How to Adjust Sewing Patterns for Petite or Tall Figures: A UK Sizing Guide

You chose your size from the chart, cut the fabric and sewed it up, and the shoulders fit beautifully. Then you spot the waistline sitting somewhere under your ribs, or a hem pooling 5 cm lower than the illustration promised. Nothing has gone wrong. Commercial patterns are drafted to one standard figure, and yours may not be it. Length, happily, is the easiest thing to alter: one line, one slice, a little tape.

Why Your Height Changes the Pattern

Most commercial patterns are drafted for a figure of around 5 ft 6 in (168 cm). Above and below that, the proportions are fixed: shoulder to bust, bust to waist, waist to knee. If you are shorter or taller, a pattern can be the right size around your body and the wrong length up and down it.

That is what the lengthen or shorten lines on the tissue are for, usually printed as a double line with arrows across the bodice, sleeve and leg. Learning to use them takes minutes and saves a lot of pointless hem fiddling later.

Height alone will not tell you where to work, though. A tall woman can be short from shoulder to waist and long in the leg. Two people of the same height often need opposite adjustments.

Measure Yourself, Then Measure the Pattern

Take your vertical measurements with a tape over light clothing, standing naturally. Ask someone to help with the back ones; twisting round to read the tape changes the number.

• Back waist length: from the bump at the base of your neck to your natural waist — the crease you feel when you bend sideways.
• Shoulder to bust point: from the shoulder seam down over the fullest part of the bust.
• Waist to hip: from your natural waist to the fullest part of your seat.
• Crotch depth: sit on a hard chair and measure from your waist down to the chair seat.
• Inside leg: from the crotch to the floor, or to wherever you like a trouser hem to sit.
• Sleeve length: shoulder point to wrist bone, arm slightly bent.
• Waist to knee: taken standing, to the crease at the back of your knee.

Now find the same landmarks on the paper pattern. Waistline, hipline, bust point, elbow and knee lines are usually marked with a small cross or line. Measure between them and compare with your own numbers. The differences — not your height — decide what you alter.

One further check for UK sewers: pattern sizes are not shop sizes. The 14 printed on an envelope is drafted to specific bust, waist and hip measurements that will not match the 14 on the rail. Ignore the number and work from the chart. On a fitted bodice, many sewers choose the size matching their upper chest or high bust, then adjust the bust separately.

Where to Make the Adjustment

Almost every length change happens at a printed line, not at the hem or the shoulder. Move the line and the design features travel with it. Trim the hem and only the hem moves.

Bodices and tops

Bodice pieces usually carry two lines: one between shoulder and bust, one between bust and waist. If you are short-waisted, take a little from both, or more from the upper line if your bust sits high. If you are long-waisted, add there. Work on front and back by the same amount or the side seams will not meet.

Sleeves

Sleeves are shortened or lengthened at the line just above or below the elbow. If you are removing more than about 2 cm, work above the elbow so the sleeve cap and any elbow dart keep their shape. Leave the cuff and placket alone; they belong at the wrist.

Skirts and dresses

The line sits between hip and knee. Taking length out above the knee rather than at the hem keeps the flare and hem shaping as designed and stops a petite skirt turning into a bell.

Trousers

Trousers need two separate checks. Leg length is shortened at the line above the knee, which keeps the knee shaping in the right place. Crotch depth is shortened at the line between waist and hip. Shorten only at the hem and the knee sits too low, the legs look shorter and the whole shape reads as borrowed.

Slash, Spread and Overlap

1. Trace a copy of every piece you are changing. Keep the original flat and unmarked, so a mistake costs you nothing.
2. Draw a cutting line parallel to the printed one if none exists, squared across the piece so it runs at right angles to the grainline.
3. Cut along the line. Do not cut through a dart, a pocket opening or the bust point; if the printed line does, split the adjustment into two smaller ones either side.
4. To lengthen, place the halves on a sheet of paper the right distance apart, grainlines aligned and cut edges parallel. Tape down, then continue the side seams and centre lines across the gap with a ruler or curve.
5. To shorten, overlap the halves by the amount needed, keeping the cut edges parallel and the grainlines true. Tape.
6. Walk the seams. Pin the front side seam to the back side seam and check the lengths match, and that notches and pocket markings still line up with the pieces they meet.

Vertical length is added or removed in full on each piece. Width is different: any change to a bust, waist or hip measurement gets shared between the front and back.

Petite and Tall Are Not Single Shapes

Roughly speaking, the trade calls a figure petite at about 5 ft 3 in (160 cm) and under, and tall from about 5 ft 8 in (173 cm) upwards. Neither word describes a proportion, only a range of heights.

A petite sewer with an average torso and short legs should leave the bodice alone and shorten the legs above the knee. Someone short from shoulder to waist but long-legged does the opposite. Tall figures divide the same way: a long back needs a bodice adjustment, long legs need the leg line moved.

Some pattern companies sell petite and tall blocks, but check the chart before trusting the word on the envelope. Compare the back waist length and inside leg with your own numbers; those two will tell you quickly whether a block is close enough to work with.

Check the Fit in a Toile

Sew a toile in calico or an old bedsheet before cutting the real fabric, especially for anything fitted. Use a long machine stitch, mark the seam lines rather than trimming them, and skip interfacing and lining. Draw the waistline and hip line across the toile in marker pen so you can see where they land. Wear the shoes and undergarments you intend to wear with the finished garment.

• The waistline sits at your natural waist, not above or below it.
• Side seams hang vertically. A weighted thread hung from each shoulder makes this easy to judge.
• The hem is level with the floor all the way round, or sits where you want it.
• Trouser legs put the knee line at your knee, with no hanging crotch.
• Sleeves end at the wrist bone with the arm slightly bent.

Pin out anything that needs changing, mark the corrections on the toile, then transfer them to your traced pattern. If you have moved more than 2–3 cm in one place, sew a second toile. It is still quicker than unpicking a finished garment.

Keep Your Numbers, Keep Your Pattern

Write the alterations on the traced pattern — what you changed, by how much, and the date — and slip it into the envelope with the original. Next time you use it, the work is already done.

Keep a page in a notebook with your back waist length, inside leg, waist-to-knee and sleeve length, and check them now and then; bodies change slowly and quietly. After a few projects you will have a small library of patterns altered to your proportions, and a new pattern becomes easier to judge: hold it against your tried-and-tested pieces and you will see at a glance where it needs moving.

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