Garment cutting in the twentieth century

by Günther F. Hertzer

I will here mention one difficulty I have had to contend with, and I have no doubt but that others have experienced the same trouble, and that a great many more will have the same vexation after this, unless they understand the principle of their work. Sometimes my pants turned out to be too long, and at other times too short; and no matter how long or how short I took the measures they would turn out to be just the opposite. Without going into details, I will give the reasons for such defects as I have learned to understand them.

Pants may be too long or too short without any other fault; and such must simply be made shorter or longer. No cutter need expect to be exempt from the necessity of such alteration, and such alteration I do not speak of as meaning faulty pants. I speak of too long or too short pants which are too long or too short because the misconstructed leg twists somewhere, and produces folds or wrinkles, and consequently draws the bottom up or down. Pants may be too long because the fork is not large enough from some cause, and cannot be drawn up into the crotch, and must be let down and cut off below; but such a garment will draw up at every step, and when the wearer assumes the sitting position the bottom will crawl half way to the knee.

Pants which have too much cloth in the front of the waist will be pulled backward under the buckle-straps, and in so doing the whole back will wrinkle and work downward, and will crawl under the heel at every step, unless made quite short; while walking, each step will draw a wrinkle from the bottom of the inner seam forward and upward to the knee. Many a garment of this kind we see every day upon the streets of every city and town.

Now comes the opposite. Pants which have too much back slope form extra large seats, and consequently they can be drawn as tightly as possible without cutting the wearer. Such must be cut extremely long at the bottom, and it will be found that it is not much of a trick to cut two pairs of pants for the same person of which one is to be an inch longer than the other. Pants that are cut away too much in front and back, and spread sidewise, will also become too short at the bottom, because in bringing the side to the body the whole front and inner seam are laid in wrinkles, which take up length. Such may be made long enough by opening the side seam and giving the whole side seam at the thigh a good stretching, extending backward and forward as far as possible.

Another cause for shortness of pants at the bottom is when the fork is not cut deep enough, for if the point of the fork is too high for the front and back curve, the extra height will fold up, and, of course, being within the measure, will be missing below. In this connection it is perhaps the proper place to point out the way in which to treat the crotch, as regards the depth of the fork point. From the front base line of the angle of 7½ deg., mark at 6¾ for the seat line, and square to the side; mark lines 8 and 10, make the division of the angle of 7½ deg. on line 8 as 3 and 9 sidewise and 3 forward; then square from the inside line of the angle of 10 deg. through 10 in front of the thigh. And observe, that squaring through point 10 from the front line of the angle of 10 deg., as directed in this work, will locate the fork point ½ inch lower than if the squaring was done from the center of the angle of 10 deg. through point 10.

If the back is made 4¾ wide, the point of the back must sink about ¼ inch lower than that square line through point 10, but a sweep from point 80 would bring all points on the same sweep. At the angle of 10 deg., the undress fork is about ⅛ to ¼ higher than the sweep or the square line, while the dress fork and back are about ⅜ above the sweep. All of which must be observed in shaping the crotch.

The width of the knee should in all cases be measured, but in the absence of a positive measurement, it should be observed that the half-seat measure gives a good width for the knee for size 36, but size 48 is large enough with 22 in., or 2 in. less than half seat, while size 24 requires a knee of at least 14 in., or 2 in. more than half seat, and it should be easy for every cutter to grade the sizes between. The same variations must be made at the bottoms.

The points of the fork must be considered unchangeable, except for style, and all changes, as to the backward or forward leaning waists, must be made upward. The fact is, that the fork and the seat are the only parts of the pants which can be obtained satisfactorily by the scale; all other widths and all lengths must be obtained by the measure.

By observing Dia. [XV] it will be seen that a certain hole is cut out of a certain sheet which the body is expected to fill out, and whenever the front is made larger it must be made that much smaller in the back, and vice versa. On top of waist, the body shifts backward and forward, and the pants must follow, while both body and pants must be considered stationary at the fork. Dia. [XV] was intended to represent a large waist, and also a forward-leaning waist, hence the front of the body is in front of the base, showing that the front of the pants requires additional cloth. The position of Fig. and Dia. [XV] must be considered as a person split in two from back to front, and a sheet of paper applied as shown by the diagram.