Spanish split pane cap sleeves ...or more sewing math

Well, today was the Owl's Nest open house/work day. Ken and I toddled off around 11-ish with a whole car boot FULL of our various odds and sods: sewing machine, knitting, SCA craft box, embroidery, Ken's fencing gear, etc.... the works. With the fire roaring in the back yard grate and several tables set up on the back porch, I set about with a piece of newsprint and my sewing notebook to design a pattern for the Spanish split pane, cap sleeves that I have wanted to add to my dresses for a long time (see the picture to the right, the top half of the sleeve). But pattern drafting is never easy for me.

One word -- MATH.

Numbers and I just do NOT get along. The difficulty is that I can start to visualize how things SHOULD go, but I struggle with getting the figures right.

Here are the basics:

• The arm hole on the dress is 22.5 inches around. 
• The estimated bicep measurement for the bottom of the sleeve is 14 inches around (to allow room for my chemise and a tie on 'warm' sleeve'.
• From my shoulder to the bicep area = 12 inches
• From my under arm seam to the bicep area = 7 inches

Herein was my problem....how to turn this into a pattern. The directions I was given were quite simply "Draw up a simple sleeve pattern and cut it apart" - but that wouldn't work because the bottom of the sleeve would be as wide as the top, which couldn't give the little cap sleeve look (think Snow White, short and kinda full).

So, after three hours of playing with the numbers, sketching it out, cursing and erasing lines, I FINALLY got it right! (I'm so proud of myself!)

The picture on the right shows most of the pattern. Parts 1-4 are cut out into individual pieces, with the blackened triangles being cut away.

The material for the sleeves came from the dress in question. Originally it had a full skirt with 7 trapezoid shaped panels. I reworked the skirt to make it a 4-panel split skirt (see the picture to the right). I planned to use the pieces I took out of the skirt to make the cap sleeves, then go around each of the sleeve panels and around the skirt panels with the same color contrasting trim (I'm thinking a mulberry color similar to what was used on my corset and farthingale). The dress is kind of a violet color (it used to be darker purple, but hey...it's almost 8 years old now!).

For any other 'dabbling' seamstress who may want to know how to make these sleeves here are the steps:

1. Take the measurements I did at the top (around the arm hole, around the bicep or wherever you want the bottom of the sleeve to sit, from the top of the shoulder to the mark on the bicep and the length from the bottom of the armpit to the bottom of the sleeve). Add roughly 1-2 inches to the bottom of the pattern so you have a bit of 'ease'. You may need to make the pieces shorter before sewing the strips to the sleeve, but better to be a bit too long than too short!
2. On newsprint, along one edge, mark out the full length of your arm hole (22.5 inches in my case).
3. Find the center of the line and measure down the length of the shoulder to bottom of the sleeve.

Now comes the hard part if you are like me and don't handle math very well...

1. Measure from the center line to the far right end of the line (Y), and divide this number by 3.  (Y/3 = X). 
2. From the center line measure X to the right and make a mark. Do this until you get to the end of the line. You only need to do this for HALF of the sleeve. Once you have made the top marks, draw a line from the top mark to the bottom edge of the sleeve for each of these.
3. Now take Y and divide it by 9 (Y/9=Z). In my case I got something like 3.5...and this is where I did a bit of tweaking. I made 3.5 the width of the bottom of the darkened triangles (the gores that get cut away). Divide Z by 2 (Z/2= A). At the bottom edge of the pattern, for each of the lines you drew from the top to the bottom, measure A to both the right and left and mark them clearly (I like to mark them using X, Z & A accordingly).
4. Next, connect the lines. Connect the A's to the Y's so that you have triangles, with the wider bit being at the bottom of the sleeve edge. I like to color in the cut away triangles so that I keep straight that they are the triangles that I am getting ride of.
5. Label the actual pieces 1-4 & cut them out. Remember that there is NO SEAM ALLOWANCE built into this pattern - you will need to do that when you cut out the fabric pieces.
6. For each piece you will need to cut 4 fronts and 4 backs to make 2 sleeves.

After cutting out the pattern pieces I moved to the dining table to begin cutting out the fabric pieces. I felt a bit silly being in there by myself, but the wind kept blowing fire ashes all over and it was easier to cut the material indoors.

So far things are looking good. I have cut out the pieces -- I had more than enough material! (YAY!) I'm going to use the leftovers to make a reversible sash. At this point I have sewn up the individual sleeve pieces and turned them right side out. The next step is to add binding trim down each side (not the top and bottom), before sewing up the tops and attaching them to the dress (temporarily). Once that is done I'll check the length of the strips.

Once payday rolls around I'll pick up the binding and add it around the sides of the strips, then I can sew them onto the bodice. I will also add binding around the edges of the skirt panels. Eventually I want to make a gold or red underskirt to wear with this dress.