Making a straight skirt in plain red twill weave - a learning experience

Background

I have been sewing since before I started school, over 70 years! 

I was not allowed to do Needlework at Grammar School because I was in the top set and made to do Sciences. I did and enjoyed teaching Chemistry and Biology to secondary students, all my teaching life before becoming involved in education at a national level. I continued sewing in my spare time, as I was told to! I now appreciate my scientific life as I think it has made me a better dressmaker  and textile maker. 

Some years ago following a car accident I took a colour and style consultation with colour me beautiful.I then trained to do this myself, mainly so that I could look at other figure types and colourings, this has been invaluable to my ‘sewing’. I found this all fascinating and did further advanced training and teaching. 

I have a number of figure challenges, I am short, having very short legs, swayback and slightly rounded upper back to name but some! 

I have quite a library of sewing related books and magazines and subscribe to Threads online. 

I have made a body duplicate model and arm, fitting sleeves well is a passion! 

Body model and arm.

Recently I have had the opportunity to do more sewing and altering of charity shop finds. 

Why the red skirt? 

A couple of years ago I bought some autumn leaves material to make an autumn dress. When I got it out to do just that this year it felt ‘a bit in my face’. So I decided to make this red skirt first, using fabric from my stash and it compliments the autumn material well. 

Image autumn leaves fabric 

With the autumn material I thought I would make an identical skirt in that fabric and also a blouse. The blouse would go well with the red skirt and if I felt it worked I could use the autumn fabric blouse and skirt together to make a dress! 

Preparing  to make the red skirt

So I tweaked the vogue fitting pattern I had used to make an up to date skirt block and then cut the skirt adding ease etc. I decided to put a waistband on the skirt and a kick pleat at the back. 

The toile for the skirt fitted the waist of the body model well, it is made in gingham pink gingham and I put press studs up the front so I could fit it on me and the body model easily. 

Toile

Well the waist does fit well. The darts are badly dimpled on here, but I did not ‘see them’. (I did not listen to advice I give, which is ‘always take a photo as you will see far more than when you just look!) 

Vogue skirt pattern

I have made a lot of skirts. I have had this Vogue pattern  for many years and made one skirt as view A, high waisted elongates my legs, as do the vertical seams. It is a good skirt to wear and feels smart. 

However, I did not like the seam across the front, so the next skirt in camel coloured cashmere I just missed it out! I love this skirt. 

Top of cashmere skirt 

Then I wove some Shetland wool to make a skirt and also made another in Harris Tweed, again no waistband and no darts.

All the skirts are lined and the wool fabric is quite thick and steams well.

So to aim to make a skirt  with a waistband is not something I have done for many years. I have realised this  as I have been making this skirt. 

So I cut out the skirt, fused fine knitted interfacing to it as I thought the twill was a bit thin for winter, I love wearing wool skirts in colder weather, either knitted or woven. 

I was going to a sewing day with Norwich Sewscials and so decided to put the invisible zip in first at home and get on with the rest when I was there. I said to Pippa it was a toile, as I had not actually made the pattern in another similar fabric first. This is VERY unusual for me. So on the day I made the lining  and that fitted well and I stitched the darts and  side seams of the actual skirt too. 

Dimples!

When I got home, the darts were very noticeable and dimpled at the points. I hated the look!  I tried steaming and initially thought it was the fabric, plain so no where to hide a dimple  and not going to shrink as wool would. So I tried lengthening and  also shortening them, the aim being to get them to end in a suitable, for my body shape. Neither of these ideas worked. 

The back dart dimples were also bothering me so I took the radical solution of removing the interfacing as I assumed the extra thickness was making the dart dimples worse. I was also concerned that the skirt did not drape, removing the interfacing would solve that too hopefully. 

Once the interfacing was removed the skirt hung a lot better and the back darts were OK. I could live with them, but not the front ones. It was very time consuming to remove the interfacing. Something to think twice about in the future. 

On looking in the mirror is seemed like the 2 (each side) front darts where entirely in the wrong place!  I thought I would look in one of my trusted books ‘Fabulous FiT ’ by Judith Rasband and Elizabeth Liechtenstein (1) .  There I read : ‘waist or hip-fitting darts don’t easily accommodate the immediate curve of a high hip….’. Well I had real life evidence to back that up. So what was suggested? ‘ Convert darts to gathers, unpressed pleats or flare to more easily accommodate the curve….’ , with using elastic being another option- something I had a distinct aversion too! 

So I moved the outer dart into the side seam and did ‘Staystitch plus’ by Marcy Tilton as suggested in Easy Guide for Sewing Skirts for the inner pair(1). I did not like the puckers so this was not going to be a solution. 

