Tag: skirt

To shop, or not to shop


Image © Zara

Yesterday I went shopping, and did not buy this silk blouse with hot air balloons and air ships all over it from Zara. I also did not buy two tops with skulls on them from H&M, and a pair of Thundercats Converse from Schuh.

I did buy four pairs of stripy over-the-knee socks, and a bright yellow skirt.

Yellow wool skirt

It’s calf length, 75% wool 25% nylon, fully lined, with pockets in the side seams. Smells a little bit of mothballs now I’ve ironed it (yes, believe it or not I did iron it before I took this picture – clearly not hard enough!), but that’s nothing that a little wash won’t fix. And it shows that somebody’s bothered to look after it. The label says “Yessica” which, if memory serves, is 1980s C&A. It cost a grand total of £6, from the Sue Ryder shop.

I have a sneaky suspicion that this skirt will sit in my wardrobe (along with the tweedy one I bought in May) and be relegated to “vaguely Steampunk dressing-up”. Which would be sad, as it’s a really lovely skirt, great quality, and with details that I really like.

So, why buy the skirt that won’t get worn, and not the blouse that will?

I’ve been trying very hard not to buy mass-produced things from chain stores this year. The biggest exception has been my ever-increasing collection of TM Lewin shirts, but I think I’ve got enough now to last me a good few years. (She says, having just looked at the website and seen a purple flowery one, and a blue one with birds… both reduced from £85 to £20… argh!)

So whilst the hot air balloon blouse is lovely, and silk, and would in fact look great with this yellow skirt… and the skull tops from H&M were just generally awesome (I’m still a sucker for anything with skulls on it)… and the Thundercats Converse were hilarious… they’re all mass-produced, fast fashion, and designed to be disposable. And I don’t want that from my clothes any more.

I’d always thought I wasn’t one to worry about what other people thought of my clothes (see: yellow coat, silly prints, bow ties, gold boots, pink hair, Being A Goth), but I think part of my reluctance to wear skirts like this and my tweedy one is the fear that people might look at me funny. I had a teacher at middle school (anyone remember Mrs Trubshaw?) who was widely ridiculed for wearing unusual clothes, including an a-line skirt with a forest design appliqued round the hem, which a) I would now kill for, and b) was probably actually quite fashionable in the mid 1980s. As kids, we were absolutely horrible to her, and I’m basically afraid of being treated the same way. Which is silly really, because if I coped with people shouting at me in the street when my hair was pink, I’m sure I can deal with a few sideways glances at a yellow skirt.

Perhaps one of my resolutions for 2013 should be to stop falling back into the comfortable trap of jeans and t-shirts, and start putting more effort into wearing the clothes that I really love.

Vaguely Victorian

I’ve been asked to work an extra day this week to help out with a school visit, for which I may have heard myself ask my boss “would you like me to come in dressed as a Victorian?”. The session goes with the Victorian part of our building, Palmer House, which was designed by Waterhouse (of Natural History Museum and Reading Town Hall fame) and built in 1880-82.

Paul, bless him, has managed to rein me in from “I NEED TO MAKE A COMPLETE PERIOD-CORRECT VICTORIAN OUTFIT BY TUESDAY” to “please can we have a look in your wardrobe first”.

Victorian-ish outfit

However, I may have used “dressing up as a Victorian for work” as an excuse to buy a corset. I chose a black brocade one which was on the “corset of the day” offer for £25. It ended up costing me almost £40 by the time I’d paid vat and extra for super-fast shipping, but I still call that a bargain. It’s not expertly made, but it’s no worse than any Vollers corset I’ve owned in the past, and it gives a “Victorian enough” shape under all those layers, so I’m happy with that.

The website was a bit weird – I kept finding other people’s things added to my shopping cart and at one point it kept telling me that I was logged in as somebody else, which made me very nervous about giving them my credit card details. But I placed my order at five to three on Friday, 3pm being the cut off for next day delivery, expecting it to arrive on Monday. The postman knocked on the door at 9:30 on Saturday morning, with my corset! So that was extremely impressive. (He also brought my lingerie-sewing book which I thought had got lost in the trans-atlantic post, so hooray for that too!)

Victorian-ish outfit

I posted on Facebook about making a Victorian outfit in a hurry, and Chris from Progress Theatre offered to lend me a bustle pad from their wardrobe. I replaced the worn-out elastic with cotton tape, and I think it’ll make quite an acceptable late-Victorian silhouette.

Victorian-ish outfit

Next I added my lilac petticoat, for volume, and a plain white vest to cover up the black dress and corset. I went for black foundation layers because I’d originally intended to wear a black blouse, but the two I thought might be suitable turned out to have inappropriate sleeves.

