Simplicity 4750: When the pattern is your frenemy
Confession: In the summer of 2008, I destashed a vintage pattern with extreme prejudice. That is, I trashed it. It was Simplicity 4750, from 1943.
I had attempted to make up View 1 in a pretty and not particularly cheap floral cotton from MacCulloch & Wallis. After weeping tears of rage during successive failed attempts to set in the sleeves smoothly, I spent hours wrestling with the collar band and buttonholes — only to find that, done up to the neck, the blouse cut off the blood flow to my brain. (I rarely do muslins.) In a fury of frustration, I wadded the whole project into a lump — unfinished blouse, pattern, instructions, fabric scraps, pins and all — deep-sixed it into the garbage can and never spoke of it again. I wanted Simplicity 4750 out of my life.
Then came Fashion on the Ration. I needed to conserve fabric and coupons, so I decided to try my hand at cutting down one of James’s shirts into a blouse for myself. Simple, right? Only I need a lot of hand-holding, and I couldn’t find detailed instructions anywhere. I consulted Google. Surely there was some pattern from the wartime years with tips to help the industrious home seamstress make and mend her charming new blouse from his old shirt? Yes, indeed. Ohai! It was Simplicity 4750, my archnemesis.
What the hell. I decided to give our relationship another chance, seeing that nearly two years had passed and I was an older and wiser seamstress.
My friend Chris is a user experience geek, which means he spends most of his working (and leisure) hours thinking about how the design of things makes them easy or difficult to use. Like many passions, this interest in design has rubbed off on his friends, including me. Awareness of design is a mixed blessing. On one hand, it’s a great relief to discover that the difficulties you may have attributed to your own incompetence or lack of ability are actually the product of bad design. On the other, once you start noticing bad design, you see it everywhere. And, because design is the concrete expression of a relationship, what bad design expresses is the designer’s indifference to you, the user.
So it is with many everyday objects. However, Simplicity 4750 goes beyond mere indifference to cross the border into the confusing territory of frenemy. On the one hand, it’s such a simple, pretty and versatile pattern. So many views! So many moods! So many bow options! On the other, I’ve never met a pattern that so patently did not have my best interests at heart. I attempted View 3, made from this cast-off shirt of James’s:
First betrayal: the sleeves. If you’re one of those seamstresses who still blame themselves for set-in sleeve woes, I beg you to read “Sleeve cap ease is bogus” by Kathleen Fasanella, Esther’s tutorial on how to remove excess ease and the section on sleeve cap adjustments in Adele Margolis’s Make Your Own Dress Patterns. Opinion on how much ease to allow in a sleeve cap and where to put it varies, but by anyone’s standards, the sleeves on Simplicity 4750 are ridiculous. These are the pattern measurements:
- Sleeve cap: 4″ seamline to back notch + 6″ back notch to shoulder notch + 7″ shoulder notch to front notch + 3″ front notch to seamline = 20 inches
- Armscye: 3″ seamline to back notch + 4.5″ back notch to shoulder notch + 5″ shoulder notch to front notch + 2.75″ front notch to seamline = 15.25 inches
That is 4.75 inches of sleeve cap ease. This is not a gathered sleeve: the pattern illustrations show a smooth sleeve cap, and the instructions say to “ease in fullness”. That is physically impossible. Unrealistic expectations are one hallmark of a toxic relationship.
Just for laffs, I cut out the sleeve exactly as drafted and followed the instructions to the letter:
“Run gathering thread between notches… Pin sleeve in armhole, matching notches and small dots. Pull up gathering thread to fit. Baste seam, easing in fullness. With a damp cloth and iron, press sleeve above notches to shrink out fullness.”
This is what I got:
Very nice, but this is supposed to be a set-in sleeve, not a gathered sleeve. Right? Right? That’s what the illustrations and the instructions said. At least, I think they did. Ever heard of gaslighting?
Second betrayal: the neckline finish. View 3 is supposed to have a simple revere collar, with ruffles or lace sandwiched between the blouse and the facing. Fine, but if you’ve cut it out of a man’s shirt, there isn’t a facing. So how do I attach the lace and finish the neckline? When the going gets tough, the instructions fall silent.
I suppose I could have found some way to make enough ruffling out of the remaining shirt and attach it with a clean finish, but while trying on the unfinished blouse, I had to admit that ruffles and lace aren’t really me. So instead, I attempted various, less frilly collar alternatives from the shirt remnants. Pointed? Peter Pan? Band and bow? Nothing worked, and by then I’d run out of shirt fabric. Another wadder courtesy of Simplicity 4750.
Dear Simplicity 4750: It’s been interesting, but to be honest, I don’t think this relationship is going to work out. We want different things — I want to make and wear nice blouses, and you want to make me poke my eyes out with my own seam ripper. I think it’s probably better if we go our separate ways.
