Wanted - Early 1930s Tailor's Draft Guide

[Cafe Impecunious]

I am looking for a 1930s tailors manual and drafting guide, preferably from 1932-33, as I am working on a copy of Clark Gable's suit in It Happened One Night, and I would like to use a period appropriate guide for drafting out the pattern.
Thank You!

[Steelmillal]

Fantastic movie! Quick wit and funny!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wcrth90C3D4

The belted waist and lapel width jump out at me. Maybe Mitchell since it evolved from that era into the 1970s final publishing.

http://movsd.com/BespokeCutter/index.php?topic=345.15
https://web.archive.org/web/20150906224624/http://www.cutterandtailor.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=546
https://www.pinterest.fr/pin/271834527497476858/

maybe that helps..good luck

[Schneiderfrei]

I have noticed that many drafts in books from the 50's are in fact more or less copies from the 30's. 

The main thing to note are

1 - Fashion points, such as the lapel, waist suppression length shoulder seam etc.

2 - Allowances, such as ease at waist, chest, sleeve etc.

If you get those things right, you can produce a properly styled garment that actually fits.  Drafting advanced a long way between 1930 and 2000.

[Greger]

The back is rather easy to make. The bottom part is a sewn on skirt. The top and bottom lines are probably curved lines with a drop in center of about 1/2 inch to 1 inch. This would depend on the shape of the seat. The top part is probably folded down the center adding in something like 4 inches. it is a single back (top part) and while folded cut that way. Many tailors did a number of "tricks" that way. The seam in back is covered with a belt. That is, probably 2/3 above and 1/3 below.
https://ia801601.us.archive.org/11/items/in.ernet.dli.2015.461004/2015.461004.The-Modern.pdf page 130 shows another way to do a similar back (it might be the same one).
https://archive.org/search.php?query=The%20Modern%20Tailor%20Outfitter%20and%20Clothier this one shows the other two volumes of the set.

[TSjursen]

This reprint of the MTOC is from 1928: https://www.amazon.com/Modern-Tailor-Outfitter-Clothier-Vol/dp/1445505355
There was a second edition in 1933, some of those drafts were put up on the old cutter and tailor forum I believe, but you would have to look for them manually via the internet wayback machine. The style changes between 28 and 33 were not huge though.

As others have noted these drafts are quite different from modern ones. Somewhat simpler in a way, more is required of the cutter in terms of experience, and there are a few "secrets" in the drafts you should know about that would have been taken for granted back then. If you want to use the old drafts these are some points you should keep in mind:

- There is no side body and no front chest/belly cut hidden in the pocket seam as in modern drafts, which limits the size of the front and underarm darts depending on how well the fabric takes to the iron. If you take out too much and are unable to shrink and "push" the resulting fullness at the front of the pocket mouth backwards over the hips, you will end up with unsightful ripples and looseness in the pocket area.
- All of the drafts have a "crooked" neck point position, which means that it is necessary to either take out a large dart in the gorge or under the lapel, or alternatively to shrink it in with the iron. This darting or ironwork has the same purpouse (although with a slightly different end effect) as the modern chest cut placed through the front dart and pocket, to make the jacket fit more nicely over the round of the chest. A common practice back then was to use the "bridle", the lapel break line stay tape, to hold in the required amount of fullness in both the fabric and canvas. It is done after basting in the canvas but before padding the lapels. It also requires that the canvas is at least somewhat on the bias along the lapel break line, otherwise you wont be able to shrink in any fullness. Putting the straight of the canvas along the front edge of the coat usually gives enough bias unless the roll of the lapel is very long. How much you need to shrink is a matter of experience and also depends on the customer, but 5/8" to 1" at most is a rough guide. You can also baste the coat together without shrinking the break line and then use pins with the garment on the customer to ascertain how much shrinking is needed to make the break line hug the chest and the front edges of the coat parallel to each other. If you don't shrink enough the coat will have a too long front balance and it will swing away when unbuttoned. If you find you need to shrink more than about an inch it is a better plan to shorten the front balance of the coat instead.
- The shoulder ironwork is done on the shoulder seam and armhole seam, not in the gorge as in modern drafts. Sometimes the middle of the shoulder was also shrunk to produce a similar effect but that is more liable to return in wear than the stretching, which is sort of locked in the seams.
- The sleeve system from the early mtoc in my experience gives a sleeve with too much fullness in the top sleeve between the front and back notches. I would recommend measuring the scye/armhole and the sleeve after drafting to ensure the amount of fullness is not too extreme. Around 10-12% fullness in the top sleeve is a good middle ground. Another point to note is that the sleeves of this era have a flat sleeve cap or crown, and an undersleeve which is not very scooped out as in modern drafts. This type of sleeve will not look as good or clean as the modern one, but it is more comfortable in wear due to the extra folds of material in the hindarm. Many customers find this unclean back sleeve unsightly though, in that case you might have to scoop out more from the undersleeve. Interestingly enough there is a small chapter somewhere in the back of the book relating to catering for american customers, where the authors note that the americans typically favor a clean back sleeve.

Scans of "Practical Tailoring", from the same era, are available somewhere on this forum I believe. If you follow the instructions there you should get a coat with a good period look. It explains the ironwork and other peculiarities of tailoring of that era as well.