Adjust Double Breasted Suit

Spilt_Milk

Ok!

I have a suit that used to belong to my Dad and I want to wear it to his sixteth birthday. It has a sentimental meaning so it would be cool to wear it.

It is a double breasted suit but is just a bit too wide around the torso. What really needs to happen is for the buttons to just move across just a couple of inches to pull it a little tighter to give it that nice fitted look

So, anyone out there got any little tricks for bringing in a suit slightly without really having to sew too much. Some clever system of pins? Ropes and pulleys?

Any help much appreciated

cath-w

The problem is that if you take in the body too much then the suit will not hang properly as it will bag in the area between the top, chest bit and the area you have taken it in around the torso.

I would try and put in some darts. This needs to be done from the inside of the jacket. A dart is a way of shaping the fabric. Here is a picture of one. http://www.sewing.org/enthusiast/html/el_darts.html

Basically you are trying to take a wide piece of material and make it narrower. If you just took a lump of material and sewed it smaller than it would look awful and so you graduate the shaping from narrow to wide so that the dart is not so obvious. You will need to sew a dart that graduates at both ends (so from narrow to wide to narrow). Rather than trying to sew just one dart one each side of the jacket I would aim for sewing two smaller ones so you can fit it better.

Now you have two choices. If the jacket is lined then you can sew the dart straight through the lining. This will look awful from the inside and you will have to be careful not to twist the lining. The other thing is to unpick the bottom hem of the lining and dart inside this and then re-sew up the hem.

If you don't want to ruin the suit I would try and temporarily sew darts in through the lining. I would also do it in a colour of cotton that I could see later on so I could unpick it. To make sure you do not twist and pucker the lining and pull it out of shape I would put the jacket on and whilst looking in a mirror I would pin the lining in place from the front. This will stop it moving too much when you do the dates as it will be hard to distort the lining too much.

I would try and put the darts in as two at the back running upwards placed halfway between your side and your spine. Do similar at the front. If you pin the darts first and then look at the jacket in the mirror you can see how it looks before you sew. You could also help to shape it by also moving in the buttons a little bit too. When you sew on your buttons stick a matchstick inbetween the cloth and the underside of the button. Sew the button on and then remove the matchstick then take your thread and wrap it around the threads holding the button on. See pics 1 to 6 here http://www.fabriclandwest.com/Notion_basics/Buttons0/sewing_buttons.htm (although they have the matchstick on the top of the button). What you are aiming to do is not sew the button on too tight. When you take out the matchstick you will see the button is loose (look at other suits or smart coats you own) this is so that the button has a bit of give and does not pull the suit out of shape.

Good luck and let me know if you have anymore questions.

C.

Spilt_Milk

Wow!

Thanks Cath that is a great help. I really appreciate you taking the time to provide such a detailed answer.

I shall give this a try - I'm failry confident this will do it as it is only a very slight adjustment and I'm only going to wear it the once

Thanks again

cath-w

No problem. I was thinking at one point whilst typing that it might be quicker for me just to sew it rather than type about it