Saturday DIY- Quick Wrap Skirt

Look Ma! No pattern!










I've had this pretty fabulous vintage fabric hanging around for awhile and I finally decided it needed to be put to use. I didn't have any patterns in my size/that I really liked so I made this really simple wrap skirt by trial and error.















First I laid out my fabric on my cardboard project board. This thing is so useful, it has a grid of 1 inch squares all over it which helps simplify rough measurements and you can make your fabric stay in place by pinning it to the board which is AWESOME!





Next I cut my fabric to be a nice even rectangle. Oh, and I ironed it.






















I then measured from where I wanted my skirt to sit on my waist to where I wanted the hem hit. I decided to make it 17" long. To that amount, I added 3/4" + 1/2" on both the top and the bottom. (that's a pretty standard measurement for a hem) This comes to 19.5". So next I cut my big rectangle of fabric across the long way ( I think the length was around 60") so the height was now 19.5"































Next I measured 1/2" from all of the edges, folded them down and pinned them. Then I ironed the folds. from there I folded the edges over again, this time 3/4". Ironed that too and stitched the hem. After this I forgot to take photos, so I'll just describe it.














So at this point I had a big rectangle with hemmed edges. I wrapped it around so it was snug around my hips, knowing I'd be putting in darts to make it taper in at the waist. I marked where it should overlap and where I wanted to put snaps with pins. Then I did some crazy experimenting with darts. I'll skip the ideas that didn't work. ; ) Here's the one that did end up working: hold your "skirt" in front of you, pinned in place using your markings of where it should overlap. Measure the top edge not including the 2nd layer that is overlapped. Then measure your waist where you want the skirt to hit. Subtract the measurement of your waist from the fabric edge measurement. The number you get is going help you figure out your darts.

Say you got 3" difference (I think that's around what I got), if you're making two darts in back like I did, it makes sense that at the top of your darts they should each measure 1 1/2". That way the top edge measurement is equal to your waist. I ended up figuring out the length of my darts by trial and error, but later found out from my sister (she's a fashion designer) that most of the time when you're doing the old two darts in back trick, that they're usually around 4" in length. I made mine 3 3/4" so it was close.

Here's how you figure out the placement. Hold up your skirt, fold it flat so the front is laying face down. measure across the top edge. Take 1/4 of that measurement. whatever # you got, measure in that much from either side and mark it. Those two marks are the center of your darts.




















After sewing my darts, I stitched a couple snaps on for closure. And a few vintage buttons just for looks. And that's it!


feel free to comment or ask questions! : )

DIY Friday- Sweater Skirt Redo!

This is one way to make a pencil skirt out of an old sweater!













Here's what my old sweater looked like:








First thing you wanna do is chop off the collar. I tried to cut as straight across the shoulders as I could. This is going to become the waist.














Next, I measured a 1/2" and folded that over and pinned it,all the way around the top part that was just cut off.
















After the whole waist was pinned, I turned the whole thing under one more time and sewed all the way around.
I set the stitch width at a wide zigzag because that allows the stitching to stretch without breaking.




























Then I tried it on in order to figure out what to do next! I realized it would fit well if I chopped off 1 of the sleeves. I put it on inside out and pinned it so that it would fit.






















Next I sewwed straight down next to the pins. I used a smaller zigzag stitch so it wouldn't stretch quite as much as the waist, but would still stretch without breaking. I'm sure it wouldn't make a huge difference if you use a straight stitch too. After sewing along the pins I cut off the sleeve.


















This next part I wish I had taken better pictures of, but hopefully you'll get the idea. Feel free to ask me questions by the way!



















So next I held up the skirt, right side out, and it had only one sleeve left. This sleeve would be made into the pocket. I tucked it in so the sleeve was hanging on the inside. I pinned the sleeve in place and sewwed around the edges of it so it would stay in place intsead of flopping around. I also sewwed straight across where I wanted the bottom of the pocket to be.




Then all that was left was chopping off the end of the sleeve that poking out from under the skirt.