One of my greatest frustrations with trying to buy ready-to-wear clothing (aside from the environmental and human rights issues - that’s going to need to be a separate post, or series of posts) is that clothes are never designed to fit me. I’m fortunate that at least my bust-waist-hip ratio are close to matching industry standards, but I have a long torso and short legs so anything that is closely fitted usually doesn’t fit quite right the bust hits at the wrong place, pants are almost always too long and the knee doesn’t line up with my knees, pants are also often too short in the rise for my extra torso length.
I have several pairs of jeans that fit absolutely beautifully. Unfortunately, the material isn’t the best and they have started to wear through, usually on the high inner thigh, so something like visible mending wouldn’t really work (unless you’re really wanting to call attention to your inner thigh, not something that would historically fit with my general aesthetic 😉). Double unfortunately, all my jeans are several years old and the company isn’t making that line anymore. Since my jeans were worn through already and I can’t get more, I figured there was no harm in taking them apart and drafting a pattern from the pieces to make my own. Patterns are another thing I tend to struggle with since I almost always have to make alterations to get them to fit me (for the same reason that ready to wear doesn’t fit, they’re all based on the same measurements). Since these are from actual pants and not a paper pattern and I know those pants fit well, no alterations necessary.
The first step was taking the pants apart. I learned some interesting things about factory-made clothing versus home sewing. One of the big takeaways was that the waistband was held together with top-stitching alone. There was no actual stitches holding anything together once I took out the top stitches. The other thing I would have to keep in mind is that these jeans used 1/2” seam allowances (patterns are usually drafted for 5/8”).
Once I had my pieces taken apart, it was time to trace the paper pattern. First I ironed the pieces so they would lie flat, then I carefully drew the grainline down each piece. After that, I placed them on pattern paper and traced around the outline.
Once I had the basic outline of the pieces, I used my vary-form curve ruler to smooth out the lines and draw in any details like pockets.
I decided to be daring and skip doing a muslin. The pants the pieces came from fit really well, so I didn’t see a need to check fit, instead I can just make minor adjustments in the seam allowance. This is also the part where I got immersed in what I was doing and stopped taking pictures until the end. The pants were more or less constructed the same way as other pants I’ve made in the past, so I used a fair amount of intuition and experience in the construction.
The corduroy and penguin cotton is from Rick Rack textiles, it’s their 8-wale, cotton, stretch corduroy, which was intended to match the stretch denim of the original jeans. I decided to add the contract waistband and pockets (not pictured, but the inside of the pockets is also penguins) to add a bit of whimsy to what are otherwise pretty basic black cords.
So now I have a pair of pants that fit! And a pattern to use to make more. I already have some stretch twill set aside with a second pair of these in mind. For the next pair I’ll have to do some work on the pockets, they don’t quite lie flat as they are right now, but I have some ideas on how to change that in the next pair.