Taunton's Threads - For people who love to sew
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From the pages of Threads magazine Copying Complex Garments Even if your garment has lots of shaping and unusual pieces, making a pattern from it is straightforward—and doesn't require taking the garment apart
In a nutshell, the copying process involves pinning garment sections flat to a paper-covered padded surface, and tracing each seam by poking through the seam and the paper beneath with a needle, or next to it with a pencil if it’s on an edge, leaving a row of holes in the paper. Then simply connect the holes to create the pattern outline, true things up, add seam allowances, and test with a muslin. A copying recap No unusual tools are needed for copying a garment. Besides a large, flat workspace, a folded blanket or something similar to serve as the padded surface (it’s not necessary to secure the padding to the work surface), and a few large sheets of paper or nonwoven interfacing for the pattern itself, you will need a pencil, an embroidery needle (or some other heavy, not too sharp needle), paper scissors, a straightedge, some pins, and a tape measure. We suggest a soft, nonwoven interfacing as an alternative to paper, because you’ll be folding and manipulating it to test each pattern piece as you work, so the sturdier and more flexible the pattern material is, the better. Flimsy tissues or tracing papers that are too crisp are not ideal.
Next, position and pin the first garment section you plan to copy, so that its grain is parallel to a nearby edge of your pattern material as a further reference point against which to check angles, and so on. The copying order is not critical, but as a rule, we start with the front, sleeves, and back, then move to the collar and other details. Arrange as much as possible of each piece so that all of its seams and edges are visible while it lies as flat as possible without distorting the grain. If you are unable to see every seam, fold the piece to reveal as much of it as possible—try to fold away the straightest and simplest seams so you can trace the more complex ones directly—and trace what you can see, including the outline of the nearest fold. Then measure the distance from the fold to the hidden seam, and add this to your tracing. That process is how Blossom will make the pattern for the wider, back piece of the sleeve that she’s pinned flat in photo 11 in the copying process, after tracing the fully visible front piece. In a similar fashion, pleats and darts can be copied with a combination of tracing for position and measuring for depth, as shown in detail in our earlier article. Photo 13 shows how Blossom needed to slash the jacket’s rear sleeve pattern to recreate the shape it had before its dart was closed. If you can’t see the inside of a dart, just feel through the fabric to measure it. In this way you can also outline pocket bags and facings, shoulder pads, and any other hidden or interior details that you’d prefer to duplicate, rather than redraft or replace. As you see in the slideshow, it’s important to check each pattern piece against those they will be joined to. This is especially true wherever the construction involves ease or shaping, as in the jacket front shown in photo 10, whether it’s obvious by observation or guessed at by inference. Eased or not, you will usually find it easiest to check and to true all seams by comparing the partially cut-out pattern pieces you’re creating, both as you make each one, and when you’ve finished tracing all of them.
Add linings, seam allowances, and test! |
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