Anyone want a 1943 blouse pattern, 32 bust? It’s yours for the price of postage.
I agree, old patterns can be such a headache. But I hope you’ll be happy with the end result eventually!
Pfff, I’m glad to hear that horrible, incomplete instructions and bad drafting aren’t just a modern pattern invention!
And I love your UX shout-out – my fiance is a user experience geek (does your friend go to UX Bookclub and the other London events?) and it’s totally rubbed off on me, too.
Sleeves have been my nemesis for years, until I started to actually measure the caps against the armsyce and the lightbulb went off! lol. Glad to know I was kinda-sorta on the right track. rofl. It’s amazing sometimes, how horribly, horribly wrong a pattern will go (such as in the case of waaay too much ease!). My sympathies are with you on this one…
♥ Casey
blog | elegantmusings.com
I have had the same problem with excessive ease in far too many patterns. I normally just end up draping something completely different. :/
I am an easing champion. I will happily take it off your hands and I bet you I can ease that sucker in. If not, then I’m a goose!
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the instructions do say “Take shirt apart and press out in sections; leave front band and facing as is”, possibly implying that the shirt has a facing to salvage?
What I don’t understand is how you can pin the pattern “along buttonholes in SHIRT” but then at the end of the pattern, the instructions tell you to “Work buttonholes in right front.” Perhaps I missed something?
Lisa, at that time they would have assumed taht you would be working buttonholes on the other side of the shirt. Left for men, right for women? or something like that. I’m guessing here, but I’d think that you pinned the pattern along the buttonholes so that they would be on the edge and cut off.
This is exactly what you do — pin the pattern over the shirt so that center front aligns with the buttons or buttonholes. There’s not much to be done about the fact that the buttons end up on the wrong side, but I imagine that would just lend to the blouse’s make & mend charm.
When the pattern says “work buttonholes,” it means _make_ buttonholes. That’s the verb used for producing stitched buttonholes, for whatever reason. As in “hand-worked buttonholes” or “work buttonholes on the right side and bind them on the wrong side.”
Hi Susannah, don’t know if you’ve ditched the blouse yet but I wonder if you’d thought of buying a tiny bit of focus fabric and using it for the facing.
Then if you’d like to edge the piece in something less frilly a bit of crocheted “lace” which isn’t gathered and isn’t frilly. The kind I find most often is a quarter inch wide and basically crocheted triangles. being tiny it isn’t fussy but very dainty.
Just thought maybe it would help you rescue your garment. I hate to toss out something if I can rescue it.
BTW, I could use your pattern if you have it still. Kitty
This is a BRILLIANT idea. I am sick of the sight of Simplicity 4750 but will keep in mind the tip about focus fabric for rescuing a project as I embark on my second attempt to transgender a shirt.
If it doesn’t work out with Donna, I’ll take it! Las Vegas, 89183. Thanks!
That sounds like a terrible sewing experience! I hate sleeve ease. Ioften find it’s far too much on patterns and I have just ruthlessly eliminated sleeve ease by various unapproved methods…but it works.
Ouch! I don’t care for Simplicity’s modern patterns and wouldn’t bother with their vintage ones. If I can offer some consolation, your blouse turned out lovely, if nothing like the pictures. But more importantly, keep in mind that “back in the day” just about every woman sewed. So I’m sure there were a lot of instructions that were just “understood” or taken for granted since most women were home sewers. They probably did leave something out just assuming you’d get it. Don’t be discouraged – it’s them, not you! (Found you on Sew Retro by the way).
This post made my day!!! I’ve had a similar experience before, and I was so disgusted with the thing I didn’t even try to salvage the material! Thanx ; )
Even though it wasn’t the look you were going for, your gathered sleeve looks lovely!
Thanks for the hilarious (though sad) post…I haven’t had very much luck with vintage Simplicity patterns myself, and have started to avoid them!
I feel bad for laughing at your misfortune, but this entry is cracking me up! I have another vintage pattern with a similar impossible level of sleevecap ease, and I’m glad to know I’m not just going crazy.
4.75″ of ease? *faints*
Thanks for the details! I already have this pattern in my stash. I will approach with caution!
Oh my! I will stay far, far away from you, Simplicity 4750.
No facings, what were they thinking? I’m suspicious of a lot of the “cut-down” clothing suggestions from WWII — I was just looking at some dress makeovers (from 1944) and there is just NO WAY you can get dress B out of dress(es) A. No way.
Wow. 4.75 inches of ease. That is a lot! I can understand your frustration. I think the style could have looked cute with the gathered sleeve cap. The facing though, that is a problem. You would probably need at least two shirts to make up one.
Hey I’d love to give this pattern a new home. Please let me know postage To Alexandria, VA, USA, zip code 22303.
Thanks in advance,
-d
Donna S. Jones/angldst on SewRetro