Flower Power

McCall’s 5056, in tropical print cotton lawn,  and a recycled duvet cover [ancient, cotton or poly-cotton, no idea!]

This pattern’s been languishing in  stash for ages.  I bought it totally on impulse, no doubt attracted to the somewhat 70s vibe of the line drawing.  I always prefer patterns with drawings, they have so much more charm than photographs, don’t you think?  And the clothes fit the models better too…

I also bought the fabric on impulse, seduced by the colours [and if I remember rightly, it was a bargain too].  Then it just didn’t tell me what it wanted to be.

Meanwhile I kept getting the pattern out, and kept putting it back because it demanded SO MUCH YARDAGE.

Eventually, a couple of weeks back, The Sewing Place set up a ‘florals’ challenge, and I found I only had this floral in stash.  It seems that I don’t often buy florals, and if I do, I use them for specific projects… Of course, there wasn’t enough yardage, AND being a border print, layout would be limited.  I looked again at the line drawing on the back of the packet, and had a revelation.  It’s cut in godets!  And the panels between the godets are simple rectangles!

I rummaged for any old cotton in  a shade of blue which would harmonise [blues can be tricksy to match, don’t you think?]  Up popped this old duvet cover, already re-fashioned into a door curtain at our previous rental, and languishing in a  carrier bag ever since.  Worn, faded, soft…yes please, just right for a 70-ish summer maxi skirt. [‘Boho’ my arse]

It’s supposed to have a drawstring, but hey, with my fat belly?  Nope.  I went with simple elastic- it goes on easily over my non-bum and hips, and only needs a bit of help to stay up.  I cut 2″ off the pattern length, and everything JUST squeaked out of the border print.

Apart from organising the slightly different length godets and rectangular panels into the right order as per the instructions, I then totally ignore them, and zoomed the whole thing up, cheat style, on the overlocker.

By that, I mean that I sewed each godet piece to a rectangular panel from bottom to where it ended, totally ignoring notches and other markings.  I just ran the overlocker off the edge when the godet ran out.  I then sewed the next rectangular panel on, again starting from the hem edge, and this time whizzing straight up over the godet point and up to the waist.  Easy peasy.  Not at all accurate, but hey, shoot me!  The waist edges ended up slightly out, but so what?

Yet another narrow hem, although I didn’t fuss to get it particularly beautiful, I don’t expect this to be a long lasting wardrobe item.  I made a loop of elastic to fit my ‘waist’, and enclosed it at by just folding and stitching.  Done.  An hour and a half or so?

It’s a HUGE swirl, more than a full circle and should be great for cool summer wear with no need for shaved legs or tights.  Result!

It falls straighter than I expected, if I did it again, I’d use pattern on the rectangles and plain godets…