Semi-Functional Arms

Today I tried setting in the sleeves to the Misato jacket body. This really brought out the way the several seams from odd  angles come together as you go around the armscye. I'll have to spend some time puzzling out which way each set of  seam allowances should be pressed and trimmed. After getting it more or less in place, I found the lower part of the sleeve to have a bit too much fabric to fit without easing under the arm. At first, I thought I would bring in the sides of the top of the sleeve, shortening the distances between the front and back notches and the long edge seam. That is, take the circumference out under the arm, rather than from the sleeve cap.

Instead, where I decided to start was opening up the hole in the jacket body. Something like this...

I made an adjustment to my paper patterns, but didn't end up using them.With the way the side, back and shoulder come together, all the adjustment is in the front and back pieces.

Rather than making a new jacket body, and to make testing it on Lucy easier, I just trimmed all around the armscye back to the sewing line. I could get enough testing out of it this way without worrying about cutting out the ability to actually sew the sleeves in at this time. On one side, I went ahead and cut down to the proposed new line.

One benefit of lowering this part of the armscye is that it doesn't interfere with Lucy's arms, which run tight to the torso near the shoulder. I still want to keep the change minimal and not do anything to odd just to fit a dress form.

While trying her arms back on, I noticed that another adjustment would be to take a sliver off the the  front lower corner of the shoulder piece. Now that there's not fabric fouling movement of the arm from area of the side seam, I could see that that point also hangs up on the arm as it moves. I also don't want to take too much off here, since this is a more visible change, if it goes too far.

Probably not as much as the triangle implies, but a little adjustment here will be a big help (probably).