Video Transcript

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Hi, this is Maria from dresspatternmaking.com This is Part 5 in the Pants Block series and I'll be drafting the pants blocks for Anne. I am firstly comparing Anne’s figure to the Standard Figure. Anne has less difference between her waist and hips than any of the figures I've done so far.

00:00:21:03 - 00:00:41:18
The Standard Figure has 10 inches difference between the waist and hips. Mine has more. Jane had less, but Anne has even less. The difference between Anne’s waist and hip is 6 and 1/4 inches. Anne’s thigh is actually just slightly bigger than the Standard Figure. By which I mean most pant block making instructions don't require the thigh measurement.

00:00:41:19 - 00:01:01:06
You don't need it to draft the block. It's an assumed measurement which works out as a percentage of the hip. So the standard figure, as far as most Western sewing patterns are concerned, have a thigh measurement that is 60% of the hip measurement. Given that Anne’s thigh-to-hip proportion is very similar to the standard figure - that is, 60.2% of her hip measurement.

00:01:01:14 - 00:01:25:06
You might then assume she'd end up with a good result for her thigh using those instructions where the thigh is worked out as 60% of the hip. However, the other part of those block making instructions that creates a difficulty for Anne is that they say to use the widest measurement below your waist as your hip measurement. So for Anne, her thigh would be worked out based on her high hip and it would end up being too big for her.

00:01:25:09 - 00:02:01:05
Now, the whole purpose of these comparisons that I'm doing to the Standard Figure and standard Pants instructions was to show that these particular figure types that I'm drafting pants for, if they use those standard instructions, would not end up with a good initial result. The other problems for Anne would have been her back and front crotch Lengths. On the left is what Anne’s block would look like if drafted using that system, compared to what her blocks look like on the right, taking into account her actual thigh measurement, not using her upper hip as the width of her block and checking she has the crotch length she needs front and back.

00:02:01:22 - 00:02:22:12
And this is the same two blocks, but this time superimposed. So you can more clearly see the difference between them. So I'm going to start drafting Anne’s block from this point here. The instructions up to this point were the same for everybody and that's all covered in Video 2. I'm going to zoom in to 200% of the previous image while working on the foundation.

00:02:23:00 - 00:02:44:19
The first thing I'll do is lower the crotch. Currently, the crotch depth is the body crotch depth and will need some ease. From point D, I will measure down 5/8 of an inch, at right angles to the C to D line, and mark point D1. I will continue the L to I line down below the body crotch depth line for about an inch or so - that's shown by the pink arrow.

00:02:45:09 - 00:03:12:04
Then draw a line right angles to touch point D1 - that's shown by the blue arrow. This will help later for drawing the crotch curve. The horizontal line touching D1 is the depth of the crotch plus ease. Where those two lines intersect I’ve marked point X. So now I'll do the calculation for the waist shaping. I’ll take Anne’s waist measurement, which is 39 and 3/4 inches and add 1-inch for ease.

00:03:12:17 - 00:03:35:04
I'll then take that total - 40 and 3/4 inches - and divided by 4. So the waist measurement for the front and back will be 10 and 1/8 of an inch. With the other figures, I started the waist shaping by coming in a 1/2 an inch from point L on the waist and marking point P, then drawing a straight line from P to low-hip point J.

00:03:35:10 - 00:03:53:18
This line would be the center front line. However, I'm not going to do that with Anne. I want to go back and look at the waist shaping for the other three figures. Here's the waist shaping for the standard figure. The pink shaded areas are basically dart values. They are not actually darts, as in a folded piece of fabric.

00:03:53:24 - 00:04:17:14
But those areas are acting as darts. That shaping - those dart equivalents - go right down to the low hip. My waist shaping also goes down to the low hip. And because I have a proportionately smaller high hip, I have more shaping or more taken out at the high hip level than the Standard Figure did. Notice that with Jane - on her side seam - the shaping only goes down to her high hip.

00:04:17:14 - 00:04:33:00
It doesn't go all the way down to the low hip. At the center front she does have some shaping down to her low hip. Here, with them altogether, you can see that most of the shaping is done at the side seam and at the center front. They all have only one dart in the center and a very similar size.

