Patternmaking For A Perfect Fit: Using The Rub-... -

Clara cleared off her large wooden dining table and gathered her tools: The target garment (her beloved denim jacket) A large cork tracing board Dozens of fine straight pins Translucent medical pattern paper A tracing wheel with a serrated edge A mechanical pencil and French curve rulers

It was perfect. The shoulders sat exactly where her natural shoulders ended. The back didn't pull when she crossed her arms. It was the exact, flawless silhouette of her favorite thrifted jacket, now immortalized in a paper pattern she could recreate in any fabric she desired. Clara realized she hadn't just copied a jacket; she had unlocked the secret to a perfect fit. Patternmaking for a Perfect Fit: Using the Rub-...

With her fresh paper pattern cut out, Clara was ready for the ultimate test: the muslin toile. She cut the pattern pieces out of cheap unbleached cotton and basted them together on her sewing machine. Clara cleared off her large wooden dining table

Taking her fine pins, she pushed them straight down through the seam lines of the jacket, through the paper, and into the corkboard below. She placed a pin every half-inch along the curved armscye and the collar. It was the exact, flawless silhouette of her

Once the perimeter of the front panel was pinned out, she took her tracing wheel. She firmly rolled the spiked wheel along the chalked-out seam lines. As the spikes pressed through the denim and the paper, they left a perfect, dotted trail on the paper beneath.

She decided it was time to learn the holy grail of custom dressmaking: pattern drafting through the "rub-off" method, also known as creating a trace-off or a cloned pattern. 🧥 The Discovery of the Method

She then had to add what the rub-off method doesn't naturally give you: seam allowances. Using her clear gridded ruler, she meticulously drew a parallel line 5/8 of an inch outside her traced seam lines.