Men's Shirt Sew-Along 9 -- Side seams and cuffs!

Long-suffering Sew-Alongers, we're nearly at the end of our journey. We've been through so much together, I can hardly wait to relive the whole thing with my real fabric! (We'll be drafting new facings and collar stand/collar too.)  But first a few more steps.

Our goals today are:

1. Stitch the side seams closed

2. Attach our cuffs

I know, it's a relatively light day, but you deserve it!

1. Now that we've flat-felled our shoulder seams, we're ready to stitch our sleeves and torso sides.

First, I line up my armhole seams.



I also check my notches on sleeve and torso and line those up too.

Now you have some options.  You can flat-fell these seams if you care to.  I didn't.  Instead, I stitched the whole long seam, cuff to hem, at 5/8", serged the seam allowance, and then stitched down the serged seam allowance at 1/4" from the outside.







Of course, there's still the challenge of stitching down the length of the closed sleeve, bunching up the sleeve as you move toward the cuff, but this is unavoidable if you want something that looks, from the outside, like a flat-felled seam.



This also leaves the inside looking nice and neat.



You can also overcast the seam allowance by zigzagging along the edge to prevent fraying.

You don't have to stitch down that seam allowance if you don't want to.  But it is a nice touch, imo.  Of course, the truly ambitious among you will want to flat-fell, and Sarai has provided very clear instructions for doing this with a regular 5/8" seam allowance on p. 26 of the instruction booklet.

However you do it, when you're done, try on your garment.  Does it resemble a shirt?  I've been pressing as I go and at this point I give my sleeves and torso a good touch up.  Eventually I get out of my pajamas.



2.  Next, we're going to attach the cuffs.  Before we do, we want to create our sleeve pleat, which is explained clearly on p. 25 of the Negroni instructions.



Personally I find that single pleat to be a little deep and I think on my final version I'll break this up into two smaller pleats. 

We've already made our cuffs, so let's get those out.
 

We'll be attaching the inside of our cuff to the sleeve, which has been turned WRONG SIDE UP,  with the longer side of the cuff (the side without the 3/8" folded over) ON TOP (in my case, this is the gingham side).   This is very clearly explained in the instructions on p. 28.

The cuff is another part of the shirt that -- like the facings -- will get turned right side out.  Make sure you understand what's being stitched to what and why.   When we turn our cuff right side out, we'll want the interfaced outer cuff facing the outside.   The edge of the cuff (the one that meets the sleeve) will already be folded under and we will simply edgestitch this outer cuff closed.

NOTE:  When you're attaching the cuff, remember that the plackets must be stitched into the cuff parallel with the edge of the cuff to create a continuous line between sleeve and cuff.  Does that make sense?
 

The nearly vertical stitch line you see in the lower right hand part of the photo above will form the outer edge of the cuff.  The outer edge of the sleeve placket (above it, in the photo) should be on the same vertical line.

Stitch the longer side to the sleeve using a 1/4" seam allowance, and then trim, all the way around the cuff.



Turn the sleeve and cuff right side out.  Use your point turner to push out those edges.  Press them flat.





Edgestitch the outer seam closed and topstitch around the entire cuff.







Friends, that's all we're going to do together today.  We're almost done -- with the muslin/test garment that is.

Tomorrow we add buttons and hem. 

As always, I'm here to answer your questions both here and in our Flickr group.  Virtual hugs to those who need them.

Happy stitching, everybody!