Alterations - a slow process

DH's blue/black cotton shirt, textured with a raised diagonal, is beyond mending. The collar and cuffs have frayed, showing the white interfacing. No use making the cuffs an inch narrower, because the sleeves would be too short for him. And he dislikes grandad collars. I like both options and if I could do something with it, there'd be a partner in colour and weight for my blue/grey wool silk trousers.

First a very rough fitting. Will it fasten? With a size 16" collar it ought to. (It did.) And can I fit a yoked garment to my sloping shoulders? Pinned on the back yoke seam and similarly at the front yoke. Yes, that's ok, just adds a little fullness to the sleeve cap.

Then the battle begins, to narrow the shoulders and shorten the sleeves. If I take out the frayed section of the cuffs, that'll be one inch out of four or five needed. Taking off the 1.5" dropped shoulder looked odd - narrow caps and loads of ease at the cuffs. So took out one sleeve*, and initially marked the whole curve an inch lower. *Ripping two lines of black felled seam, it's a job for daylight.

Folded and pinned, the caps were disproportionately narrow. After a bit of experimentation, settled on 0.5" dropped shoulder, take 1" height from sleeve at armpit and shoulder point, but keep as much width as I can. That's better. Couldn't take more than an inch at underarm because the sleeves narrow downwards.

Why bother? Well mansize shoulders are much broader than mine, so the cap seam needed work anyway. For shortening, the standard procedure is to trim at the cuff, which is fine for an inch or so. For this job, on the one hand, the placket simply isn't long enough to take a 4" change. On the other hand, the placket would interfere with the drape if I cut and gathered the sleeves instead. 

Rant. This was a battle with a man's shirt that I chose to fight, rather than trying to get myself to a nearby city during a bus strike. Annoyingly, as rtw gets made for taller and taller people, I find myself battling both ends of a sleeve made for women. Even then, usually the maximum I can take out without ruining the whole thing is 3", and that's often not enough. Ever wondered why I prefer to sew rather than alter? 

Failed Experiment with sleeve tucks*.  

I'm playing, as a can't spoil it project. But I do expect to dismantle, cut nicely, and restitch. Instead of attacking the shoulder point as I thought I might, I tried putting one inch tucks in the untouched sleeve. 

It reminded me that:

• It helps to bring the cuff inside the sleeve (making a mountain fold) and press before stitching. 
• One inch tucks are too big with this taper. Maybe I used 3/4" or 1/2" last time. 
• Can't tuck the sleeve head (it's gotta be at least as big as the armscye) or the placket. The taper angle will be different on the tucked sections. 

Not at all a success. Lots of volume at bust height. I don't care enough to try shoulder pads to balance. I may photo for the gallery of shame. This attempt will be unpicked. 

* I got away with this technique a few years ago on a poplin floral ex-office shirt. Not one of the three relatives I visited, all better dressmakers than myself, noticed anything wrong. Phew! 

Can we get more fabric below back yoke?

Thinking I've been taking the right steps, but not necessarily in the right order. I unpicked the sloping shoulder adjustment, and patched in a ribbon under the yoke line for a round back adjustment. My estimate of one inch made a huge difference to comfort round the collar. 

Unfortunately, I  hadn't pinned my hair up in the before photo, so can't be completely objective. But from sensory feedback, I'm keeping this change! With the unpicker in my hand, removed the trial tucks in the sleeves, too. Looks like 3" to 4" reduction will be enough, but I'll wait until back, shoulders and the other cuff are correct before confirming. 

EDIT : Oops, I'd picked up a smidgeon of fabric near the cuff when stitching the lowest tuck. No wonder that sleeve looks short in the photo. The unhappy areas-of-volume comments from the other day stand. 

Making it permanent

Up till now, except for one cuff which had been cut and trimmed, all changes were reversible and have been reversed!

Firstly, the equivalent to adding ribbon under the back yoke is to raise the whole shirt an inch, everywhere except the centre back yoke. So stitched a horizontal tuck between the top and second buttons. And a long dart under the back yoke, straightening out for the middle 8" between my shoulder blades. 

The bonus for a small person is that the tuck and darts shrink the armscye by 2", which'll let me shorten the sleeves from the top. Using the grid on the cutting mat, worked out that with this particular sleeve taper, I can take 2.75". Together with the inch I get from cutting the frayed bit off the cuff, that's not quite as much shorter as I'd like, but good enough. 

Pinned the sleeves in. There's enough fabric, just. Notice that the sleeve cap is symmetrical, but the centre line is well to the back of the shoulder line. I managed to reduce the drop shoulder by 0.5", but it's still a lot of drop on me! 

The verdict

It's been a good can't-spoil-it project. The hours of fun have been notionally booked against the Continuing Education budget (grin). Overall, I'm pleased with the fit from the centre back adjustment. Might consider a smidgeon more another time. Less happy with the seam line just under the neck. Another time maybe unpick the collar and move the whole collar/front yoke seam down? Whilst I'll settle for the sleeve length I  achieved, I would prefer less volume as well. This is sounding like unpick everything except the placket, the front band and the hem, isn't it? 

Nevertheless, this'll give me something temporarily usable. It fills the wardrobe gaps labelled 'sleeves roll right up for medical appointments' and 'spring/autumn weight and goes with grey blue wool/silk trousers'. Or at least it will fill in until I get a women's shirt pattern Tried and Trusted.

And since DH has worn it many more than our target of 30 times, any additional wears from me are a bonus.