Sleeves On Saturday

Oh my, do I owe everyone an apology. I came home yesterday afternoon with every intention of posting the first of our new series. "Just a short nap," is what I told myself. Well, the short nap lasted quite a bit longer. Thankfully I awoke in the nick of time to go and pick my husband up from the airport last night. Please forgive me. Evidently I really needed the rest.
So we begin with what I hope will be a fun and enlightening series. I've always felt that an interesting sleeve can make what would otherwise be a plain garment, really pop. If you come across a sleeve that you would like for me to explore, send me a picture and I'll be happy to see what I can do.

 Our first sleeve looks a bit complicated, but it is really quite easy to do. It looks fantastic on a jacket.

 As you can see, there is a seam in the center of sleeve at the wrist and there is the piece that folds over and forms a "V."

To begin, you will need a normal sleeve pattern. Make sure it is not a fitted sleeve as you want there to be some fullness in the sleeve.

 Draw a horizontal line at the bicep area. From this line, turn the sleeve into a straight sleeve by squaring a line down to the wrist line. This line is shown in red in the picture below.

Now the fun begins. Find the mid point on the side seams of the sleeve. From this point, draw a line down to the wrist that is 1" out on either side of the wrist line. This is shown in red in the picture below.

Find the mid point of the wrist line. Measure up 2". This will be the top of your curved line as shown above. To determine the opening of your sleeve, measure around your fist and add a little ease to this measurement. This will allow for your hand to easily go through the wrist opening of your sleeve. If your measurement is 10", you will divide that measurement in half, which will be 5" and you will measure in 5" on either side of you sleeve at the wrist. To compensate for the 2" that will be cut out of your sleeve, will will need to add that back. The extended line that you see in the picture above at the wrist is 2" below the wrist line. Draw in your curved line and connect the extended wrist line to the side seams.  

Your final pattern will look like the above picture. Be sure to add seam allowance to your new line. A 1/4" seam will be sufficient.

To sew the wrist seam, fold the curved line in half and stitch. 

Once sewn and turned, your seam at the wrist line will look like this. Now if you have a fabric with some drape, you can play around with the point.

My fabric is a very structured woven, so I tacked the point down and added a button.
Enjoy!
This is the first of our year long series, so there will be 52 sleeves in all. I'll be back next Saturday as long as I don't pull another Rip Van Winkle!
Hope you're having a lovely weekend.
Rhonda