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I am nearly finished with the bodice for my "wishing" dress, finally. It's the 1880s Dinner Bodice, altered to have a faux vest front, and a normal collar instead of the mandarin. I've done a ton of work on it, and now all that remains is attaching the sleeves and then a bit of decorating. It looks amazing! It fits like a glove.

However, when I sewed the first sleeve on, I discovered a problem....

With my arms down at my sides, the sleeves are all wrinkled, as though they are too big. But when I try to raise my arms, the fabric cuts into my upper arm, right about armpit level. It's very uncomfortable and restrictive, and feels claustrophobic because I can't move my arms. Yet, I can't see any obvious flaw, there's no place where the fabric is obviously too tight. So, I'm at a loss how to fix it.

I've let out the front seam of the sleeve, and that helped a little. But it's still very tight and now the sleeve is more wrinkled when my arms are down. I could let out the back seam, but I don''t know if that will do any good, since the back fits fine, it's the front that cuts into my arms.

I've always had this problem, tailored jackets and coats are always too tight across the upper arms. I thought that I had compensated for the problem by cutting the armscye a little wider in the front, moving the sleeve forward a bit. And the first time I wore the bodice (before it was boned and had hook and eye fastenings), the sleeves were fine. But now they're definitely not fine.

Is there a solution? Preferably without having to cut new sleeves? I'd love to get rid of the wrinkles, too, but my first priority is getting the sleeves to fit.

[Heather]

Ok, the first thing is that you can't raise your arms. And yeah, you can't raise your arms while wearing a fitted jacket or bodice. If you can get to 90 degree lift, that's as good as it gets. And forward and up, like to reach a car steering wheel, can be imposible. Welcome to historical clothing, where movement is optional and lifting and reaching is what men are for anyway. Tight clothing not made out of spandex is restricting, no way around it.

Second is the wrinkling, and fixing this also may help with problem #1.
Without a pic it's hard to tell, but it sounds like the bodice shoulder area could use a trim. The bodice shoulder should just barlely extend beyond your natural shoulder line. The front of the armpit should have the seam allowance edge sitting smoothly around your arm and not binding at all, or if the seam allowance is turned under already, there should be 1/2" ease at the front of you arm pit. Often, sleeve wrinkles are created when the bodice shoulder is too long and the sleeve head falls in on itself as nothing is there to hold it up.

On a long shot, I will also toss in the idea that the sleeve may be set into the armhole at a bad angle. When looking at the sleeve when set it, the front seam should hang straight down to the elbow, the back seam should lean forward towards the elbow, and the wrist should be in front of the bodice. IF your wrist is hanging straigth down from the armhole, that will cause a problem with wrinkling as it forces the fabric forward around your arm, and be more binding than usual. The fix is easy, remove the sleeve and pivot the sleeve head, and reset.

Hmm. I may need to stick to ballgowns with puffed sleeves, or else find a solution to this... I feel way too claustrophobic with the sleeves constricting my movement so much!

I laced myself properly into my corset and took photos of the bodice. They're not the greatest quality, but I hope it will help. The wrinkles were a lot better when I tried it on this time, but it's still constricting too much.

Whole Bodice
Bare Shoulder
Sleeve With Arm Raised Forward
Sleeve With Arm Raised Off to the Side
Sleeve with Arm Down at Side

With the bare arm, you might be able to tell where the shoulder edge is. I'm not sure exactly where the "natural shoulder line" is, so I've no idea if it's in the right place or not. The edge of the arm? Straight up from the armpit? Somewhere in-between?

As for how it's set, I tried to see if it lines up the way you said, but I'm not sure. All the seams seem to be at angles, at least somewhat! It does hang sort of odd, with a buckling of the fabric just under the armpit, but that may be because it's pinned on. It won't hurt to try rotating it, anyway. Part of the problem may be that I didn't have any markings to tell where to sew the gathering line and where the parts of the sleeve were supposed to line up with the arm hole, so I just winged it.

