Some pattern making

Today, I finally had a chance to work on that jacket pattern. In your comments to my previous post, some people asked about the pattern so I thought I would show it to you.

When working on the alterations I had described, I also kept thinking about making a real raglan sleeve version. That might make the acute angle between the lower edge and the bottom of the sleeve a bit more natural. I ended up drafting both. I will make a muslin of each and see which one I like best. 

This is the old pattern piece for the front (all pattern pieces are without seam allowances or anything like that). See that narrow, straight collar piece? That was my problem. I can't show you the old back-and-sleeve piece because I re-used it to make the new version.

This is the new half-kimono-sleeve version. I you look closely, you can even see where I added width to the sleeve. I also added so width to the bottom of the side seam to compensate for what I took away on the front pattern piece (where I needed to remove some material at chest height but wanted to keep that curved line). To the right is the new front piece, with above it the under collar. At far right is the collar and front edge facing and the back neck facing is that little C-shaped piece at the top.
This collar was drafted using the full instructions for a tailored shawl collar. And obviously, it was drafted on a much wider neck ring than before.

And this is the raglan sleeve version. I used the same collar pieces but completely re-designed the body around it. This variation has a very small back piece (which, unfortunately, refused to stay flat on the floor), a front piece which does extend under the arm and a huge one-piece raglan sleeve. Pattern makers among you will know that a traditional raglan sleeve for a woven fabric is normally cut in two pieces or has a shoulder dart. In this case, with the odd shape of the jacket and the tiny sliver of material at the front shoulder, I thought I could get away with some creative messing around. I turned it into this: A one-piece sleeve without shoulder shaping. We'll see how it works in the muslin.  

I had hoped to also finish the muslins today but, as so often, time was passing faster than I thought. At this moment, I really don't know which option I will prefer but both are fairly approximations of the design in the photograph.