00:04:33:06 - 00:04:56:22
Despite the differences in the waist and the hip. Now (Anne’s) larger circumference is at her high hip. Therefore, we want the shaping to stop there at the high hip and not go down to the low hip. If we followed the directions for the standard waist shaping and drew a line from P down to the low hip, we would be cutting some off at the high hip, which is why we don't want to follow those directions for shaping the waist.

00:04:56:22 - 00:05:14:04
for Anne. Therefore, I'm not going to do any shaping at the center front. I will draw a straight line from point L at the waist down to point J at the low hip. This will be the center front line. Now, the issue is we do want a straight line from the waist to the low hip, so we can put a zip in it.

00:05:14:11 - 00:05:30:23
We don't really want a curved line there. We certainly can't go from the waist to the high hip in a straight line and then down from there that wouldn't work. So I'm not going to do any shaping for Anne at the center front. Doing the waist shaping at the side seam and with darts will limit that shaping down to her high hip.

00:05:31:12 - 00:05:55:19
So using the result of the calculation I did earlier, I'll take 10 and 1/8 of an inch and add 1/2 an inch for a dart. From point L at the waist, I'll measure towards point O at the side seam, for ten and 5/8 of an inch and mark point P. So moving on to the high hip, I'll take the high-hip measurement of 46 and 7/16 of an inch and add 1-inch ease.

00:05:56:01 - 00:06:16:17
Divide that total by 4 and I get 11 and 7/8 of an inch. I'll measure on the high hip line from point K towards the side seam point N and mark point Q. As you'll notice, I actually have to go beyond point N to mark point Q. That's not a problem. I was expecting that because I drafted the width of the foundation to her low hip measurement.

00:06:17:04 - 00:06:35:07
She is larger at her high hip. Therefore, this will extend out beyond point N. Now I'll draw the dart in. I’ve allowed for 1/2 inch dart. I'll center it on point A and make it 3 inches long. Now I've actually taken an extra measurement for Anne between her waist and a high hip to help with the shaping.

00:06:35:18 - 00:07:01:20
I've taken that measurement 1 and 1/2 inches below the waist. So doing the usual calculation, I mean one inch ease and dividing by four, I get an amount of 10 inches and 11/16. I'll measure across from point R towards the side seam and mark point S. However, note that this crosses the dart and that dart amount should not be included as it will be closed when the dart is sewn.

00:07:01:20 - 00:07:23:00
Therefore I need to actually measure to the dart, stop measuring, start measuring from the other side of it. And then mark point S. Now if I try and draw a side same using the current side seam points from P at the waist to C at the hip, I do not get a good result at all. I can't make that into a good side seam curve. Now

00:07:23:00 - 00:07:42:14
it would work if I could ignore point M, but we don't really want to do that, and there's some other things we can do to get better shape. What I'm actually going to do is try and draw a side same curve, concentrating on the curve from the high hip down to the low hip and thigh and then trying to get that curve to go up to the waist.

00:07:42:24 - 00:08:00:20
Now I'm not going to worry about trying to hit point S - that extra measurement - because that point will change when I put a second dart in. I'll have to measure around that second chart at that depth like I did the first art. So I'm actually drawing in a curve first dart. Then working out the dart from that curve.

00:08:01:03 - 00:08:20:22
You could do it the other way. There might be some toing and froing trying to get yes, the right dart width, but that's part of the process. So if I'm working with that curve as my side seam, then point P to P2 will be the value of my second dot. Otherwise that would be extra ease at the waist which we don't want.

00:08:21:10 - 00:08:36:15
Note that this side seam curve is still a bit of a guess at the moment. I’ll mark in that second dart and check I have enough room on the low waistline. That is, from point R, is it might not be right. I might have to go back and try another dart width etc. but this is what I'm trying first.

00:08:37:07 - 00:08:56:21
This is just an aside. It's not following on from the previous slide. This is just an example of another side seam I could try - that blue arrow, that's the side seam. If I did use this one, I would have a bigger dart at the waist because point P to point O is wider than point P to P2 was. There is no problem with the waist being the width of the block.

00:08:57:01 - 00:09:12:21
It would just mean that there is no waist shaping at the side seam and no way shaping at the center front. All of the shaping would be done by the two darts. Given Anne’s figure, there's no problem with all of the shaping being done by the darts and no shaping being done at the center front or at the side seam.

00:09:14:02 - 00:09:38:16
So back to the previous seam curve that I drew. From P to P2 is 9/16 of an inch. Now if this was actually much larger, if I was using the value that I showed you on the previous slide, I would probably add the two dart values together and then divide by two and change the other dart but 9/16 of an inch is almost half an inch.

