With all the clothes I’ve made, I’ve never had as many fit problems as I did with the Wiksten Shift. It is made for upright folks who don’t mind lots of ease. I have rounded shoulders and don’t want to look pregnant. But hey, problems with a pattern are an opportunity to keep adjusting the pattern until it fits.

So I did.

For this version of the Wiksten Shift Top, I removed just under 2 inches of ease from the pattern, by making two cuts from the hem of the back pattern piece and overlapping each cut a little less than half an inch. I swung the front piece forward over the fold of the fabric by a quarter inch when I traced it so that I wouldn’t be taking all the ease out of the back piece, thereby creating new and different issues.

I increased the seam allowance so I could finish it with French seams without affecting the fit, lengthened the sleeve pattern piece, and lowered the neckline. Also to accommodate my French seam finish, I shortened the top portion of the sleeve. The way the sleeve attaches to the top in the pattern instructions uses up a lot of fabric, but my French seams only use 5/8 in. seam allowance, so I wanted to pull the top part of the sleeve up a little higher to leave the drop shoulder seam further up on my arms.

I cut the sleeves pieces at the selvage and skipped hemming them. Since my sleeves are rolled up, you can’t see it, but the pattern goes right up to the edge with a really nice, clean finish.I also did the two adjustments that were required based on my body type – the High Round Back adjustment (for me, 1/2 an inch), and the Forward Shoulder Adjustment (I added 1/4 inch to the shoulder seams of the back piece and took 1/2 inch from the front seams. With the High Round Back adjustment this brought the shoulder seams forward half an inch).

The pattern pieces had been floating around on my dining room table waiting for attention for so long that they were rumpled and had some taco sauce on them. After I hacked the pattern up, down, and sideways, it looked even more disheveled. Just like that, I owned my posture and made clothes that fit me now, not an ideal and nonexistent upright me. The resulting shirt sits just where it should on my shoulders and doesn’t GO anywhere. This can’t be taken for granted.In the sewing community, we get a bit dodgy about using our Nani Iro double gauze – it is a bit pricy, luxuriously soft, and if you make a mistake, its delightful folds will easily absorb your tears. I’m glad I used my first Nani Iro fabric on this top. With all the adjustments, I got a great fit that lived up to the expectations of the beautiful fabric I made it with.