Victorian-ish outfit

Here’s a side view with the bustle. Is my bum going to look big in this? 😉

Victorian-ish outfit

Next layer: the ivory lawn pintucked blouse that I usually wear for being a rural Edwardian when I’m out with the clog dancers.

Victorian-ish outfit

I spent all day making this skirt, but unfortunately velvet doesn’t photograph at all well in poor light so I can’t show it to you properly. It’s Simplicity 2207, the same as my red and black stripy one.

Victorian-ish outfit

And for the finishing touches: a black wool man’s dress waistcoat, a length of black ribbon, and a marcasite brooch in the shape of an owl. I wear this waistcoat to work quite often, usually with the owl on the lapel.

Victorian-ish outfit

I must admit that I’m not completely convinced by the bustle, even though it’s much smaller with the weight of the velvet skirt on the top. I was looking at photographs of Victorian teachers and the more I see the less I’m convinced that a bustle, even a small one, was worn underneath everyday workwear.

I’ll try the whole outfit on together, and hopefully I’ll be able to get some better photos while I’m at work tomorrow. I can’t do much about my extremely un-Victorian hair and glasses, sadly, but I think this is not too bad, considering I had almost all of it lurking in my wardrobe already!

Vogue 1202 – the skirt

Vogue 1202 - skirt

I thought I might persevere with Vogue 1202, so I started to cut out the pattern for the skirt.

And then I realised that there is no space in my house large enough to lay out the pattern. And that if the giant pattern piece has to be laid on the fabric sideways, the stretch in my chosen fabric is in fact going the wrong way.

Never mind.

I’ll find something else to do with three metres of wet-look lycra, I’m sure.

Butterick 4731, perhaps.

Handkerchief Hem Skirt

Handkerchief hem skirt

I’d been thinking about making myself a floaty black skirt for a while. My seersucker skirt‘s been worn almost to death, so I thought I ought to have a backup plan for the day it comes out of the washing machine in pieces. I’ve been waiting for this to happen for months, thankfully the fabric’s more resilient than I’d thought!

This time I wanted a more floppy skirt, full and drapey, with an asymmetric hem. I looked at patterns, browsed through fashion magazines, and eventually had a brainwave in the middle of the night. This is made from my simple circle skirt pattern… only instead of rounding off the hem of each quarter piece, you just leave it as a square! So it’s effectively four squares sewn together, with a little shaping at the top for the waist.

As usual it has pockets in the side seams, and my trusty elastic waistband. The edges were done very simply on the overlocker, because I didn’t want to make hems that might spoil the soft draping of the very thin cotton lawn. I’m not sure this would work as well in a heavier fabric (even a shirt-weight cotton might be too much), so next time I’d like to make one with two layers. If I offset the points at the hem I think it could look really pretty, especially if I went for contrasting colours.

The only problem with using a fabric as lightweight as lawn for a skirt (aside from it being a bit chilly if you happen to live in a country that’s apparently not having a summer this year) is that it creases like crazy! This skirt was beautiful when I took it off the ironing board (yes, believe it or not I did iron it!), but within seconds of putting it on it was all wrinkly again. I think I’m going to have to adopt the same approach as I have to linen, and simply not mind looking a bit crinkly around the edges.

Simplicity 2207 – Striped Steampunk Skirt

Simplicity 2207

The title says is all really – this is Simplicity 2207, my striped steampunk skirt!

Somewhat eye-bending, but I knew the stripes on the skirt would end up going in all directions, so I deliberately placed them vertically on the front and horizontally on the ruffle.

Both edges of the ruffle are finished on the overlocker, with the “raw” edges left visible. Over the gathered join is four metres of beaded trim, with four metres of braid stitched over the top. I think I spent more on the trimmings than I did on the fabric!

(This was sadly evident as I was sewing – the black stripes are printed rather than woven, and I ended up with very grubby hands. Yuk.)

Simplicity 2207

I attempted to put pockets in the side seams, but that turned out to be a lesson in reading the entirety of the instructions before you start. The waistband has a somewhat unusual construction, so the two sides of my pockets didn’t match. Not wishing to rip out all the overlocking and start again, I simply chopped off the pocket pieces and pretended I didn’t want pockets after all.

The back of the skirt is twice as full as the front, and has an elasticated waist. I have a horrible suspicion that, despite measuring, I’ve cut the elastic a little bit too short. Thanks to the waistband construction I can’t easily get in and change it, so for now I’ve adjusted my dress form to be a little bit bigger than me, in the hope that it’ll stretch out a bit before I wear it. Fingers crossed.

