I Have Sized You Up

I have had a dress pattern hanging on my wall for some time. I got the pattern as a result of shopping despair, because I don’t fit into almost any off-the-rack dress. I hoped I could learn to make myself dresses that would fit me properly, and be nice and comfortable. I got a simple pattern, a McCall’s A-line dress with no waist, cap sleeves and a bust dart. I chose one called a “one hour pattern” because I figured simple was better for a completely novice dressmaker.

I’ve made little progress on the pattern because of the clear difference between its measurements and proportions and mine.  I knew it would never fit me as is, and I wasn’t entirely sure what to do about it. Yesterday my mom and I spent time scratching our heads over it, trying to alter it to fit me. We made progress, but there’s a ways to go.  I think that one-hour pattern is going to turn into 15 hours before I get the alterations right.

It would be okay if I were just a little bit off-pattern, but I’m nowhere flipping near standard pattern measurements. I wear a 12 or 14 in misses’ off-the-rack clothing, which I now realize has little to do with pattern sizes. For those I appear to be an odd combination of measurements from pattern sizes 16 – 26. Not kidding. Is it just me? I really hope it’s not just me this happens to.

I found the size variation enormously problematic when I was trying to pick a pattern size. I’m outside the range of sizes they give you with a single pattern packet (for example, a pattern package might come with sizes 18 – 22). I picked a median number.

It was also hard to choose a pattern to begin with because of the ridiculously unlikely pictures and sketches that accompany them. The women are twigs! It leads me to believe that pattern manufacturers hope we are all bony, curve-less hangers on which to drape cunningly tailored fabric constructions that don’t allow for comfort or possibly even breathing. This is not an uncommon idea, as we all know so well from being bombarded with pictures of inappropriately clothed women in Cosmo while we’re innocently trying to escape with food at the grocery store.

The pattern measurements themselves, on the other hand, appear to me to reveal other terrible assumptions. I’m quite sure there are more assumptions not listed here, I am being snarky in a self-absorbed fashion about my own considerable pattern-fitting difficulties. I spent three hours trying to figure out how I could be a size Y compared with a size X, and I got a tad bit testy about it.

1. You’re a B cup. If not that, they hope you’re an A. Cleavage of any kind is clearly verboten.
2. D cups and larger don’t exist. If such a calamity occurs, it must mean that either you’re incredibly obese or you work in Hefner’s mansion, and those women don’t sew.
3. You’re smaller on top than on bottom. By 2-4 inches at least. Perhaps you’re pear-shaped?
4. Nope, clearly it’s not about being pear-shaped, because you also have a long, thin neck and wide shoulders. Congratulations, you’re a swan-quarterback hybrid! But in an elegant way.
5. You have a well-defined waist, but not small, preferably in the range of 28-34 inches, and it’s toned like an Olympic athlete’s. Except once you get below your waist you likely have a potbelly. Yeah, I don’t understand that one either.
6. Your butt and hips are pretty big. Probably your thighs, too. In fact, go ahead and assume these measurements are oddly exaggerated in proportion to your waist. Maybe it has to do with that potbelly you apparently have.
7. You are 5′6″ to 5′8″, maybe even 5′9″ (well above women’s average 5′4″ height) and are perfectly proportioned in length on top and bottom. Petite people, take note! Your selection of merchandise remains tiny.
8. You do not have curves. At least not ones that you’d notice casually. You should only create those sometimes, when they’re in fashion, with artful tailoring or a belt.
9. Did I mention that if your arms aren’t super skinny you may run into difficulties?
10. Last but not least, you are perfectly symmetrical and everything on both halves is exactly alike. None of us would ever be (gasp!) irregular, would we?

If you are this person, congratulations! You can wear anything you want. On the other hand, I will be doing a considerable amount of pattern-wrangling, because I am, in so many tiny, fiddly, irritating ways, the antithesis of this ideal pattern person.

Next step? The internet, for help. Next step after that? Muslin. I’m making a cheap test dress so I can figure out this dress alteration thingy, and how much I’m really going to have to do. Wish me luck, the patience of a saint, and an extra pattern so I can rip this one up when I’m too frustrated with it.