When your measurements aren’t on the charts, draping gives you design freedom.
If you’re plus-sized, draping is the answer to your pattern woes. It’s the perfect way to get your proportions right and turn pattern fitting into a breeze. But this technique can also work for anybody, regardless of your shape. Kathleen Cheetham takes you through the steps of draping a bodice and then transferring the information to paper. When you’re finished, you’ll know how to make a bodice pattern block-sometimes called a sloper-that basic close-fitting pattern with minimum wearing ease that just might change your relationship with patterns.
We are all uniquely shaped-torso length, crotch depth, leg lengths, shoulder width, bust cups, rib-cage circumference, tummy, seat, hip placement, back hump, and even our posture affect how a pattern fits. Standard commercial pattern companies just can’t make enough sizes to fit all of us. Kathleen puts you in the driver’s seat whether you are altering commercial patterns or making your own.
From Threads #130
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I've seen lots of articles here and there about drafting your own bodice block, but few that say once you have the block, how can you apply the information in it to a paper pattern to make alterations. I don't want to design my own blouses, I'd like the blouses made by designers to fit me.