Saturday, February 4, 2017
My Perfect Knit Skirts
My Perfect Knit Skirts
Now, these are not the most exciting garments youll probably see on a blog today, but in my opinion, they may be the best! These are stealth garments: not attention grabbers (well, maybe the spotty version is a bit), theyre just quietly doing their job really well. They are the result of my penultimate nippy weather sewing plan. Please read on...
Pattern:
The pattern I used for both of these is the third (and possibly final) incarnation of the easy knit pencil skirt from Gertie Sews Vintage Casual book (pictured above). If you recall, a navy Ponte de Roma skirt was my first attempt, and I made some tweaks to the height of the waist, hem length and side seam shaping as I went. My second version (the faux denim skirt) was improved further still. And for these two I made one more adjustment by lowering the waistline even more so that the waist elastic sits below my belly button rather than on it.
I stitched the side seams using my overlocker (having basted them together first to check the fit, every knit fabric behaves differently), then finished the top and bottom edges with my overlocker also. Next, I used the lightning flash stitch on my regular machine to hem them and make the elastic casings.
Fabrics and notions:
The black skirt, although nothing to write home about, is actually super soft and feels quite luxurious. Its made from a small piece of black Ponte de Roma thats been in my stash for years. I think it was probably a sample piece that I got whilst working for TRAIDremade, however this jersey Roma from Fabric Godmother looks pretty much the same, and Girl Charlee has some really fun printed Ponte de Romas here that would also work well.
The spotty Ponte de Roma was something I actually bought with my own money specifically for this purpose. I first saw it at the Fabric Godmothers open day last August when I went to help out. Josie was very generous in offering me some fabric for my troubles, but I picked the light weight denim and faux stretch denim instead. I kept thinking about the spotty stuff though, and when I went to visit her before Christmas, I bought about 70cm which was the perfect amount for this skirt.
I utterly adore this fabric! Its not a solid black, you can see some of the white showing through the black which gives it a lovely textural look. Its bobbled a bit after a few wears and washes, but its still my favourite skirt to date.
Finally, I added a couple of cute labels so that I could easily identify the fronts from the backs. Id already started doing this for Doloress clothes, and it makes sense to do it for my own as well when it would be useful. These woven ribbons come from my blog sponsor Textile Garden which have a superb and adorable selection. I stole this idea from Marilla Walker who swears that she in turn stole it from someone else! If you havent started doing this yet, feel free to steal it from all of us!
Thoughts:
I now own four of the best and most useful basic skirts in the history of (my) skirts. I love the simple, close-fitting silhouette, but the elasticity of the fabrics and the elastic waistbands mean they are also as comfy as can be. My levels of comfort when wearing these skirts are now entirely governed by the tights I wear with them, as I can bearly feel the skirts themselves at all! I dont think Ill need to make any more for a number of years, however that could all change if I came across some leopard print Ponte de Roma! Oh, and Id also like to try this pattern with an unwanted mens wool jumper (a bit like this). So maybe Im not done with this pattern at all.
Cost:
Pattern: £0 (I received the book for free in exchange for an honest review, however it can currently be purchased here for £17.94)
Fabrics: black = £0, Spotty Ponte de Roma = £10.49
Ribbon for labels: £0 (I was given them by Textile Garden, however you can find their selection here with prices starting at just £1.25 per metre, which would make A LOT of labels!)
Elastic and thread: £0 (from my stash)
Total: £0 for the black skirt, £10.49 for the spotty one.
Available link for download
