Self-Drafted Skirt.

I've been getting a lot of wear out of the self-drafted skirt. The wool suiting and Bemberg lining are luxurious and make a world of difference in comfort. I love wearing this skirt. Now I need to sew a more appropriate blouse to go with it because the one I'm wearing in the pictures isn't tailored enough to cut it.


I went to Britex on my lunch break today to look at their fabric remnants.  Afterwards, I went downstairs to the suiting fabrics to get some lining. The gentleman cutting in suiting looked down at my skirt.

Did you get that fabric here?

I told him that I did.

I thought it looked familiar!

Then he picked up a bit of my hem to check out the ribbon trim and said   Is this--? It is! Hand sewn. Great job.

 
Made. my. day.

The true 'true waistline'.

I bought my dressform almost 2 years ago. Since then, I've been trying to learn how to get the proper fit on my garments and the process has been slow and more than a little frustrating. The self-drafted skirt is the first time I've fit something totally to my measurements and it fits me like a glove.

But when I put the skirt onto the dressform, I kept having to adjust it to hit what I thought was the true waistline on my form. Since the skirt fits me perfectly, I figured it was time to reconsider the location of the form's true waistline.

Weekend Projects.

This H&M courdoroy skirt has been the bane of my existence. I've been meaning to take the waistline in (for about a year) to stop the skirt from doing a 360 spin every time I walk from point A to point B but never got around to it and now I hate the skirt. Before throwing it in the scrap bag, I took the super-EZ alteration route of measuring in 1/2" at the top L and R side seams and then using my hip curve to draw a nice line that blended in with the existing side seam about 6" down. Then I sewed along the new seam line. A proper alteration probably would've involved removing the waist band, then redrawing the side seams & sewing them, then redoing the waistband & sewing it back on the skirt but I didn't want to make that kind of time investment. Anyway, the skirt fits fine now.

Waistband-less skirts.

Tonight when I got home from work & before I did anything else, I picked up the self-drafted skirt to take an inventory on what needed to be done. I'd already started with the hand sewing, but there was spot that needed to be resewn by machine, so I fired up the Juki for a little night sewing under stadium lighting.

Backing up a bit- I've made a total of 4 skirts.  Two of them had waistbands and fit kind of funky and the other two did not and fit great (one of them is in the photo above).  The waistband-less skirts were made from a basic Built By Wendy skirt pattern and without waistline facings.  I first read about these facings in Couture Sewing Techniques.  This is the same book that showed me how to apply ribbon trim without puckering.  As with the ribbon trim, the book refers again to Chanel-

Usually finished with a grosgrain or lining-fabric facing, the faced waistline was favored by Chanel for many of her designs.  Because it doesn't include a waistband, this finish is used on skirts that accompany overblouses and is flattering for short-waisted figures.

Wait.  Short-waisted?  I thought I was long-waisted. Maybe I should do some investigating?

Anyway, I wanted to add a waistline facing to my self-drafted skirt because it's made of good suiting fabric & I wanted to add a little heft to the waistline edge.  Here's how I did it and I used a combo of what I read in the book and this Threads article which I used to line this dress:

misc #34.

I made Butter Chicken from scratch



and buttermilk cupcakes



because the waist facing I'm adding to the self-drafted skirt is giving me fits. Here it is interfaced with a light denim fabric scrap.

pucker-free ribbon trim.

it worked! Here's the before and after (L: machine-stitched; R: hand-sewn with a running stitch)

Who does ribbon and trim with no puckers?

ribbon trim pucker.

I drafted a skirt pattern before the holidays and this weekend I finally got around to cutting it out.

Note the Bemberg stamp on the lining fabric. (Also note that I'm displaying the Bemberg gold against a skirt piece with a beautifully serged edge - I love my serger!)

I'd read about Bemberg lining (it's good stuff) but this is my first purchase. When the Britex lady in suiting said Here's your lining fabric. Who knew? Not me, until I was cutting out the lining pieces and saw the flash of gold. That's Britex for you.

wool suiting.

Sale at Britex on wool suiting.

I needed a scrap of gray fleece to fix socal girl's dog's reflector vest. You pay on the first floor which is where all the beautiful suiting fabric is. They had a table of suiting for 50% off. These 2 fabrics were originally $40/yard, plus I used my discount.

1 yard of each to make skirts, which is <$20/skirt, not including the lining & notions.

Not bad and the fabric is beautiful.