A sewing friend and I are getting together weekly to work on bodice slopers. She’d taken a class a few years ago, but her weight had changed a bit so she wanted to redo her sloper.
I had done the Suzy Furrer Bodice Sloper class on Craftsy, and it was wonderful. Like my friend my weight had changed since I’d taken that class too.
So we’ve been getting together for the past month to work on slopers together.
She brough all her class notes, but something wasn’t working out for us, so I thought of the book I had sitting on my shelf.
I have the second edition of the wonderful book Patternmaking for Fashion Design. It’s a great book, but read some reviews before you purchase a newer edition. I did. That’s why I purchased this edition. 
This book helped us. It had a few steps included that her class notes didn’t have. So we were off and going.
This week we finished drafting the pattern, tracing it off, and cutting it out. I sewed mine up that evening. 
I had to cut into some quilting fabric I had because I didn’t have enough muslin fabric. So I have a very pretty sloper now.
This fits me loosely and I’m not sure if that’s correct or not. I know we did add seam allowances, so I’m thinking it’s correct. In the Suzy Furrer class we made a moulage and it was tight fitting. 
I’m actually so happy with how this fits, and how pretty it is. I’m almost thinking of adding sleeves and buttons to the front to make it an actual blouse. 
Ah, but the back… Here it doesn’t look so pretty. I guess a sloper it will stay.
Overall, I’m very happy with how this sloper turned out. I’m sure it can use a few tweaks but it’s very close to wearable as it is.
This isn’t the only project I’ve been working on. I have something fun to share from Porcelynne in the coming weeks.
Happy creating!
I don’t particularly care for these slopers with only one dart, as they’re so unbalanced. The grainline is really thrown off and it becomes difficult to see how things should lie. When I was in design school, our slopers had two darts in the front, one from the shoulder and the other from the waist. The angle of yours is also extremely sharp. Once sewn, it should be a straight vertical line from the bust point to the waist, parallel to centre front.
Everyone’s views are different, of course, though I did work as a patternmaker in the fashion industry in Montreal, before my husband’s transfer to Edmonton, where I operated a home-based custom design and dressmaking business for a number of years. There were lots of slopers in my life, LOL.
Sandy, is there a resource you recommend? And do you teach courses on slopers? I wondered about the single dart in the front. But I’m very much a beginner here.
I’ve got a collection of books, of course. 😉 My favourite sloper is from Esmod, the fashion design school in Paris. I lucked out when I found that book in Montreal. Winifred Aldrich’s Metric Pattern Cutting is very good and the sloper fits beautifully, even though it has one dart. That dart originates from the shoulder neck point and so doesn’t throw off the grain below the bustline. I’ve recently purchased MJ Shannon’s Ultimate Guide to Patterndrafting series, which is spendy, but looks really good. I’ll let you know what I think once I get into it (darned job!). The blocks look a lot like the ones I made at school, which I have to admit are my favourites.
I haven’t checked out Suzy Furrer’s class, but I like the look of that sloper. I’ll have a look at the Craftsy listing. Is there a reason you went with the Armstrong one? I like the book and own two editions, but have avoided the slopers and just used the designs as direction for making my own patterns.
I’d love to get into teaching at some point, perhaps virtually. Who knows?
I realized after hitting post that my statements about a particular sloper being my favourite could be confusing. The blocks we drafted at school were a variation on the ones contained in the Esmod book. Esmod’s is a princess seamed garment and ours were changed to have two darts, one each from the shoulder and waist. We also divided it up into a bodice that only came to the waist vs a full torso. The latter was drafted later, once we did a unit on a skirt as well as bodice designs.
We went with the Armstrong one because that was the course my friend took, and we were both wanting to redo our slopers. That was the only reason. I’d asked at Central if they’d offer classes on Slopers. Asked Ron Collins to consider it. So far, I’m not seeing any offered. In person classes would be fabulous because it’s hard to measure yourself accurately. I was thinking I would redo the Craftsy bodice sloper and compare them. The Craftsy one is a full torso bodice.
I think sloper classes are a hard sell. People seem to be more project-oriented. Personally, I believe that everyone should do one – you learn so much and then you can alter any pattern to fit or forget buying patterns and draft your own. It is so liberating! I’m working on blocks with a friend when she visits soon. You can’t properly measure yourself and a sewing friend is invaluable to the process.
And in-person classes offer an experience that you can’t replicate. After all, not only do you learn from your own work, but you learn from everyone else in the class. (One of the very best classes I’ve ever taken was from Beverly Johnson on bra fitting. At the end, we had to partner up and fit each other, then Beverly critiqued with everyone watching. It was amazing.)
Making one from the Craftsy class and comparing sounds like a worthwhile way to spend a day. You’ll come out ahead, I’m sure. You may even end up combining bits of each to customize further.
Off topic, but I’m glad to hear that Central Sewing is still around. I bought a Bernina 180E from them back in 2002 and she is running strong. Eastern Ontario is a desert for garment sewists.
It’s too bad Sloper classes are a hard sell. I’d sign up in a minute for exactly all the reasons you listed – draft my own patterns for clothing – that fit! Yes I did a class like the one you did but with Jeanette. It was great! Yes, it is good Central is still around. They have a new teacher this fall for Bra Making as I couldn’t stay on. I’m glad to see that too.