A Petal Sleeve Shirt Sewing Tutorial
Today we’re going to make a petal sleeve shirt with short sleeves out of this fun bird fabric. And it’s going to be lovely.
Material:
- ¾ – 1 yard of fabric
- matching thread
- pattern paper (to draft the sleeves)
The skinny:
This petal sleeve shirt is super easy. It’s just your basic t-shirt with a slight fashion twist with the sleeves. But don’t let that fool you. With the right fabric, this shirt can be super classy.
Fold your fabric in half. Lay out a shirt that fits you well to use as a guide. I’m using my Lacy Summer T-Shirt as my guide. Tuck the arms in and cut around it, adding your desired seam allowance. This will create the front and back pieces to the shirt.
Adjust the neckline on the front shirt as desired. I’m going to give mine a scoop neckline in the front, and a slightly lesser scoop neckline in the back. Using your shirt fabric as guides, cut out a neckline lining from the front and back of the shirt. I made mine 1½” wide.
Next, make your sleeve patterns using this little petal sleeve pattern tutorial here. Cut out four of these.
Take your front and back shirt pieces. Right sides together, pin then sew across the top of each shoulder. Trim off any excess fabric.
Now take your neckline linings. Right sides together, pin and sew across each end. This will make a circle of sorts. Trim off any excess fabric. I’m sewing this with a slightly wider seam allowance, to make it slightly narrower than the shirt neckline. That way when I sew the two together, it will help the neckline keep its shape.
Right sides together, pin the neckline lining to the bodice pieces. To make sure it is put on evenly, first pin each seam of the neckline lining to the to top each shoulder, then pin the middle of the front of the lining to the middle of the front neckline, and then the middle of the back of the lining to the middle of the back of the neckline. Add more pins as you want but you will have to try and make sure it’s pinned evenly. Sew this together.
Tuck the neck lining fabric into the inside of the shirt so you see the right side of the seam. Pin the lining in place on the wrong side of the shirt and again sew around the neckline, but this time use a wide straight stitch.
Okay. Now, the sleeves. First time doing a petal sleeve for me. Here goes!
On each of the four sleeve pieces, hem along the bottom of the sleeve.
For ease, I’m going to sew the two sleeve pieces to each other to make two sleeves. For this, I’m just going to use a wide straight stitch, just to sort of tack them together before sewing them to the shirt.
Now, right side to right side, pin and sew the sleeves to the shirt, making sure to match the center of the sleeve to the center of the sleeve hole and sew from armpit to armpit. Do this for each side.
Now we will sew the sides of the shirt together. Right sides together, starting with the end of one sleeve, pin and sew along the bottom of the sleeve to the armpit, along the side, and down to the bottom of the shirt. I’m giving the bottom of my shirt a little scallop edge at the sides, so I’m going to stop my stitch 5″ from the bottom of the shirt. Repeat this for the other side.
Hem along the bottom of the shirt, taking care when sewing up and around the side slits. Use as many pins as you need to help keep things in place!
And now a petal sleeve shirt is in the books!
My housekeeping notes:
Stretch Needle: settings, 10, 3.5, 2.5
settings, 03, 4,5, 2.5 or 0.3, 4.5, 2.0 for a more wavy hem
settings, 0, 3.5, 3.5