I knew when I made up the skirt that I alterations would also be needed on the coat.
On the skirt I had to shorten it by 10inches, to keep the proportions correct I did 1inch off the yoke, 4inches off the main skirt body and 4inches off the pleated hem.
Now then the coat is so long 54 inches and I am so damn short that I have to shorten it to 41, even then this will be as long on me as it is in the pattern picture.
So my question is how do I shorten this by such a huge amount.
Do I,
- alter the paper pattern first and run the risk of the curved edges not matching up.
- make up one back half and front section in calico, then shorten it, take it apart and use that as my pattern.
- I can't think of any other methods.
As on my last post about this outfit, again I greatly appreceate all answers from you lovely sewing bloggers out there,
Many thanks in advance from a very mystifed Sew Vala. xx
I'm afraid I'm no help for the beautiful pleats that are coming out - and my google-fu is not strong today apparently. as for shortening the jacket, i definitely suggest a muslin first, not just for length but also because I've found that patterns for taller people tend to have the shoulders in a very different place than I need them. I also suggest shortening in *two* places: (1) the waist (unless you are long-waisted for your height) which should again help to keep the proportions a bit more even. and (2) about 12" down from the hip (on the straightest part of the jacket). You'll want to take out some of the length at the position that redrawing the lines is going to look most natural - you have that nice straight section between the hip and the curve of the hem so it makes most sense to me to take the length out there.
ReplyDeleteHope i've been of some help!
Thank you Kimberley for your reply. In the end I didn't have time to make up the matching jacket for the event it was planned for. So I went with a large red cloak/coat I had. But now this gives me more time to create the jacket in a muslin and get it just right for another day. I will deffinatly have a go with those changes. As for the skirt I left it to hang for days and my daughter loosely tied a tape measure around the skirt and lowered it slowly each day. It certainly got out most of the pouffness, the pleats still weren't hanging straight down but the end result left a querkiness which I thought looked rather cool.
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