Making a Dress - High Waist Skirt

Sorry for the delay with this post but I had trouble with post because I was waiting for supplies to arrive.

Anyhow I am not quite making a dress this time but it is still sewing.

Inspiration 

Since receiving my lolita sewing mooks I have been dying to making something from them and I have decided to make the skirt in this picture.

It is so cute and frilly!  Plus it fit nicely with my existing wardrobe of work blouses although I do need to make a proper lolita blouse.

Fabric

So the fabric this time is this one.

What is special about this fabric is that it is actually a kimono bolt and I was very tempted to turn it into a kimono because I always wanted a checkered kimono but alas my desire for a classic style lolita skirt was more important so it will be turned into skirt.

Design Process

As with all Japanese sewing mooks they give instructions on how to draft the patterns when I noticed on thing.  The waist measurements are a little bit too small for me, in fact only 4cm too small so that needed to be altered.

Then after I cut out the first piece it dawned on me that the pattern may be too wide for the fabric.  So I did a bit of calculation and oh dear it was.  This meant I would need to alter the pattern more then I wanted but I do not think it will affect the overall look.

Fingers crossed!

Construction

So time to cut the fabric eeeekkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

No turning back now is there.

I tried my best to be as economical with the fabric as possible because I wanted some left to make an accessory.

I think there is just over a metre of the fabric left which is more then enough.

Now the pieces are cut, it is time to put it all together.

Fortunately most of the construction was pretty straightforward.  The only thing that was new in this dress making is that I will be inserting my first ever concealed zip into a garment.  Actually it is the first zip I have every inserted.  I have watched plenty of YouTube videos and read a lot of articles on how to insert them so they are not unknown to me however there is always a bit of hesitation when it comes to the real thing.

The biggest surprise for me in this skirt is adding on the frills.  Who would have thought adding 2 layers of frills would take a whole Sunday afternoon!  So much for the zip being the most complicated thing.  It also didn't help that my sewing  machine decided to have a hissy fit just as I was about to sew the second layer.  Ooooooo that did not make me happy.

Anyway here is the finished skirt!

I am very happy with the result!  I was a bit worried that the extra seams at the front and back (due the width constraint of the fabric) would make the skirt look odd but it didn't so hooray.  Now I need a nice blouse to go with it.