Also I looked at a skirt that I have had for many years, think 2001, it was part of a work suit when M and S made clothes in England.  This has a couple of tiny darts, about where I had excess fabric and I noticed, a very narrow waistband (5/8”) but the fit of the skirt  works brilliantly for me. 

M and S skirt to show micro darts close by the side seams and narrow waistband 

I also looked at another of my favourite ‘fitting well’ books ‘Fit for Real People’ by Patti Palmer and Marta Alto ‘ Hip bones often protrude on thinner people. You can camouflage them by adding a little width at the waist and gather the skirt to the waistband over those areas (ie just above the hip bones) or ( and this seems to work best for me) angle the dart towards the permanent bone for a pucker free dart and a smoother fit’ . 

After trying small darts I abandoned that in preference for tucks, but I did topstitch them down. This was the bast solution so far. So I thought I had resolved the darts so I have a skirt that fits hips and waist. The back fits rather than hides my swayback but it feels comfortable. 

Skirt showing the stitched down tucks close to the side seams ( the light is owing from the right but they are not very noticeable, look on the left) 

I usually put an invisible zip in a seam, it used to be in my left seam, as that is where it is mainly in bought garments. However, because I have less of a curved hip on the right I had been putting the zip there in more recent makes.  For some reason I decided to put the zip in the back of this red skirt, it is OK but I am thinking of going back to putting a zip in a fitted skirt in the right side seam again next time. 

So the skirt progressed, albeit slowly, and I got to the waistband. 

I decided it would look smarter with some of the elasticated mesh inside the waistband. So I joined the waistband to the skirt, put in the elastic mesh to give it a bit of body and pinned the waistband over to the inside and tried it on and the fabric below the waistband at the front looked all puckered and gathered! So what is the problem and how could I solve it? 

Form the M and S skirt, I decided I would make the waistband narrower, but it was still a little over 3cm certainly an improvement but it still looked puckered and there was too much fabric below the waistband. I tried pushing the fabric at the front up a bit into the waistband and that was better still. Also making sure the base of the waistband is actually at my waist is better still so that is my solution for this! 

I did a couple of minor personalisations, the button at the back. I have a collection of vintage buttons and always on the lookout on where to put one or more Ina sewing project. 

Button at the back - I will have to live with the wobble on the waistband seam! 

pocket 

A small  inside pocket for a cotton hankie, made from one of Michael’s ties (Macclesfield) silk I think, that he discarded when he retired. 

The finished skirt 

In the meantime I decided that a fitted skirt like this is not the best for the autumn fabric which is soft with a good drape, I going to make a slightly fuller skirt and  possibly with pockets. I don’t usually wear a fuller skirt and width below my waist makes me look even shorter! It certainly won’t have gathers so I am likely to put pleats in that to fit the waist. 

However, next time I do a fitted skirt I will choose a forgiving material, wool is my all time  favourite. Also I will go back to either making it high waisted or with no waistband……and there was enough Harris Tweed coat material and the lovely silk lining left to make a skirt…..

But the next project is to make the autumn blouse, so it is not spring before it is made! I do have the pattern sorted for this, alterations already done and two made to the same design already. 

This is a hacked ‘old’ vogue pattern that I have used lots of times, made in silk

 

Further skirt thoughts for challenging figures…

On trying on the skirt for about the 99th time I was reminded of the lady who first measured me at her pattern making workshop. She was a formidable woman called Betty Foster, she was an engineer by training and career and wore a lot of skirts. Her secret to a perfect skirt, stitch it onto a top which hangs from the shoulders. ‘You can hide all the figure flaws that way’. Just one of her unforgettable sayings! 

I welcome other ideas and thoughts on making a fitting basic straight skirt.

Notes 

1. Simply Staystitch / Easestitch plus is putting your finger behind the foot as you do stay stitching and let the fabric build up. Do trial this first to get the effect you are hoping for. Easy Guide to Sewing Skirts by Marcy Tilton - one of what I regard as an excellent series form Taunton. I love these older books, both are American. Fabulous Fit dates back to 1994 and Fit for Real People, is copyrighted 1998. Fabulous Fit  is more technical but it is the Fit for Real People which is  serious money for a second hand book. I would still recommend these books now. 

Other books I used to get the details correct for other techniques: 

Easy Guide to Sewing  Linings Connie Long - helping me decide how to treat the lining at the back kick pleat. This book is the last one in the series I bought, has been hard to track down at a sensible price but well worth getting. 

Easy Guide to Sewing Jackets Cecelia Podolak - I knew it had good advice for sewing square corners, in my case at the kick pleat. The method I used being described as ‘an easy industry technique to sew corners that are perfectly square’.