Sewaholic Renfrew Top view C: how do you get rid of armpit wrinkles?

I love a good cowl.

I started a muslin of Sewaholic Renfrew Top, view C, size 8, today.  I was striving for "wearable muslin"...mission accomplished!

When I first basted it together, it looked like this, lots of armpit wrinkles, it was riding up and it felt too tight to wear, defeating the purpose of the wearable muslin:


I then undid the side seam and sleeve basting and ripped out the most beautiful sleevecaps I had ever sewn. I then resewed the armhole seam almost a full half inch over, while retaining the original seam allowance of the sleeve. I also sewed the side seams as 3/8 instead of 5/8 SA, and voila, there were less wrinkles:


But how do I get rid of the wrinkles? KID MD suggested on twitter that I lower the armhole then cut another sleeve wider to fit.  That means cutting another muslin.  So I did the things as I wrote above,  as I not only wanted a wearable muslin, I wanted a finished wearable muslin today.

Here it is, done. (hands on hips is another way to get rid of armpit wrinkles)

I love the sleeve bands when I didn't think I would. I'm not sure about the band on the bottom. I might take that off and use a stretch twin needle for a regular hem.

There's a touch of swayback pooling that I think I can reduce on my next muslin:

Yeah, not sure about that bottom band.  But hey, I'm wearing the brown J Stern Designs corduroy jeans I made, yay!


This was also my first time using my seam roll and stand from Stitch Nerd. Honestly, where have you been all my life?

I used the seam roll for pressing seams, including pressing open the sleeve bands.

Here,the sleeve band is on the roll, waiting to be pressed

I then pressed it with a pressing cloth and iron:

and then used the Angela Wolf clapper to set the press:

Look at that, gorgeously pressed open seam:

I folded the band in half and then used the seam roll for pressing a crease horizontally so as to not create a crease vertically.

Pretty sweet! It was also my first time using gigantic sheets of wax tracing paper, another concept that has changed my life, but I'll save that for another time.
Be well!