Satin Bustle Skirt

Bustly skirt - front

To go with the silk corset, I made a satin bustled overskirt. The idea was to have something that could be worn over several different skirts, and could be varied in style.

The top layer is from Simplicity 2207, with a bit of modification. Instead of using a single layer, I doubled the fabric to give a bit more volume. Rather than making ruffles, I gathered a pretty wide lace along the centre back and the lower edge.

Bustly skirt - back

The under layer is made from two widths of fabric joined together in a french seam and gathered in to the waistband. Left rectangular, all the edges were trimmed with the same wide lace, and then the sides were gathered tightly to create the draping at the front. The whole thing simply ties around the waist.

In between the two layers, below the waistband, are several plastic rings. These correspond with ribbons sewn onto the skirt. The ribbons can be pulled through the rings and tied in place to create different bustle effects, or left loose to create a train. I used six metres of satin in total, but because it’s such light fabric you get a lot of volume without too much extra weight.

The skirt, corset, pirate shirt and waistcoat all took a trip to the Summer Darkness festival, and I’m hoping to be able to show you some action photos soon!

Summer Skirt

Mum's Skirt

Right back at the end of last year, my Mum gave me a length of fabric for a new summer skirt. It’s made using my basic gathered skirt instructions, with modifications to the waistband. Instead of being elasticated all the way round, the waistband is flat at the front with the skirt gathered into it. The back of the waistband has elastic running through it as normal.

I also made two round tablecloths, which I simply hemmed using the overlocker. They were cut from a single size bedsheet, simply because it was the only fabric we could find in the right colour.

(You can also see that I made this before I had my great big clear-out in the Shed. Excuse the mess!)

Skull Print Skirt

Mini skull skirt

So, this is a bit of a departure from the type of thing I’ve been sewing lately – in fact it’s a skirt pattern that came from my first business, about eight or nine years ago.

There are four layers of skirt altogether, each with four panels for fullness. The inside three layers are black net, trimmed with red gathered lace. The top layer is skulls-and-roses print cotton, trimmed with the very last piece of black gathered broderie anglais in my stash. Fabric Land haven’t had any of this in stock for a long time, and I don’t quite know what I’m going to do without it. It really is absolutely my favourite kind of trim.

(Is it silly to have a favourite kind of trim? I do, anyway.)

The waistband is another favourite – red bomber-jacker elastic, also from Fabric Land. it’s made in the same way as all of my elasticated skirts – simply divided into quarters and zig-zagged into place.

I haven’t worn a skirt this short for years – in fact I’m not at all convinced that it’s actually long enough to cover my bottom, or that a person of my advancing years should be seen in it at all. I suspect I will be very grateful indeed for a pair of black leggings to wear underneath!

Floaty Velvet Skirt

Vogue 1170

This is Vogue 1170, another Rachel Comey pattern. I actually made this one first, and it inspired me to try the pink party dress.

You might recognise the design of the back – it’s pretty much identical to the dress, including the not-invisible zip! (This one wasn’t supposed to be invisible, but it should still be less visible than this.) I didn’t bother with the hem facing on this one – because the velvet has a slight stretch to it, I exaggerated the flared hem by simply stretching the fabric as I ran it through the overlocker.

Vogue 1170

You can’t really see the details on the front, but the skirt has the same angled seams as the dress. It also has tiny little pockets, hidden in the seam of the waistband. I don’t know that I’d bother with those next time. Normally I’m all in favour of pockets, but they were fiddly to make and they’re too small to hold anything useful!

You’ll just have to trust me that this one looks much better on a real person with a real bottom, than it does on my dress form.

Broderie Anglais Circle Skirt

Broderie Anglais Circle Skirt

I’ve been clearing out my fabric stash, and stumbled upon four metres of crinkle broderie anglais at the bottom of a pile. I bought this while I was working at a fabric shop, and had been sent to a different branch for the day. Black broderie anglais is a very rare beast, so I snapped up as much of it as I thought I could carry home on the train.

It’s been sitting in the stash ever since because the sewing machine I was using at the time would have made a dreadful mess of this crinkly fabric. Thankfully my trusty overlocker has no such problem, and I ran up this simple skirt in no time.

The spots of pink that you can see through the holes in the fabric are from my Giant Petticoat of Doom.

I have just over a metre of fabric left, and I’m planning to use it to make a matching top. I’m not a hundred percent certain about going out in an outfit made entirely from crinkly fabric, mind you. I don’t want to look as though I’ve been sleeping in it!