00:09:38:22 - 00:10:00:23
So I would just make this dart 9/16 of an inch wide. So I've drawn a dart 9/16 of an inch wide at about one and a half inches from the first dart. That is of course towards the side seam. I’ve then re-measured from point R to point S and not included those dart values - and re-plotted point S.

00:10:01:08 - 00:10:20:09
Now that is a little bit of extra ease there 0 between point S and the side same. But I'm just going to go with this. If this was your block, you could try and finesse it further. Alternatively, you could just shape the darts differently rather than make those that dartleg straight. They could go out a bit wider at the bottom so that you could take that extra ease.

00:10:21:14 - 00:10:41:15
So this is where I'm up to now with the block. I have the side seam and I have the two darts. What's left is the crotch curve and getting the extra crotch length that's needed. And later on, of course, finishing off the leg shaping. Now I'm going to draw in the crotch curve from point J on the lower hip down to point D1, which is the crotch depth plus some ease.

00:10:42:04 - 00:11:10:15
I'll draw an arrow one inch long from point X and that one inch line is shown by the pink arrow. It's at 45 degrees to the horizontal and vertical guidelines - that the X is constructed on. I'll then use a French curve to draw the curve. Note that if you watched my last video, this 1-inch guide that helps me draw the curve works because Anne’s thigh is almost the same proportion to her low hip as the Standard Figure. For other figures,

00:11:10:15 - 00:11:32:21
..depending on the hip-thigh proportion, the length of that arrow will be a bit more or less. That's covered in Video 4 - it's around nine and a half minutes or so. For Anne, that one inch length arrow, which is the same as the Standard Figure, works to get a good curve. And that's because, as I said, Anne’s low-hip-to-thigh proportion is very similar to the Standard Figure.

00:11:32:24 - 00:11:50:05
So her extension is the same proportion to her hip. Now that I've drawn the curve, I can measure the front crotch length. When I measure it, I will not measure right up to point L at the waist line. I will stop about 3/16 or a quarter of an inch before point L and I'll call that point L2.

00:11:50:15 - 00:12:17:01
I will measure from point L2to point D1. Note that the waistline is completely straight when we join those two pieces together. When we saw them at the center front line, that waistline is still straight. In the last slide, you may have thought, well, obviously, but in this slide, notice that the waist is completely straight. But when the two fronts are sewn together, there is a curve.

00:12:17:05 - 00:12:41:13
And that's because this block had some shaping done at the center front. So the center front line is on an angle. So with an center front being completely vertical, with no waist shaping angle, if we want a gentle curve on the waist, we need to cut a little bit off the top so we get this curve instead of a completely straight waist. Just an note...

00:12:41:13 - 00:13:03:10
..abd I may well have missed pointing this out before, When I measure from point L2 to point D1, I'm not actually measuring the front crotch length, I’m measuring the front crotch length, plus some ease. So the pink line is a little bit longer than the body measurement. So it's best to add about 3/8 of an inch to the body measurement to get the crotch length you need.

00:13:03:10 - 00:13:28:06
Otherwise it will be a little tight or very fitting. In my previous videos, in order to get extra length in those videos, it was the pant back. I used the cut and spread method - that meant cutting the paper that you drafting on and putting paper underneath, spreading the required amount and sticking it down with sticky tape. Now I'll be doing a similar thing to get the same result, but in a different way.

00:13:28:06 - 00:14:01:08
So not actually cutting the paper. This time I'm going to put a piece of cardboard or paper underneath the paper I'm drafting on. Now cardboard is better because it's easier to trace around, but paper's fine too. Obviously in real life you wouldn't be able to see the paper underneath, but I'm showing it to you with a yellowish square that I have paper underneath the foundation. Using either a tracing wheel to trace, either just by itself one of those tracing wheels that leaves little puncture marks or with tracing paper that leaves colored dots.

00:14:02:07 - 00:14:24:17
You can use the tracing wheel or an awl to mark key points. When you later pull that piece of paper out, you join up those dots that you've made with a ruler and a pencil or a French curve and a pencil. So I'm showing you in green what I want imprinted onto the cardboard below. I want the outline in green and the lines in green.

