Following a couple of questions about the construction of my sorta-6Nap skirt, I’m just going to go over it here, as previously blogged, but all together. Hopefully it will make some sense!
First I made the waistband and yoke from a stretch remnant, judging the shape of the points just by eye, sticking masking tape onto an existing skirt… I was in a hurry!
For the floaty bits, I started with rectangles, using full fabric widths, and just cut away a bit at the upper sides to get a better shape.
This was done very roughly, not by measuring, using some old net curtains pinned onto the missus! The ‘waist’ curve happened naturally after I pinned the curtains onto the skirt yoke and cut away the excess.
I trued it up a bit, and despite the above pieces being different front and back, just made them the same. The missus has a bum, I don’t!
I could have got very fancy and clever, draping the two layers separately, but I couldn’t be bothered! I think that if the yoke was not stretch, I would have had to be much more precise. Maybe not. Who knows?
I cut out four pieces in tartan silk [from Truro Fabrics], 2 in the silk chiffon/georgette/whatever for the underskirt/lining [both from Fancy Silk Store]. I made them all up with french seams, for neatness. The ‘side seams’ are the slanted cut edges, the original selvedges became part of the hem. I hand hemmed the lining, with a tiny rolled hem.
It’s FAR from perfect, I enjoy hand sewing but don’t want to spend weeks aiming at perfection! It’s a lovely fabric though, and perfect to stop the organza hem facings from getting scratchy.
Right, those facings. My calculations were partly to help waste as little as humanly possible. These fabrics are gorgeous, well worth the cash…but I did spend a fair bit on it! Hey ho, how many skirts with about 6.5m of silk do we get to make?
I just tore the organza into strips. Fun! They’re roughly 6.5″ [16cm]. Just as wide as you can afford really. I thought about joining them into a continuous piece first, but couldn’t be bothered, I joined as I went along.
Two skirt layers, each with 4 right angled [convex] corners, and two acute [concave] corners. It took a while! I pinned on the strips, right sides together, and joined more strips on as I went along. I had some left over at the end, so much for my maths degree. Because the organza is so wonderfully crisp, the mitred corners were very, very easy, honest.
I hope you can see here how it worked-assuming I was going from left to right, I simply pinned until I got the hem edge right to the corner, then when I turned and started pinning the next edge, I smooshed the excess up so that the facings were nice and flat. The extra fabric just stood up out of the way, and I pinned it along the 45 degree line. No measuring, nothing clever, it will fold itself naturally.
I did this all the way around. The mitred angle was a little trickier at the concave corners, but not much. Once it was all attached, I took a few hem edge pins out at each corner, and used a pencil and ruler to draw in a better stitching line, using those pins to guide me. I sewed the mitre seams, trimmed with pinking shears, and pressed them flat.Then I zoomed all round the hem edge, trimmed with pinking shears again [only because the organza is sheer], clipped corners, turned facings to the inside, and pressed.
I turned the upper edge under, and stitched by machine, because I wanted to get the ruddy thing done. I’m very pleased with this finish, I love faced hems. The organza is shot, and shimmers beautifully when I’m wearing it.
After all this clever stuff, I got down and dirty, and attached both skirt layers, one offset from t’other, to the yoke WITH THE OVERLOCKER. Shocking.
And of course, to serve me right, I chopped a little hole into the yoke with the blade. Bum. So I had to go round again, to conceal my booboo. Shame on me.
After that, I stitched the lining piece onto the inside, offset again from the top 2 layers, to cover the shameful overlocking evidence. When I line a skirt, I’m never sure which way to turn the hem, towards the skirt itself, or towards me…meh, who’ll be looking?
It’s pretty much a take on Shams’ rightly-popular ‘tablecloth skirt’ really, and it’s the fabrics that make me love it so! This will be worn until it disintegrates, just watch…
I hope that answers any questions, but happy to add more detail if needed- I didn’t want to bore everyone to death with this!
thedementedfairy 
I like the look of this skirt – I can see why you’d wear it forever. Clever construction – I think I’d need to play with it on a small scale first because I am very slow to catch on.
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A mixture of painstaking attention to detail and winging it (like mine). Thank you Elaine and nice to see more of the fabric. How lovely the organza facing looks; love the close-up of the mitred corner.
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Thanks- I’d posted all the pics previously, but in separate posts, as I went along. I’m very fond of that organza facing, and find myself sitting playing with it when I wear the skirt!
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I still think you spent much more time and effort on yours that the rest of us did and I’m now feeling guilty – the majority of my ‘skirt’ was made on the overlocker, including the hem!
It’s a great result and by making two separates you’ll get much more wear out of both. Fab!
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Ah gwan gwan gwan. After all, it is silk, so I wasn’t going to do it on the overlocker. I was in a hurry, or I’d have dealt with that hem facing with more hand stitching. And the yoke’s a disgrace [the hole is still there!] I do love it though, so it’s pricey and indulgent, but worth it.
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It’s a great skirt and these notes are really helpful; and interesting.
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Glad you find them helpful
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I like it with the purple cardigan too.
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It looks every bit as gorgeous as I expected. Well done Fairy!
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Ta missus- I was wearing it yesterday for work, and found myself flouncing a lot to make it swoosh
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