Glossary of Sewing Terms with Pictures: What is an armscye? #SewingChat #SewingVocabulary

Armscye: The portion of a garment where a sleeve can be attached to the bodice. Left: a Disney Princess Toddler doll models a sleeveless garment, with brackets around her exposed shoulder and the arm hole of the garment. Center Top: Bodice front, bodice sleeve, and bodice back pattern pieces are laid out, with arrows showing where the sleeve’s curved top area is joined to the armscye. Center Bottom: where sleeve and garment front have been sewn together, exaggerated stitches demonstrate the armscye. Lower Right: learn more at Chelly Wood dot com. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable sewing patterns for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

DEFINITION: The portion of a garment where a sleeve can be attached to the bodice.

This is my own definition. Of course you can google this term to find other definitions as well.

It should be noted that I’ve only heard this word pronounced like “arm – sigh,” but when doing research for today’s blog post, I also heard someone say it as “arm’s eye.” Perhaps the pronunciation difference is regional. In the comments, I’d like to see what you think.

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Free sewing patterns for 18 inch dolls. Left: a graphic shows a dusty-rose colored pinafore over a cream colored long-sleeved shirt with a collar. Center, we see a Journey Girls doll modeling a handmade pink pinafore style dress with a scoop collar and extra large sleeve holes. The dress is made of pink cotton dotted with tiny yellow, white, and green flowers. The print is reminiscent of mid-century modern fabric styles. Far right: a Kaya doll from American Girl models the same pink cotton dress. Visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns for making this and other 18 inch doll clothes. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable sewing patterns for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

As I understand it, even if you’re talking about a sleeveless garment (shown on the left in the image above), that arm hole area is still called an armscye. Somebody correct me in the comments if I’m wrong about that.

And when we look at the ChellyWood.com logo, which appears at the bottom of that image, you’ll see a turquoise blue outline bodice pattern behind the letter C at the start of the logo. That part of a garment pattern that’s shaped sort of like a closed parenthesis ) — that’s the armscye.

Dolman sleeves don’t really use an armscye, as the sleeve is already attached. (See image below.)

What is directional fabric? Top image shows the garment front with dolman sleeves (the kind of sleeves that stick out from the basic rectangle that makes the dress front, like the square sleeves of a kimono). The pattern of tulips and other stylized flowers on this red dress front are all facing upright, with their leaves coming up from the bottom of the flowers’ stems. Bottom image shows the same dress’s back pieces cut out with the fabric going the wrong direction. In other words, the tulips and stylized flowers are all upside down. Each flower stands on its head, with its leaves jutting out from the top of the stem, which is above the flower’s blossom. So the backs were cut out with the directional fabric going the wrong way, and the main reason we can tell is because these dolman sleeves form a T-shape, which tells us where the top of the garment is. But the flowers are all upside down. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable sewing patterns for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

And some jacket patterns will have more of a horseshoe shaped armscye. A pink arrow points to the armscye in the image below:

The tiny green arrow points at a strangely M-shaped sleeve pattern. The yellow arrow shows where the pattern for the yoke has been torn at the bottom of its S-curve. The jacket front has been torn at the sleeve attachment area (which is open at the shoulder but closed at the underarm) and along the neckline. A pink arrow points at the sleeve opening of the jacket while the turquoise blue arrow points at the neckline tear. The skirt pattern is clearly an A-line skirt, but it, too, has a tear along the hemline. These pattern pieces rest on a green cutting board next to the envelope for the Advance 9939 doll clothes sewing pattern, where we see a drawing of a brunette pony tail Barbie modeling a yellow version of the business suit these patterns will make. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

The green arrow above points to the sleeve, and that dip in the sleeve is where you would attach it to the lowest part of the horseshoe shape on the armscye.

That pattern comes with the Advance 9939 vintage sewing pattern for Barbie.

This image shows me attaching that sleeve in figures 2 and 3:

Figure one shows a woman's fingers pressed toward the center of the M-shaped top of the sleeve, where she is gathering the fabric. Figure two shows that she has stitched this gathered area to the inside of the bodice's sleeve opening, with right sides together. Figure three shows that she has done the same with the other sleeve. Figure four shows how she tried to attach the S-shaped lining yokes to the front of the garment, but it isn't fitting properly. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

If you want to learn more about how this is done, I wrote a whole article about that method of attaching sleeves to the armscye. The article is called, “I made a SUPER CUTE Valentine’s Day jacket for Barbie.” You can click on that link to read the whole article.

Last year’s Halloween / fall ensemble for vintage Barbie, regular Barbie, and Curvy Barbie uses more of a traditional fitted sleeve. You can see that shirt below.

Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

If you’d like to make this ensemble, click here for the free doll clothes patterns.

And in the image below, you can see where the armscye is located after we sew the shirt backs to the shirt front along the shoulder seam.

What is an armscye? A shirt has been sewn together at the shoulders, and it lays flat on a purple surface with the back pieces extending from the shoulder seams. The bodice backs are labeled, as is the bodice front. The garment has not been sewn from underarm to hem yet. Where front and backs come together at the shoulder, there's a bracket indicating that this "arm hole area" is the armscye, on both sides of the shirt. — Please visit ChellyWood.com for free printable PDF sewing patterns and tutorial videos for making doll clothes to fit dolls of many shapes and all different sizes.

DISCUSSION QUESTION: I’ve only heard this word pronounced like “arm – sigh,” but when doing research for today’s blog post, I also heard someone say it as “arm’s eye.” How have you heard it said? Do any of you know if there’s a regional difference in the way it’s pronounced? In the comments, please give me your thoughts on the pronunciation of this word.

Please come back to this blog post at the end of next week, so you can see what comments other people left!

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Chelly Wood and the ChellyWood.com website are not affiliated with any of the doll or toy companies mentioned in this blog post, but Chelly enjoys designing her doll clothes to fit a variety of dolls. To learn more about the doll companies mentioned in today’s post, please visit the doll or toy company’s website.