Such Treasures

I hardly know what to tell you. I have made progress. I got a gusset to work. That was cool. It performed just the function it should have and gave Jeff more freedom of movement when he lifted his arms. However, it pooched out and made the shirt seem pokey around the underarm area and he didn’t like that. So out the gusset went.

The t-shirt pattern I’ve drafted fits him perfectly. I don’t think I can achieve a better fit. I have learned alot and I am thankful to have figured it out. The remaining thing to figure out is the perfect amount of ease for movement and wearing.

Trying to find this out, I made an official, real fabric t-shirt over the weekend. I played around with flatlocking the seams using my coverstitch machine — I ran the already serged seams through it on the wrong side so the looper threads would show on the right side. Those seams look awesome. In all truth, this t-shirt is the best garment I’ve ever constructed.

Here is one shoulder seam showing the result of coverstitching on the wrong side.
I used wooly poly black thread in the looper.

The resulting t-shirt fits him very well — not loose, not skin tight, a really lean fit. Now here’s the “but…” part. There was no other way to find this out other than doing it. (I’m telling myself this to feel okay about it, but I really think it is true.) He doesn’t prefer it being that fitted. Well, fitted was our goal in the beginning and we achieved that.

Now we have to adjust the goal.

I’ve adjusted the pattern to include the wearing ease that we *think* he prefers, which I found out by measuring a t-shirt he has that he thinks works well (adjusted goals in mind, remember). Then this morning, I took in one of his existing t-shirts to match that amount of ease in the chest & waist & arms. He wore it to work today. Before I create another brand new t-shirt, I’ll rework some of the t-shirts in his closet. They are currently much too big in the chest, waist and arms.

A recap. The bad news, which isn’t really so bad… I made a finished t-shirt and it didn’t work. But I learned alot. At least I can say that. I can take it in and shorten it and I’ll be able to wear it myself.

The good news is… good pattern, good fit, good things learned, recycled t-shirts (why didn’t this occur to me sooner?).

All in all, I’m encouraged. I am getting somewhere.