Men’s Shirt Pattern: McCall’s 2447

m2447_cover_smThe last shirt pattern I have to review is McCall’s 2447. I originally wanted this pattern so I could do a “formal” dress shirt, one that’s much dressier than the other shirt patterns in my collection.

And McCall’s 2447 caters to that upscale feel, with companion patterns for a vest, tie, and bow tie. The silhouette on the vest also seems much nicer than the vest included with Simplicity 2741, though I haven’t compared the patterns yet to see how the shape varies between the two.

I have a few cuts of very fine Italian shirting that I picked up from Britex Fabrics during one of their rare sales, that is waiting to be made with this pattern. I thought I was going to be making this pattern much farther in the future, but it seems like the future is now.

Let’s look at the features in McCall’s 2447 that make it suitable for my shirtmaking class. Again, you can click/tap any picture for an expanded version.

Sleeve

m2447_sleeve_detail Here’s the detail of the end of the sleeve piece. A few notes:

  • It’s a one-piece sleeve. Yay! Easier cutting and assembly, and it makes for a cleaner finished look since there’s fewer seams.
  • The end of the sleeve is not straight. It has a pronounced curve between the pleats and the under-arm seam. This is obviously some sort of styling feature who’s purpose I don’t understand. I want to see how it looks when put together.
  • It has cut lines for a proper tower placket! Yay!

So far, this sleeve is hitting all the right notes, and I’m intrigued by the curved styling on the cuff end.

Sleeve Placket

m2447_placketYes. A proper sleeve placket. This looks like it matches up nicely with Pam Howard’s Tower Placket Tutorial and it also looks like the tower placket pattern presented in David Coffin’s book.

Yoke

m2447_yokeMcCall’s 2447 has a very standard yoke, without weird western styling or extra pieces. It also marks where the shoulder seam should fall in relation to the yoke. It also seems to have two pleats over the shoulder blades, rather than one centered box pleat, which I kind of like. (Update: I looked at the instruction sheet, and it’s a centered box pleat. The shoulder blades simply appear to be regular pattern notches.)

Collar

m2447_collarMcCall’s 2447 also has a very sophisticated collar, with separate pieces for upper collar and a slightly smaller lower collar. There’s also a collar facing (not shown here).  This is very close to the collar presented in Pam Howard’s class.

Pocket

m2447_pocketA pocket with a curved bottom and an angled top hem (not a flap) is included. I’m not a big fan of the angled top hem, but it’s easy enough to flatten it while tracing the piece.

Front Band

m2447_front_bandThis pattern also has a front band. So I’m going to have to confront how this band works with the front piece as shown in Pam Howard’s class.

Views

This pattern has four views:

  • View A is a casual version with a button-down collar and standard cuffs. The collar omits some of the pieces such as the undercollar and the collar facing.
  • View B is the same as A, but has short sleeves.
  • View C is the full collar including the under collar and facing, with French cuffs.
  • View D is like View C, but uses contrasting collar and cuffs cut from a contrasting fabric. It also has French cuffs.

Summary

This pattern is the closest match to what I am seeing in Pam Howard’s class, so it’s what I’m going with. There’s a few differences that I will have to work out just like the others, but it gives me the greatest opportunity for learning with sophisticated patterns for collars, cuffs and plackets.

I plan to do View C, only using the standard cuff from View A.

In the next posts I’ll be looking at the fabric, interfacing and cutting.

 

3 thoughts on “Men’s Shirt Pattern: McCall’s 2447

  1. Robin Chambers

    The reason for the angled lower edge on the sleeve is to accommodate the curve of the arm. A two-piece sleeve has this built in; a one-piece achieves the same smooth hang by angling at the cuff seam. Try it, you’ll like it. I make all my husband’s dress shirts, and I make this adjustment if it isn’t on the pattern.

    1. mportuesisf Post author

      Thanks for the tip! I’m drafting my own sleeve for the shirt pattern I’m currently working on, and I’ll definitely take this into consideration.

  2. Beverly D. McDonald

    Hi, I recently purchased this pattern from McCall’s for only $2.99 and I guess I got what I paid for. Discounted instructions for discounted price. Page five shows “continued on next page” and I flip it over and it states “this page intentionally left blank. So am I guessing that the printing went from page five to page eight, leaving me clueless what the instructions are for finishing the tie and making bowtie. I would use another tie pattern if I had one and hadn’t already cut the pieces out. McCalls has yet to respond to my request for this info, is there anyway anyone of you could scan and email me those pages? I was confused about the beginning of tie making instructions, never heard of doing such a thing, but the lack of final instructions didn’t help any. Thank you for considering my request.

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