Vogue 8425 was my first sewing project after a more than 20 year hiatus from sewing. I started sewing it early in 2008. the high-waisted waistband was constructed from 14 pieces. i should've known.
the 14-piece waistband didn't fit me right no matter what. i added darts to both the skirt & waistband & of course with new darts, any waistband seam that was supposed to correspond with a skirt seam had to be adjusted as well. it was a losing battle & damn shame because the wool fabric was expensive.
about a year ago i was talking to another sewer about Vogue 8425 & she suggested i chop the waistband in half. it was a great idea, except that i should've just made a whole new plain waistband instead of trying to chop & fit a 14-piece waistband, which is why another year has passed.
i'm shutting lots of old doors these days to make room for new things to happen. Vogue 8425 was one of those old doors. i got rid of the 14-piece waistband altogether, kept most of the added skirt darts & drafted a standard waistband to attach to the skirt. i didn't have any heavyweight interfacing for the waistband, so i repurposed some white canvas from an old chef's coat i had & it worked great. so great, that from now on i'm going to use canvas to interface my waistbands.
the poor lining was a little bedraggled, but i took out all of the old gathering threads, pressed it & used my Greist gathering foot to make new gathers at the waistline
& finally, i used my new serger to finish the lower edge in preparation for hemming.
Vogue 8425. may she rest in peace.