00:14:25:02 - 00:14:45:05
So definitely I need to mark the low hip, the high hit, the low waist need to mark the darts, the dart points, not the legs or the legline. So the green shape and the green lines are what is being marked through from the paper to the cardboard or paper underneath. What I don't want to mark, what I want to exclude, is the front crotch curve.

00:14:46:10 - 00:15:05:00
So when I pull the cardboard out, I use a pencil and draw those lines in. If you use a tracing wheel and colored tracing paper, then you don't need to draw the lines in. They're already there. And then you cut this shape out and be very accurate in the cutting. So here it is, cut out. I'll make sure it's correct by placing it on top of my draft and checking it.

00:15:05:13 - 00:15:33:14
So now I will hinge it at point C and pivot it until I have the extra inch length I need. The pink arrow is the new front crotch length. Now I have worked out I need one inch extra length, but I won't only just open it up one inch where you see that blue wedge. I will also then double check and measure that length from D1 up to the waist to make sure I have the correct length.

00:15:34:04 - 00:15:50:18
Now, just in case anyone looks at this and thinks, Well, now we've tilted it, did we need to actually stop short of the waist? That's 3/16 we cut off top of the waist. Did we need to do that since it's now on an angle? Does that mean we didn't have to stop short of the waist to get that waist curve?

00:15:51:08 - 00:16:09:20
Well, yes, we did. I'm just showing you here the final block. And notice we still only have a gentle curve. Very gentle. If we'd have continued straight up to the waist and not cut that bit off, then we would again have a very straight line. So now that I have the length I need for the crotch, I will trace around the rest of the cut out cardboard.

00:16:10:05 - 00:16:26:04
And I need to mark all those lines, including the wedge that's been added. I need to add the darts and the dart points. I will also, when I lift it up, erase the other lines so I don't get confused. Now as far as the lines go, you don't need a tracing wheel to get the low hip, the crotch and the high hip.

00:16:26:10 - 00:16:44:00
You just mark the edges and use a ruler to join up the notches when you lift it up. So this is what I have when I've drawn in the lines with the ruler and as I said, erased the lines underneath. So they don't confuse me too much. Then all we need to do is the leg shaping and the front is finished.

00:16:44:18 - 00:17:13:12
I'll keep that cardboard. Definitely not throw it away. I'll use it again to draft the back. So for the final block, I'll also need to extend the grain line up from the crotch level because when it got cut it would have skewed off. So extend that straight up to the waistline, make sure you don't rub out the crotch point, that’d circled in yellow and the two intersecting lines that it's based on, this information should be kept on the block.

00:17:14:01 - 00:17:33:12
Now it’s not obvious from my image, but there should be notches on the edges to mark the dark legs and all of those key points the low hip, the high hip, etc.. Well, yes, it's a case of do as I say, not as I do. The leg shaping needs to be done from the crotch point to the knee with a French curve.

00:17:33:19 - 00:17:52:05
You may not get the curve in one pass. You may need to draw part of the curve, move the French curve and draw in the second part and blend those two lines together. And you can always take an extra measurement between the upper thigh and the knee to help to do the shaping. A good place is the lower thigh, 7 and 1/2 or 8 inches above the knee.

00:17:53:08 - 00:18:17:16
So this is Anne’s front finished and I'll be starting the back from this point that’s shown, with all the guidelines drawn. The plotting of these points is covered in Video 2 from about 18 minutes onwards. That applies to all figures. So I'm not going to cover that again. Now, these next few steps were also covered in Video 2 from about 20 minutes to 23 minutes, but I'll cover them again quickly

00:18:17:19 - 00:18:41:21
for Anne. So I'll draw straight lines from the knee to the ankle from knee point E to ankle point G, and from knee point F to ankle point H. I’ll draw a short guideline about 2-inches long down from point C and at right angles to the C to D line. I'll take Anne’s block and turn it upside down and match the inseam knee point of the front block with the knee line of the pants back at point E.

00:18:41:21 - 00:19:03:18
I'll rotate the front block until the crotch point touches that guideline I drew in the last step. I'll name the point where the back crotch touches the guideline point C2 and I'll trace the front inner leg curve from the crotch point down to the knee or from the knee up to the crotch point. Same difference. I'll draw the guidelines for the back crotch curve.

