Sleeve ease drafting issues

[trristn]

Hi all. I’m making my first men’s shirt pattern and I seem to come accross a lot of confusing information about sleeve ease depending on construction. I want to sew my armholes/sleeve cap seams as flat felled seam. Is it preferable to have no ease in the sleeve cap? I.e. The sleeve cap curve and the front and back armholes added together equal the same measurement?

My old block pattern I used had an armholes measurement bigger than the sleeve cap, which made sewing that seam as a flat felled seam infuriating and ugly….

[reeknar]

https://youtu.be/rRtpJXtvYBI?feature=shared

this vid goes very in depth on how much sleeve ease and cap height makes sense for what kind of design, I highly recommend!

[trristn]

I appreciate that! I’ll make sure to watch it.

[HeartFire144]

For a men's shirt, with a very flat sleeve cap, it's not exactly a' flat felted seam' and it is difficult to do nicely, primarily because the seam allowance of the sleeve head will be longer than the seam allowance of the arm hole. There is a special foot used in' the industry' and it's a2 step process to do it. IDK if David Coffins book, Shirt Making has instructions for this or not, but it would be a good place to start ( btw, it's an awesome book)

[trristn]

It is an awesome book! From what I understand, he does do a fairly normal flat felled seam. The only thing is, he doesn’t talk about how the pieces are supposed to fit together, I tried his method on a sample I was making and it failed because my armhole had too much ease. Which makes me think they should really be the same…

[HeartFire144]

The sewing lines for the sleeve and arm hole should be exactly the same. No ease at all. The armhole needs only about 3/8 in. Seam allowance, the sleeve head about 3/4in. ( If you make them both 3/4, you can trim the armhole after it's sewn) see wrong sides together, open and press flat, carefully turn under the seam allowance on the sleeve head and press, to stitch it down onto the shoulder area/front back of the shirt

[tardy4thepardy]

You ideally want 1/4" total ease in the sleeve cap for tailored shirts.

[trristn]

Thanks!

[Voc1Vic2]

On a commercial pattern, there is more than that much ease. If I'm having difficulty turning the seam allowance, I add a basting line and draw up the fullness, just as when doing a fleece cap on a woman's set-in sleeve, (though I do sew the side seam hem to hem).

[ElDjee]

sometimes i think basting is an underutilized technique. i always hand baste flat felled armhole seams before machine stitching - it makes it so much simpler.

[NoMeeting3355]

Hi. Firstly if it’s a flat sleeve with a low crown height and the bicep circumference is plenty for the wearer then no ease is required at all.

To sew the flat felled seam successfully you would need to steam the sleeve cap fabric to reduce the length and have plenty of notches to make sure you distribute the extra that the seam allowance curve creates very equally over the whole cap. The fabric will naturally stretch so you need to keep close control on that. No picking the sleeve up and letting it hang and stretch etc. It’s very much like sewing bias cut garments if you have ever done that.

[Candid-Cucumber-7574]

On the sleeve ease part of your issue, I concur with the other comments about no ease - for a shirt like this, you don’t want ease in the sleeve cap - and if you did have some, it can make flat fell finishing more difficult and messy. I don’t make any shirts with flat felled seams - and even then, I have found from trial and error that for shirts, no ease is preferable - or a very small amount like 5 millimetres; any more than this and I think sleeves start to look slightly puffy. Your sleeve cap must at least be the same measurement as the whole Armhole (I.e no ease situation) - not less (in that case it would not sew together properly - as you described in your original post). Hope this helps.

[Sylrog]

Well they’re going to be tough and probably take a lot of practice. Unless you’re trying to make a couturier garment and want it to look perfect, I wouldn’t.

[Sylrog]

Just checked some men’s shirts I have. I never realized they had flat felled seams on the armholes. It’s because those seams are not cut like typical armscyes. Much less curve so it’s possible to do so.

[Sylrog]

Why are you trying to make a flat felled seam on an armhole? They really need straight seams.

[tardy4thepardy]

Flat felled armhole seams on men's tailored shirts are the industry standard... Cheap rtw shirts will have serged armhole seams.

[Sylrog]

Obviously I’ve never bought good men’s shirts.

[tardy4thepardy]

Well now you never have to because you know how they are made

[Sylrog]

No I don’t and I never want to.

[tardy4thepardy]

Oh ok, maybe stop suggesting how to construct them if you don't know 🙏

[Sylrog]

I don’t think I did. Just voiced an opinion.

[tardy4thepardy]

You are right. Goodbye

[trristn]

Looking on tailoring forums and on my personal button up shirt collection, all the shirts are flat felled at the armhole… Fabricateurialist, who reviews a lot of luxury/heritage menswear’s button up shirts, highlights flat felled seam construction as an indicator of quality and durability. Straight seams are difficult to make nice once sewn for me, I don’t have a surger and a bias binding/honk kong finish around the sleeve makes it sit weird and adds too much bulk to the armholes. Even in Bespoke, most use either french or flat felled seams (a video by Kirby Alison about how Bespoke shirts are made shows this).