McCall 6617 (1946) experiments in restoration Part I

I got McCall 6617, a very nice and very wearable 1946 blouse pattern, with another pattern, as a giveaway because it's missing a piece.  





It turns out that it's missing the entire front.  Sigh.  Of course it couldn't be a facing or a sleeve band or some other easily-reproduced bit, right.



This gives me an excuse to try scaling up a new pattern piece from the line drawing on the back of the packet.  I don't expect this to work flawlessly, but I hope it gets me closer than just trying to redraw it freehand.

I'm using the back bodice piece for scale since I have it and can compare it to the drawing, and it has a convenient and easily-measured straight line down the center back where it would be cut on the fold.

I am assuming a size 16 since that would be mid-range and is the size pattern catalogs used to estimate yardage.  Arbitrary, less, but one has to start somewhere.

The copier I have on hand only goes up to 400% so I had to scale up in stages.  I scaled up and then measured.  The center-to-underarm horizontal measure came out to two inches, which was convenient since the pattern at full size would have been 11 inches (my piece is 10 1/2 inches but it's a bust 32.  A bust 34 could safely be estimated to be about a half-inch larger horizontally).


One I got it scaled up to four inches across the underarm, I had to cut it into sections to fit on the copier.





I copied each section individually at 275%, then cut out and taped the pieces together.




It's too long, and shallow across the lower armscye, but it's at least ballpark.  I think I can use this method on the blouse front, assuming I expect to do some fitting muslins.




Overlay comparison:




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