Hello everyone,
First time posting on the forum (yikes!) and I wanted to ask a simple question regarding shoulder drop. How can I accurately measure the drop without the use of a Perkins shoulder device?! I'm usually one for gauging by eye and making adjustments/recutting as I go through fittings but I've recently become obsessed with trying to find a better method... And, I can't find a second hand shoulder device for love nor money, ha ha.
I'm still at the beginning of my bespoke tailoring journey and have slowly been getting to grips with understanding form and fit - more towards ladies suits. However, I'm keen to know if there are any handy secrets to measuring/figuring out shoulder drops and so on before getting stuck into drafting and making.
We all know that Perkins tailoring instruments (and the likes!) haven't always been around, so if anyone can give their advice I would be eternally grateful. :~)
Thank you in advance!!
_m
PS, for women, the 'apex' point to tip of shoulder is used for front measurement. Same principle, draw a couple of arks and where they intersect on the draft is the shoulder tip position.
You can take measurements from the tip of each shoulder at the seam, to the centre front @ (true) waist height. Same for centre back. Then take length measurements from side of neck to the tip of the shoulder.
Now front and back parts each have two pairs of coordinates (for left and right) which determine shoulder positions on a draft. Using either a specialist drafting compass (can't remember what mine is called, but can provide details on request), or a tape measure (more on this in a moment), you draw arcs to determine the true position of the shoulder tips. Or you can jiggle a couple of rulers until you find the intersection of shoulder length and tip-to-centre front/back measurements.
If you have a tape measure with a hole in the end, you can insert the tip of a pencil or chalk pencil in the hole, measure out the distance and hold down that part of the tape with a fingertip. Rotate the finger tip as you rotate the pen. It's a bit rough and ready, but it should get you close enough to the proper position. Rulers can then be brought into play to fine tune things if necessary.
Personally, I don't see any real benefit to complicated devices. It's not that much extra work to draft a standard shoulder drop (generally more straight than most people require), then at the first fitting simply pinch out the amount that needs to be removed. Or, if a straighter shoulder is required, simply slash the basting stitches and smooth the shoulder into the correct position, using the inlay at the front shoulder seam. But good luck with your search, this could be an interesting thread.
https://freesewing.org doesn't differ between the left and right shoulder, however, they use a method of getting a selfie and then measuring the angle between a shoulder and an imaginary horizontal line. So, I have just pondered a bit about that... What you could do, is get a decent bit of paper (you're drafting a pattern, aren't you? 😉) - draw a bunch of horizontal lines on them, 1" or even 1/2" apart. Then tape that to a wall or door, at shoulder height - make sure it's level! Put your victim (or yourself) in front of that - and take a picture.
That way, you should get a pretty accurate idea of the difference between both shoulders AND it should give you a clue, if possibly both shoulders drop more than average.
*** In the Netherlands, this is what we call "Mustard after dinner" - I found out that a) both my shoulders drop more than average and b) my right shoulder drops even more! Now, if I'd have thought of this before ... it might have spared me a lot (10+ times) of re-basting the shoulders ***