Charity shop wool blazer, took 3cm total out of each side seam from underarm to hem to lose the boxiness. It looks much better standing still and now I can barely reach forward, the armholes feel a size smaller. I didn't touch the sleeves. Can this be recovered or have I ruined it?
Before you unpick, check whether the sleeve head is now sitting differently. On a lined jacket, taking in the body drags the armhole seam and the lining will tell you. If the lining is pulling at the underarm it needs releasing and re-hanging too, otherwise it'll bind even after you fix the shell.
For future charity shop jackets: buy for the shoulders and the chest, alter everything else. Shoulder width is the one thing that's genuinely difficult and expensive to change, and it's what makes a jacket look wrong when it's off.
Shoulders fit, which is presumably why I bought it in the first place. Good rule to keep.
Press the seams open properly over a ham as you go. A lot of feels-tight-after-alteration is a seam that hasn't been pressed and is standing up inside the garment.
@seamripper_sol · 5mo ago · 3 replies
Recoverable, and it's the standard mistake so don't feel bad. Taking the side seam in all the way to the underarm removes width from the chest and back exactly where you need it to move, and it effectively narrows the armhole even though you never touched it.
The fix: unpick the top 10-12cm of each side seam and taper the alteration so it's zero at the underarm and reaches the full amount at around waist level. You'll keep most of the shape improvement and get all your movement back.
If you want the chest slimmer too, that comes out of the back, either a centre back seam adjustment or a small vertical dart under the shoulder blade. Side seams are where waist shaping goes, and that's basically it.
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@hip_opener_hana · 5mo ago
Tapered to zero at the underarm and it's completely fine again. And it still looks much better than it did originally.
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@upright_uma · 5mo ago
This is why altering a jacket is a series of small changes rather than one big one. Every seam does a specific job and moving the wrong one costs you movement.
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