New problem... Bodice Closure
You may notice there is something going on with the front closure. I thought I'd fixed this problem, but obviously it's still there.... The front closure overlaps; I put in alternating hooks and eyes to fasten it, 10 of them, about an inch apart. Toward the waist, the fabric pulls away from the hook and/or eye, making it look as though the bodice is being fastened against great strain. But it isn't! I have room enough to shift the bodice around, and to easily hook and unhook the fasteners. So it doesn't seem too tight. I can even flatten the fabric by hand, but when I let go, it goes back the same way.

Is it really too tight? The hooks up at the top do this a little bit and it seems loose up there. But the ones toward the bottom are the worst. I sewed the hooks and eyes down securely, at the sides of the eyes and the tops of the hook, not just around the eyelets. So it's not that the hooks are pulling away from the fabric.

After looking at the picture, it occurred to me... could it be that the lining is too loose or too big? The vest panels are lined separately, with the fabric basted to the main lining. Could that stitching be too loose, allowing the lining to fold outward like that? I could redo the basting, make it more secure, or maybe pull it tighter so the lining is narrower. Or would topstitching the edges do the trick?

I'm not going to be much help for the sleeve thing, but I have a suggestion for the bodice front closure.

You say your hook and eyes are 1 inch apart. I would say, try adding additional hook and eyes in areas where you are having gaping problems (so they end up more like 1/2" or even 1/3" apart). It may not be that the bodice is too tight, just that you need those extra points of closure over curves like your bust.

You can baste the extra fasteners in roughly and try things on before committing to sewing them in.

I'm not sure if gaping is really the problem, since the area over my bust where you'd expect the worst of it is actually okay. I will try adding some extra hooks, though, like you said Violet. Thanks for the idea.

It could be that I just sewed the waist seams too tight. It'd be very difficult to correct that, though, now that the lining is all sewn in place and all the seams are boned. But I was thinking of shifting all the left hand hooks and eyes over closer to the edge, to give me a bit more room in the waist.

I don't suppose I should have boned the edges of the closure...?

The only hooks I have left are tiny ones I use for doll clothes, and I'm not able to get to the store. (Can't drive, husband's at work all day, and mother is out of town.) But they might work just to ease the strain a little. I'll try them and see what happens. Thanks, Violet!

Just wanted to add... I rotated the sleeve a bit, and it made a HUGE difference!!! It's still a bit restricting, but not nearly so bad. It eased it just enough that I can deal with it. And all the wrinkles went away, too!

Now, to just figure out how to get the other sleeve to line up in the exact same way....

I'm still working on the closure issue, but I'm much less worried now. You've no idea how stressed that sleeve problem was making me! Thank you so much, Heather! You're a life saver.

[Heather]

I know that to get that sleeve set in is a problem and I don't have it marked well. But if you make any changes to the shoulder area of the bodice, the marks won't mean anything anyway, so that is my dilelma with the marks. Once you get a feel for how a sleeve should set in, it gets easier to eyeball it.

The pulling problem is caused by the lining of the bodice stretching under presure and the fashion fabric not stretching. The only real fix that I know of is you have to sew through all the layers at your closure, not just the lining. Of course, now you see the stitching, and this is why so many bodices used false buttons to hide it. Or other trims.

It was my fault---I just didn't transfer the markings to the sleeve. Your pattern had all the notches and such. I've no idea why I ignored them when I originally cut the sleeves out! But I think I've got it figured out now.

I was redoing the lining of the vest front when I noticed that some of the hooks where sewn all the way through the interlining and some were only sewn through the lining. Guess which ones were only through the lining? So I went back and sewed all of them through the interlining. That way they get the support of the non-stretching fabric, without the thread showing on the front. It seems to have done the trick, though I haven't actually tried it on, just hooked them all and then pulled on the sides to simulate the tension of being worn.

The edges still flap away, but I can't see a real solution for that, except maybe putting tiny snaps along the edge. I should have gotten a mixture of hooks: black for on the navy fabric and white for the ones on the ivory lining fabric. Then they wouldn't have been noticeable. Oh well. Live and learn.

Thanks for all the help!