Pattern Test: Wardrobe Builder Tee

Okay, life has been crazy in the past couple months.  We have to move to continue my husband's training (on to fellowship!) so we have been prepping our house to sell, navigating offers, counter offers, inspections, finding a place to live in our new location, and on and so forth.  I've had my head down getting it all figured out and never even blogged about projects I finished up right before the chaos started.  But I'm starting to surface now that all of that stuff is getting resolved and figured out.

I tested the Wardrobe Builder Tee from Wardrobe by Me.  I've been wanting a versatile well drafted pattern for T-shirts to make my own shirts.  I completed three versions after making two muslins.  I made size 4 even though my measurements suggested I blend a 4 and 6.

The pattern has just about every option you would want for a basic wardrobe.  5 necklines (crew, scoop, deep scoop, boat, and v-neck), 5 sleeve lengths (cap, short, half, 3/4, and long-but you could also make it sleeveless which some testers did), 3 length options (regular, extra length, and curved), as well as a ruching option.  

Both of the shirts I made were long sleeve since it was winter here.  I loved the length of the sleeve.  It was just right for me.  I also really liked the regular length for the shirt.  The extra length was too much for me and I didn't try out the curved hem.  And I made the regular scoop neck for all of my shirts and really like where those hit.  I'm not sure the deep scoop or the v-neck are right for me (I'm not comfortable showing cleavage), but I can see myself adjusting them to be a bit more conservative for my taste.

What I'm not so sure about is the fit of the shoulders, under arms, and neckline.  The shoulders were too narrow for my broad shoulders, I seemed to get some wrinkles under the arm into the bust, and the neck band has some slight pulling on two of my versions. The neckline on my muslins were fine.  My actual shirts were made out of 2 way stretch ponte, a clearance find that looked like jacquard, and some interlock with no recovery layered with a stretch lace.  The first two materials were both thicker, stiffer, knits with strong recovery.  I think the slight pulling along the neckline in those versions is because of those materials. 

I tried making an adjustment for wide shoulders by extending the seam on the top of the shoulders out by 1.25 inches and adjusting the armscye.  That adjustment helped the sleeve to hit at an appropriate place on my shoulder, but then the seam where the sleeve attaches started poking up, making a funny box look.  And I sometimes get some wrinkles under my armpits after lifting my arms up.

I plan to make another version or two with this pattern to see if my material choice can solve some of those puckering/wrinkling problems and to see if I can figure out how to get that width in the shoulders without making the shoulder seam look weird.  Since I haven't been able to get to that yet (painting, decluttering, paring down my workspace to the bare essentials...) I haven't really formed my opinion of the pattern.  Maybe not as helpful of a post without a clear yes or no to the pattern, but I want to get all this information out before I forgot it all.