it’s kicked in a bit now that I know induction is a distinct possibility if my health gets wonky over the next 12 weeks.

on a happier note, Fetus is bouncy and seems to be coming along contentedly in there. she kicks extremely hard for 28 weeks, which I’m choosing to take as an early indicator that she is a strong, fierce little critter. she reacts to music and seems especially responsive when her brother talks to my belly, which is the most heart melting sweetness. I couldn’t ask for a more loving, gentle spirited son, and he’s so happy about it all.

so today is for researching how to make newborn onesies (i have dreams of mother/daughter ziggy stardust bodysuits, not gonna lie) and mellow, soothing tunes and playing with watercolors and trying to distance myself from stressing about things out of my control. i’ve been trying to enjoy the small moments this summer, and playing with a camera a bit more to capture them.

 

we spend a lot of time playing on the kitchen floor.
we spend a lot of time playing on the kitchen floor.
sweet kitty.
sweet kitty.
 

happy saturday, everybody. I hope it’s been a relaxing one all around.