First Fitting of First HTA Coat

Hi HTAers

This is my first attempt at an HTA coat (and the first on the forum) and only fourth coat ever having only started sewing last year. So help me out here please

I was surprised at how many creases the coat had when I finally put it on. I think I have identified the following

1. Sleeve length - this is the most perplexing for me. My sleeves have 2"of inlay at the hem. When I first put it on it looked ridiculously short. I do have long arms and shirts never fit me in the sleeve. I went back to the pattern and found that I had a head measurement of 9 1/4" but (being in Australia) I converted that to cm but took off 4mm to make it easy 23cm (bad mistake) the sleeve length was two head measurements so I was about 10mm short. Probably wouldn't have been a problem if if wasn't for also the long arms!. So I took 1/2"out of the inlay and lengthened the sleeve on the photos. This has left me with 1 1/2" on the sleeve hem inlay. I would like to take as much as I can out of the inlay but not sure how far I can go? I feel from the fitting process that I would need another 1" leaving only 1/2" hem inlay at the cuff. Is this enough for the sleeve and fitting the lining?? You will see that my shirt sleeve length is also short and so the interplay with the coat length wouldn't be that bad (until I find a shirt with longer sleeves!) Help on this one please. Also the shoulder pad sticks out a lot and i wonder if this is not helping. The shoulder seam length looks ok so can I cut the shoulder pad back yet?

2. The front overlay at the button is ok at about 1 1/2" and that feels like it fits well there. However it feels quite full at the chest and sort of sitting out. I pinned it back at the side seems about and 1" each side and that feels better - is that what I should do to bring this in?

3. The length of the coat is on my second knuckle up so about 1" short but I feel that any longer and it might look odd on my long thin body. I don't mind the shorter look and it probably helps with the shorter sleeve length. Any thoughts here?

4. Surprisingly it appears that my left shoulder is about 1/4" lower than my right (never realised that!). So I think the left shoulder needs bringing together by about 1/2" each side. Does that sound right? seems a lot to take in for 1/4" drop?

5. On my back I have a funny looking horizontal pleat happening at the waist. Not sure what to do here? But I think that it might be that the front button overlap might be too tight or I may have to let the back panel waist out about a 1/4" each side - all comments welcome there.

6. The sleeve pitch looks a bit funny. The front of the arm crosses the pocket at 2/3rds back ie not half way. And the top of the sleeve has these diagonal creases. I am guessing that the arm pitch needs rotating in the arm hole? but not sure if this is right or by how much. Currently the rear arm seam matches the back balance line (I think it is called that!) see photos.

7. I am a little concerned that the shoulder seam runs to the back of the shoulder over its length - is this right?

8. I don't seem to have any creases at the waist under the arm so I think the arm fits into the arm hole well enough.

Just to let you know that I also had an email exchange with Rory about when I was putting the fabric onto the canvas. He suggested putting it onto the Forum for your info and input. FYI I haven't put in the neck dart as don't have a big chest. When working to overlay the fabric I started from the dart out to the lapel smoothing as I went and the dart was straight up and pointing to the shoulder point - all good. But as the fabric smoothed over the breakline bowed out at the middle about 1/8". So I did it again making sure the dart was straight and the break was straight and was left with a little fullness on the fabric between. However when I put it on the form it seemed to fill out. When I asked Rory he said to start at the break and work back towards the dart. I was a bit worried this would just create a bow in the dart as the fabric went back. I told him that it fitted ok over the form and he suggested leaving it. Just wondering if anyone has any experience of the same and what they did. I did wonder if the fullness above in No2 was a result of this. I also thought may be I could start at the dart, smooth it out,

and then remark the break and the lapel edge. Any thoughts on that?

I think that is all I can see (enough for me to sort out!!) but really happy if you can spot any other things i need to work on. Thanks heaps 😋(PS Hot here hence the shorts!!!)