I’ve just completed a semi-tailored jacket for a customer, but as it was long distance, I only had one fitting. The shoulder was far too wide, so I narrowed it and lowered the armscye to try and keep the fit the same. However, it’s come out that she can’t lift her arms up. Is there a way to solve this other than putting a gusset in under the arm? It fits perfectly everywhere else. If a gusset is the best way to go, any tips on making it?
Thanks
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This sounds similiar to what I have been going through. I found out that I need to shorten the shoulder length so the seam fits on my shoulder joint but then I had a weird wrinkle in the back. I had to cut the back piece, at the shoulder side only, lower than near the neck and then lower the back armhole by the same amount. This leaves the front alone which was fine as it was. I was using a multi-size pattern so I cut the shoulder, sleeve and neckline to size 14 and the body to size 16. I tried once to increase the entire armhole by cutting the pattern and adding 1 inch to both front and back and that was a disaster, I could not move!
I've had this happen when altering RTW jackets with too broad shoulders. In that case the problem is because the bottom of the existing armseye hits too low and the armhole is too big. (The top of the sleeve is too big and has too be pared down.) When you narrow the shoulders you can easily enlarge the armseye by mistake. You need to determine the exact reason she can't move her arms. In RTW I have to use a gusset because I'm having to "fill in" the lower part of the armseye to fit with the pared down sleeve. In your case, if it's because the armseye is too low, you might have left enough fabric in the bodice so that you wouldn't need a gusset. I hope this makes sense.
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