Making the Suit Pants - Day 1

And we're off! (our rockers, mainly)

It appears I am indeed making a suit; ETA December 30.  Thanks for all your encouragement yesterday.

I decided to use the pinstripe wool.  For one thing, it's lighter weight, so I think I'll get more use out of it.  For another, the stripe makes cutting much easier and, I'm hoping, everything else, from welt pocket to waistband.  Yesterday I used Pam Erny's machine pre-shrink method (you can read about it here) to prep my wool.  I've used it before and it seems to work fine.  Although, since you're not going to wash your wool garment in the machine, but rather take it to the dry cleaners, why do you have to pre-shrink wool in the first place?  I thought the whole point of dry cleaning is that it's for garments made of shrinkable fabric you can't wash yourself.  Anyway...

I pre-shrank both fabrics, just in case, but like I said, I've opted for the pinstripe.  I also have much more of the pinstripe, so if I need to cut anything out twice...

I'm making the pants out of McCall's 4359, version E -- no pleats but with the little watch pocket flap (but no actual watch pocket) on the front right side.   It's the guy in the brown pants and mustard sweater.



I could have used a suit pattern, but with pants, there's very little difference and I just couldn't deal with the 6,000 pieces of an entire suit pattern all at once.  Notice how the line of the pleated pants looks identical to that of McCall's 3995, the pattern I used to make Michael's shirt last week.  I didn't measure one against the other but my hunch is that they're the same, despite one being thirty years older.  I'll have to check that out some day.  Men's fashion changes very slowly, if at all.

Anyway, the pattern was uncut, so first I had to cut it out.



Even with just the pants, it's a lot of pieces.



Then I had to adjust the pant length and the rise.  I've done this before and I'm safe with 1 1/2" off the rise and 2" off the length; I really don't want hip huggers.  Of course, since I'm shortening the rise, I also have to shorten the fly and fly facing as well as the pockets and pocket facings.



This morning I started cutting.  I used rulers to make sure my grainlines were straight.   It took a lot of time to cut and I cut solely single layers at a time, never double.





I labeled front and backs with a chalky yellow pencil (see top pic) -- there is a subtle difference between right and wrongs sides on this fabric.



And that's it so far.  I may do a little sewing today or not.  Frankly, I'm already pretty wiped out just with all the cutting and I don't really feel like rushing through these.  BTW, I am referring to the Cabrera book, Classic Tailoring Techniques after all.  It has a ton of useful information.  I may even include the recommended "crotch reinforcement!" 

OK, time for lunch.  Happy Sunday, everybody!