New Look K6230, Raglan Sleeved Jumper II

I took a sewing holiday back in February and made my first Raglan sleeved jumper and it's come in pretty handy since. This week I took another sewing holiday and I made another Raglan Jumper.

I made the same changes to the pattern as last time- omitting the centre back seam (what's it there for?), and creating a waistband and cuffs. I cut these a little shorter than the circumference they needed to fit. The bands are then stretched as they are sewn, matching up mid points like when you sew on elastic. It can be a bit of a gamble just how much shorter they need to be, as you don't want gaping, but you also don't want puckering... It can be a bit of a minefield but I just opted for the jump in and have a go method and it seemed to work!


After sewing on the waistband I tried on and thought the extra length this added made it a tad too long, so took it off, cut down the bottom and put it back on again. Much better!

Pattern matching was an interesting one with this fabric! Most importantly I made sure everything was as symmetrical as poss by cutting everything out single, but lining up top piece to bottom piece to make sure all the Xs matched. Where the sleeves are inserted I have tried to focus on the horizontal lines remaining parallel right the way round. This seems to have worked out ok-I'm not too sure how else I could have done it, as I really wanted a row of Xs straight down the centre front and back.

When it came to trying on, the neck line was too wide. It didn't help that I'd forgotten to take the seam allowance out of the back of the pattern where there is a centre back seam. I decided to make seam allowances bigger where the sleeves join the body (I think I took in an extra 2 cm at each one!) and this made things much better.

I cut the neckband on the bias simply because visually I thought the crosses going diagonally around the neck would look better (less room for dodgy match up!). A bit of guess work made the band the right length after taking so much out of the neckline circumference.

Pretty simple- I love putting in raglan sleeves! I would suggest to myself that I maybe cut the pattern a bit smaller next time...
...But better too big than too small (Or so they tell me, I really wouldn't know.............)

x

Currently listening to: Psychedelic Lover, Goat
Location: Arundel Street, Sheffield