I'm making a new shift so I'm going to try and remember to keep photographing throughout and make a rough guide to making a shirt or shift. There are a few out there already, but I thought I'd just add my tuppenceworth.
This isn't a kind of The Only Way Is This Way method... it's just how I do it. You don't have to look at many surviving examples to work out that there are some things they have in common and some that are one-offs.
Generally speaking, it's usually a better idea in re-enactment to stick with the 'things in common' and avoid the 'one-offs'.
Right, the pattern. This is a combined pattern, largely from the extremely good site http://www.fabrics-store.com/first.php?goto=ec&menu=ec&mn=tm&m=kess_shirforallseason but with a few bits of background from spending much time looking at extant examples, one linen shirt I own and wear which is pre-1800 (no idea how far pre-1800, could be 1640s for all I know! I think it's around 1780-1800 though on probability) and from spending time over Janet Arnold's superb book Patterns of Fashion 4: Linen
The photograph shows the pieces cut or torn and laid out ready to sew. Every pattern-piece for a shirt can be torn along the linen's grain which avoids having to own expensive scissors. In a shift, there is one diagonal line which would need cutting but a sharp knife down a fold will just about do this.
These pattern pieces don't include the "skirt gores", triangular pieces let into the side-seams of the shift. That's because until I've made some of it, I won't know the measurement for those. I'll calculate it and cut it later on.
The body-pieces are 45" long for this as it is a shift. For a shirt I use 35-40" length.
The Pieces:
Body x2 27" wide and as above 35-40" long for a shirt, 45" for a shift. I wear my shifts short - Arnold gives various patterns for shifts which are 50+" in length.
Sleeve x2 24" long and 20" wide. I use the selvedge at the shoulder-seam, so I can put both sleeves in the right way round, rather than one being 24" long and one being 20" long and the same dilemma in width! If your arms are short or you are very bulky, change the dimensions.
Sleeve gussets x2 9" square but if you have a scrap of linen that gives you ones 8" square, that's fine... it's to give the ease of movement without ripping the place where the sleeve-seam, side-seam and two ends of the shoulder-seam join in a crossroads.
Neck gussets x2 these are 3 1/2" square and just fit into the sides of the neck-slit to reinforce an area of stress. Some shirts exist without these and often you can see where it's started splitting along and needed repaired.
Cuffs x2 half the width of the collar (see below) and as long as fits easily round your forearm/ wrist. I adjust them in the making as it is very annoying to have a too-large cuff sliding down over your knuckles. They are folded lengthways in the finished version.
Collar x1 The only piece there is only one of. I cut mine 6" by 17", folded lengthways.
You can see these all laid out in the photo, with the body top-right and the sleeve top-left, and smaller pieces below. I've ironed the fold into the collar and cuffs along the line of the fabric's grain.
