Isn't that true? After I saw the front and back of the first version of the Marfy pants, I knew it was time to step it up and get those things fixed! Digital pictures make it so easy to see the whole garment on you as someone else would. The Internet makes it easy to get fitting opinions and instructions for pattern changes from experts I'll probably never get the privilege to meet in person.
Here's the finished product, second time around. They are better, no bagging in the back and much less pulling in the front. Sorry they're a bit wrinkly and not pressed tremendously well - I was in a rush to get the pictures taken this morning before leaving for school and didn't have the pants quite ready.
I made two major changes which really made a big difference in the pants. First was to take out a fish-eye shaped dart in the back of the pants to take out the excess material under the seat. I used these directions by Debbie that I found on PatternReview.The other major change was done on the front thigh of the pants. I had several people suggest lengthening the front crotch curve. I tried that first and ended up with more body space in the abdomen area, which I didn't need, and still the pulling in the front. What I ended up doing was adding material to the front of the thigh only, as I have a protruding front thigh. Mother-in-law thinks its because of the weight lifting (she's a gymnastics coach and has seen quite a few buff bodies with the same issue), but I think it's probably more genetic. After some digging on PatternReview, I came across these instructions, by Els, which is what I ended up doing. There's a picture, too, of the altered pattern piece which was extremely helpful.
To confirm my suspicion about the front thigh, I took a pair of scissors to the pants. I put them on, and cut the pants where they were too tight, leaving large slashes down the front. Crazy? Absolutely. The pulling was gone! The pants cost me less than $5.00 to make and were too tight and baggy to wear out anyway. Ok, that sounded weird, how can you have pants that are "tight" and "baggy"? Only on me, I guess. I then pinned in a section of scrap fabric to see how big the dart on the pattern piece really needed to be and where I should place it. I think I could have extended it a bit longer at the top than I actually did, but I'll try that for another pair. You can see the ugly fabric below, pinned in the slit.
After tracing the shape with a marker and removing the piece, here's the resulting shape of the fabric that will need to be added in the front of the thigh. Pretty dart-like, huh?:
After a bit of careful measuring, slicing and taping, I ended up with the pattern piece below. I think I should have made the curve a bit less dramatic on that outseam by reshaping a bit so it's straighter, it wouldn't add that much fullness to the leg. Again, something I'll do next time.
Overall, these are a much better fit! I'm still pretty pleased with them and will wear them after a better pressing job. I feel they need a bit more tweaking, but I'm satisfied for the moment. I learned a lot making these alterations to these pants! From now on, it's front and back pictures for fittings for me!
13 comments:
After I suggested extending the front crotch, I ran across this in the "problems with fit" section of my Helen Joseph Armstrong book (she was my patternmaking instructor in college!). Anyway, she says to slit the fabric EXACTLY like you did! She suggested dividing that amount in 1/2 and adding it to the front and back crotch length, but I can see what you mean about it adding too much abdomen space. (I wrestle with this same problem).
Anyway, just wanted to let you know that another suggestion she makes is LOWERING the crotch curve (not extending, just taking it down a bit). Don't know why I didn't think of that, but it could be a little tweak that could help just a bit.
Pants are always a great challenge!
I would love to read Els' tip but the link doesn't work and a [not too intensive] search on PatRev did not yield results.
I wonder if some of this information could be transfered to a one-seam pattern. I have one I love, but a little tweeking in the back would improve it.
Patsijean - never fear! This is how I got to her tip: From the home page, go to "Knowledge Base" and then scroll down to Fitting - Pants. From there go to a Boards Discussion marked "Alteration for Full Thighs", in that thread, in the 6th message is a link to "el's pants alteration for full thigh". That's where I found it. Sorry the link didn't work!
Thanks so much. I find PatRev difficult to navigate when searching for something or someone adn I am willing to spend only so much time doing so. Has anyone else had this experience?
Found it! Question: do you have to make an additional alteration to allow for the extra length in inner and outer seams once the full thigh adjustment had been made?
Alisa: Strange how that worked out with taking scissors to my paints - I did what seemed logical to me, opening up what was too tight. I had thought of lowering the crotch when I saw the second round of pictures! Thanks for confirming that's a good idea; I could probably still lower it on this pair.
Patsijean: Glad you found it! PR can be a treasure hunt; if you dig long enough you'll find a gem.
As far as the inner and outer seams, it's easy enough to overlay the front and back pieces and make sure there's enough length. For this pair, I defintely made sure the crotch curve/length was correct. The inner/outer seams I made sure was correct at the top waist area, and just trimmed at the hem. I knew I had 5" to play with at the hem and wasn't concerned about cutting them off to be even.
cool! I would never have the guts to do what you did, but it was so worth it ( and to be honest, 5 USD isn't too much isn't it? )
Tini - No, I don't think 5 USD is too much for an experiment that yielded a pretty good fitting pair of pants. It's hard to put a price on comfortable, correctly fitting clothes, isn't it?
I often spend more than 5 Euro on muslin, so :)
Correctly fitting clothes are soooo worth the effort.
Btw. I linked to this and the other blog entry on our German sewing page (hobbyschneiderin), so don't be surprised if you get a lot of hits from Germany :)
Aahhh... The extra length issue was just "too easy" to solve. I am going to see if the derriere thing can be solved on one seam pants. I will have to slash the pattern at the side seam, make the adjustment and then put them back together again. Might make them about 1" longer at the same time. Then I will see about the front thigh thing, although this is not a big problem for me. Thanks.
Yeah, Patsijean, I had it easy on the length issue. This is one time when short legs have come in handy!;)
Tini - It's not a problem to link to me, thanks!
Hi, I am glad my tip was helpful for you. The link is not working because there is an extra http://
You did the right thing by using your pair of scissors to slash and fill the slash with fabric to see what is missing. That is the way to work on a muslin garment.
I fixed the link! Thank you Els for pointing that out, so I could fix it.
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