I’ve mostly been devoting creative time to my big warm coat project, but I also cut this out at the time as a palette cleanser/relaxed thing to make, and indeed, the times I picked it up, it was a quick little project. This is a revisit of Butterick 7329, which I loved in the short sleeve version, and I wanted to see about the long sleeve.

My pattern is a tracing from Clara that doesn’t actually have the long sleeve version, so I just extended the arm out at a slightly less wide angle and chopped it off at a “safely long” length as judged by stretching my arm on the table. (No progress photos this time apparently that wasn’t at all on my mind)

Fabric is again a bedsheet, but this time almost certainly all cotton and therefore it does not horribly to having its seam finishes and of course is wrinkle prone as heck. I’m not one to sing the praises of “stripe play” by and large, I’m not against it by any means it just doesn’t spark any particular excitement to make lines go different ways on a garment for me. That said, if it is your thing, boy is this a good pattern for it.

I did refer to my last make up of the pattern to work out what needed to change, which was mostly that I disliked the facing last time, but every time I thought about redrafting the facings as a placket/back facing, I felt dull and just cut it out as before. Although honestly. I need to redraft with a placket and maybe a bias facing along the neck; it would look and feel much cleaner.

I did feel like exploring collar drafting and while I’m not totally happy with it, this is almost a passable mandarin collar… I uhhh think it’s too tall and the way they cross over on this shirt looks almost intentional but is clearly wrong. I haven’t changed the paper pattern at all since I think I’ll revisit it and coming at it comparing the worn garment to the results while fresh seems like a good idea to me.

That said, I was careful to cut the undercollar on the bias and with a 1/8” slice removed where it pieced in order to ease in and encourage the right turn of cloth. That did work out nicely, and I like the view of the collar at the back.

I should possible add a button to said too-large collar but as one can’t just take away a buttonhole I haven’t done so yet. I might like it this way despite it being more casual? Or at least my theory is the imperfectness of the collar reads more as designed for casual than it would if there was a button. But maybe not.

Anyway I did an awful job of the collar attaching in just silly ways - forgot the collar completely the first time I added the facing. Put interfacing around the neckline on the wrong side of the front facings. Forgot I’d drafted the collar base with a 5/8 seam to match the neckline and sewed it on at 1/4 (to the neckline’s 5/8) and it just looked comically large. Sooooo I redid the whole thing three times to only end up with the middling situation I have (complete with the reversed facing interfacing, which only prevents this from being worn camp collar style, which almost works with this proportionally off collar) but I’m no perfectionist so that’s good enough.

In any case, the button would be pink or white, the lil green buttons are a surprise from Michelle in my very last (😥) Matchpoint order. I liked how they contrasted so they got homed on this shirt, but there are only five so I want the last one to blend into the shirt more than mimic them. 🍀

I finished the hem with a band, cut so at front the pink lines would line up with the white ones. Not that it matters much since I’m not fond of these shirts as untucked (they aren’t made for that!), but I like it as a lil touch.

For the sleeves, I waited til everything else had been worked out to see what worked visually. Eventually I landed on clean double box pleats into the cuffs with no additional ease. I like the look but at some point I made a mark not with my eraseable pen but with a regular pen so it’s already a dirty shirt. Then I promptly spilled coffee on myself the first time I wore the shirt, even before these photos, so like, yeah. Dirty shirt. Ugh. Also I forgot to put on the cuffs cleanly and did it the quick and dirty way… I say no problem what with the facings already lending messy inside vibes as far as I’m concerned.

My topstitching was OK though. And between the sleeves and the collar the experiments didn’t suck. And now I’ve got another long sleeve shirt (a thing I really feel short on this winter) that will hopefully have its stains come out reasonably well…

OH and nary a pin touched this project. I probably should have used one instead of the dumb ol’ pen on my sleeve but otherwise… who needs them? Feeling v. validated in this move by Kathleen Fasanella’s blog (the treasure trove of treasure troves)

Pattern: Butterick 7329, extended sleeves/collar self drafted
My measurements: B35, W30
Size made: B36
Fabric: Pink and white cotton topsheet
Notions: special vintage green flower buttons, lightweight woven interfacing
Next time: Make the facings into bias + placket. It’ll be worth it. Still lots to learn on collar making.