Making the 1830s Sleeve

I found the 1830s sleeve really hard. I have never been very good at sleeves in the past however this was very different as it was clear you did not draft it as a one or two piece sleeve but had to scale it up and use free hand by refering the the Janet Arnold pattern book.

Dexter suggested I made it much bigger then scaled it down however when I tried this it was still far to small so I had to be more daring and confident and cut it really big. I got the sizing right after about 4 attempts. I also had to ensure I didn't make it to big as the top had to be gatherd into the armhol which I managed to do through trial and error, and patience.

When I sewed it together the shape just wasn't right however when I spoke to Dexter about this he suggested adding a double layer of netting inside it to pad the top of the sleeve out so I re-cut and sewed the sleeve with the netting which did help quite a bit and did give it the classic gigot shape of the era. However, I feel it would have worked much better made from lightweight calico and possibly with a couple more layers of netting inside it. I ran out of time to do this but if I ever made the sleeves again I know what to do now.

The final hard bit of the sleeve was putting it in and where to place the seam as again there is not seam line on the Janet Arnold pattern I am using for this dress so I had to refer to my hostorical reserch. This wasn't much help ither as most of the images were drawings and don't show the seam however I did find one reference and so placed the seam in a way to match that and in a way that looked correct on the stand. I feel the sleeve may need some ajusting later on in the project if there is time however overall I feel it looks like the picture that I am aiming to copy.

The sleeve (padded up with tissue paper so it sits better on the stand and so the collar can be cut over it) -