After completing the mockup, I tweaked the pattern a
bit. I looked at my photo of the sleeve
mockup side by side with the concept sketch I made. I decided to alter the panes by making them
about 50% thinner. That means a lot more
cutting and layout work, but it will also make it easier to use up more of the
coat. When you chop a wool coat up there
are a lot of seams, pocket holes, button holes etc. Those holes and seams which get in the way
when laying out a patter. With the
thinner panes I will likely get more use out of the wool provided from the coats. I chose to alter the size of the segments of the
sleeve as well. Previously with the
mockup I was not happy with the smallest segment by the wrist. I spaced them out differently. The sleeve outside length is 27 inches. The segments are 4”, 5”, 5”, 5” and 7”. I also think that I will put a small amount
of padding in each of the upper sections to produce a little more volume. The silk looks nice now, as it is, but doesn’t
have the body I was hoping to produce the look I intended after the wool strips
are applied.
Here you can see a side by side of the most recent mockup,
the original sketch and the final hand stitched silk sleeve.
I have chopped up enough teal and purple for the
sleeves. Ran out of energy cutting up
the black and will have to continue another day. So far the progress is slow going, but
looking good. The strips are only one
inch wide and any variation off the straight line is very visible. It seems to take more focus than I would have
expected to simply cut a bunch of straight lines.
