Full bust adjustment on the Granville blouse

I lost a few days last week to some unforseen circumstances, but I'm back to sewing today.

As I mentioned previously, I'm working on my first Sewaholic Granville blouse. Sewaholic patterns are drafted for a pear-shaped figure, which translates into small bust, small waist, and larger hips. I, however, am more hourglass shaped, with a large bust, smallish waist, and hips that match my bust.

For the sake of transparency, here are the measurements I took today...
High bust: 36"
Full bust: 40"
Under bust: 32"
Waist: 34"
Hip: 42"

The measurements for Sewaholic patterns don't match up to my measurements, unfortunately. If I were to sew the size closest to my measurements without any adjustments, I'd end up with a shirt that fit like a tent everywhere but at the full bust. I've talked before about how, when you're bigger than a B cup (not necessarily your bra size - like with ready to wear sizing, sewing pattern cup sizing follows different rules), you can't just go by your full bust measurement and have a garment that fits. You end up with extra width across the upper chest, which makes for weird armhole bagginess, and a big waist and hips.

This is why we do full bust adjustments.

Tasia at Sewaholic has posted several great tutorials on the blog, discussing how to make her patterns work for other types of figures. Just because you're not hourglass shaped, doesn't mean you can't fit Sewaholic patterns to your figure. You just need to know how to adjust them! This post specifically addresses the basics for many of her patterns, telling you just what you need to keep in mind if you're sewing for other figure types.

In my case, with the Granville, I'm sewing it based on my high bust measurement, waist, and hip. This would make it too small at the full bust, but I'll adjust for that with an FBA.

This post by Tasia was very helpful for me to understand the sizing of Sewaholic patterns. The pattern is drafted in such a way that the full bust is 2" larger than the high bust. Therefore, if my high bust measurement is 36", I should sew the size for a 38" bust. Looking at the pattern envelope, that puts me in a size 12/14 as I'm in between. I'll go for the size 12, because I'm only off by 1/2". My waist measurement puts me in a size 14/16, as again, I'm in between sizes. I'm right in the middle, so I could grade between sizes, but if you look at the pattern envelope, the size 14 has a finished measurement of 39" at the waist and the size 16 has a measurement of 41" at the waist. Because I don't want my blouse to be baggy at the waist, I'll sew the size 14 waist. As for my hips, my measurement puts me in a size 10. Why is this size so much smaller when my measurements are reasonably proportionate according to most sewing patterns? Because as I mentioned, these patterns are drafted for a pear shaped figure. I could grade down to a size 10, but to make things easier, I'll use the size 12 for my hips.

To make this more readable and easier to follow, these are the sizes I'm using...
Bust: size 12
Waist: size 14
Hip: size 12

©Aspiring Threads

How do you cut these sizes? Easy. You simply grade between the two sizes to make for the larger waist measurement. A French Curve is very useful for this purpose, as it gives you a nice, smooth curve. Grading can also be done freehand, but I prefer to use the grading ruler.

The next step is the FBA, which many people (including myself) have a love/hate relationship with. In this case, I'm in luck, because the Curvy Sewing Collective has a tutorial on how to do an FBA on this exact pattern! The CSC is geared more toward plus-sized women, but they have a lot of great information on the dreaded FBA, so it's a resource I use often.

©Aspiring Threads

 As I mentioned, I needed to add 2" to my bust. Since a pattern piece is typically 1/2 of the front (except in some circumstances, like my wedding dress, where it is the full front), you divide your increase by half to get the full amount to adjust. I like to use my cutting mat for this purpose, as it has a 1" grid, so it makes these adjustments quite easy.

©Aspiring Threads

 It is easiest to use pattern weights, which I need. Instead, as you can see above, I used various small, heavy objects to keep my pattern in place while I slipped bits of paper into the spaces. In this picture, you can see my completed FBA. I've trued my dart, and added the necessary length to the centre front section, so that it matches up with the side, where it got longer thanks to the adjustment.

©Aspiring Threads

Here's my bodice front, complete with FBA, with the dart graded into the original bottom front that I cut off in the beginning of the FBA, per the CSC tutorial. This eliminates the need for waist darts, which are not a design element of this shirt. I've never used this method before, which makes me a little nervous, but I really didn't want to add darts to the waist. This shirt is fitted, but not body-hugging, so I think it will work just fine. Because of this grading, I didn't need to grade separately for my waist measurement, though I did grade the back pieces.

The other thing to keep in mind is that if you have a pattern with a separate button band (like this one), you'll have to add to the band as well, if you do an FBA. Remember in the second to last photograph, there was a section of the front that needed to be moved down? That space needs to be added to the button band as well! It will also change your button placement, so you need to keep that in mind when transferring markings to your fabric.

Next step... cutting my fabric!