00:19:03:24 - 00:19:22:19
I'll extend the L two eyeline down for a few inches below the cropped level. Then at right angles, draw another line to touch point C2. I'll mark the intersection of those two lines with an X. I'll set aside the pants front for the minute and measure in 1/4 of an inch from point D and mark point D2.

00:19:23:07 - 00:19:45:00
So I'll bring the front block back again and flip it over to match the out-seam point of the front with a knee point F of the back. I'll rotate the front block until it touches D2. I'll trace that front block from point F to point D2. So I'm going to use that traced off section of cardboard I used earlier to help to extend the front crotch.

00:19:45:10 - 00:20:01:14
And the first thing I'll do is erase the darts. Now I'll be turning this upside down, but because I have it translucent, I don't want the front darts to be confusing things. If you're doing this, when you turn it upside down, you won't see the darts you'll see the notches on the edge. And you do want to ignore those notches.

00:20:01:21 - 00:20:28:15
So the front waist up are not relevant for the back. So firstly I've flipped it over vertically. I still have the waistline on top and the crotch line at the bottom and I'm going to measure across from the side same, that is from right to left for the back waist value, which is 10 and 1/8 of an inch plus 3/4 inch dart - the total is 10 and 13/16.

00:20:29:01 - 00:20:48:03
So a measure from the side seam, and mark where the waist ends. I'll then draw a line from that point on the waist to the low line with a ruler and pencil, then cut that bit off. I have to say here that I find the Imperial system extremely painful. Is America ever going to get on the same page as every other country and move to the decimal system?

00:20:48:12 - 00:21:12:20
That's my whinge. So I'm going to draw a line starting at point X and 45 degrees to the two guidelines where X is the intersection. And that line - indicated by the arrow - is 2 inches long. That's going to help draw curve from point C to the tip of that arrow. Now, this might seem odd, but firstly, I'm going to draw a curve just from point C2 to the tip of the arrow with the help of the French curve.

00:21:13:00 - 00:21:32:10
We haven't got the other points yet for the rest of the back curve, but I am starting with just that little bit of the back curve from point C2 to the arrow tip, and that crotch length is 17 inches and 15/16. So I've measured that little curve that I've drawn from C2 to the arrow tip, and it's 4 and 3/8 of an inch.

00:21:32:19 - 00:21:51:12
Now I'm going to measure from the waist to the crotch depth on the cardboard that I'm using now. This should be the crotch depth from the front, but it is minus that little bit that was taken off at the center front waist. So rather than going and finding the crotch measurement on the table and remembering how much we came down, just measure the cardboard.

00:21:52:17 - 00:22:10:22
So I have to work out how much to tilt the foundation shape of the cardboard up to get the length that I need. Anne’s back crotch length is 17 and 15/16 minus what we have, which is the curve measurement and the cardboard measurement. So I'm short about 4 and 1/8 of an inch. That's how much needs to be inserted.

00:22:11:06 - 00:22:33:20
So I'll tilt that cardboard up to get that length and then I'll draw a curve with a French curve, of course, making sure that from C2 up to the waist is 17 and 15/16 of an inch. So after checking that back crotch length is correct, I will lastly trace around that cardboard shape to get my final foundation shape for the back.

00:22:34:08 - 00:22:54:12
Now I'll make sure that I transfer all the lines and make markings to the paper underneath. So the low hip line, the high hip, etc. and actually haven't drawn the dart in will have to do that at some point. So a bit of finessing of the side seam will be needed and also this will be need to be trued to the front.

00:22:55:03 - 00:23:15:04
The shape of the side seam doesn't have to be identical to the front, just the same length. So I've got to put it in the back dart midway on the waist I'll put in the dart at right angles to the waistline. I’ve allowed a three quarter inch wide dart and it's about 4 and a 1/2 inches long. So here it is finished back and front.

00:23:15:09 - 00:23:33:17
As I said, it needs to be trued. They need to be trued to each other. Crotch curve, in-seam outseam, waistline, etc. I've covered that in previous videos. I won't go through that again. I've got the grainline, I’ve marked the block. I haven't shown notches, but yes, they would all need to be notched. All of those key points need to be notched.

00:23:33:17 - 00:24:01:23
The dart sneed to have little holes put through them so you can put your pencil through to mark the paper underneath. So that's it that's Anne’s block finished. My next videos are going to be ‘Patternmaking Bust Cups’ and then ‘Why Upper Bust?’. This is Maria from Dressmaking... chao.
 
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