I'm going to try this again. I still have trouble understanding the urge to blog, which I've interpreted as publishing "dear Diary" entries. But I've been reading other people's blogs in the past couple of years, and some of them seem more like invitations to interact.
And I do feel an urge to join the conversation. But I'm not sure how, so now I'm standing in a corner at a loud, raucous party whispering "hello."
Portishead "Toy Box"
This morning, I'm listening to a You Tube mix of Portishead and decided to post a tutorial on turning a maxi-dress into a skirt. If you want to do this project, you will need a dress, enough elastic to fit snug around your waist, and sewing implements. (I use a sewing machine, but you could sew this by hand.)
Here is the starting garment, a fairly voluminous maxi dress I bought at Seattle Goodwill Outlet (a.k.a. the pound store, as shown in Macklemore's Thrift Shop video
here where nearly everything is sold by the pound, the prices are on the big board behind their heads.)
As a dress, this is awful on me: the top hits me wrong and hangs shapelessly off me. But there's green in the border that I think will work with a pair of lime green suede boots I recently acquired so I'm cutting off the lower third of it to make into a skirt.
First up, I put the dress on (while wearing the lime green boots) and belted it. Then I adjusted the skirt by pulling more fabric up over the top of the belt until I got a length that I liked. I stuck a safety pin parallel to the ground, right where the fabric came over the top of the belt.
I didn't care if my skirt was
exactly that length so I didn't add any extra for the waistband. But you might care: add the width of the elastic you want to use if your fabric has nice cut edges Add double the width if your fabric will become unraveled or is otherwise nasty when cut.
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| smooth edge! Only my cutting is bumpy. This will not fray or unravel. |
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| frayed/ unraveled edge (and some cat hair.) |
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| nasty edge (bumpy, uneven or pokey fabrics all qualify) |
Next up, cut into it! I recommend cutting one layer at a time, because fabric is tricksy. You may think it is all smooth and flat but it can squirm around when you least expect it. I nip a small amount next to the safety pin, then folded the skirt over, matching lengths and nip again on the other side. My fabric has a bold pattern that was easy to cut across just be eyeballing, but you can use a felt pen and ruler to draw a line first.
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| Just a little nip here and there. |
Now you should have a tube that is already finished on the bottom edge, and sewn up the side. All we need is the waistband. I chose to stretch and sew the elastic onto the fabric because my fabric is pretty slippery and I wanted it to be evenly distributed around my waist, and not all bunch up at my right hip while I'm wearing it.
I wrapped the elastic snugly around my waist and pin with safety pin where the ends overlap. Try not to stretch the elastic too much when measuring. The thicker the elastic, the less stretched it should be. Never make is so tight it won't fit over your hips. Check that now, and cut if satisfied.
Form the elastic into a loop by overlapping the ends about 1 inch (2.5 cm.) Make sure your loop doesn't have any twists in it and pin it together. Sew using a wide zigzag stitch down the length of the overlapped pieces and reversing or turning to sew back up again.
Pin skirt to band, wrong side of skirt facing elastic, matching edges. I divided my skirt in half, using the one side seam as starting point, folding it across and putting a pin in vertically at the fold on the other side. Then I did the same to the elastic. I matched the two pins up and pinned through both layers, from the elastic side. Then I pinned the elastic lapped seam to the skirt side seam. (My skirt only has one side seam, yours may have two. Just divide the elastic in half and match each pin to a side seam.)
This amount of pinning was enough for me. But you can repeat the process by sticking a vertical pin into the side seam/elastic seam side, then re-folding your elastic/skirt combo so the vertical pins line up. Then add new vertical pins to the folded edges (separately for skirt and for elastic) and then matching those pins up and pin through the layers horizontally from the elastic side. . You would have four matched up points instead of the two shown. Remove all the vertical pins before moving on.
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| Here is the skirt pinned to the elastic in two equidistant places. |
Time to sew! Place the fabric, outside down on the sewing machine bed, with the elastic on top, near one of your pins. Set machine to widest, longest zigzag possible (unless it is wider than elastic.) Take a couple stitches to anchor everything, stop with needle down in the material, and remove the pin. For my narrow elastic, I stitched in the center. For wide elastic, stitch close to top edge (right-hand side)
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| Starting to sew the elastic to skirt edge. Go slow and try not to sew over the pins. |
Next stretch the elastic so its length matches the fabric as you are sewing it together. This step can be tricky. I start by stretching the whole thing from needle to pin with my left hand, then taking a grip on both fabric and elastic about 12 inches in front of the needle. I let go with my left hand, move it to behind the needle to guide the piece through the machine while holding tension with my right hand. I sew up to where my fingers are, then repeat the stretch and grab all the way around the waist.
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| About half way through. Notice how the fabric is not evenly matched to the edge of the elastic. It's just not that important. . |
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| Finished, sort of. |
If you're in a hurry, you can stop right here. You have a skirt! (I used to amaze my old roommate by whipping up a new dancing ensemble in the one hour between deciding to go out, and us leaving the house, including shower and makeup. Most of that stuff I made looked like this.) But for this skirt, I want a more finished look. But here is a good point to try on the skirt and see how you like it. Does it hang evenly? Is the elastic tight enough, but not too tight? Good? Moving on:
Examine your stitching: are there spaces where you just missed sewing the elastic and fabric together? You can sew over those areas now to attach them: remember to stretch the elastic!
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| Don't be concerned about some variation in edges matching, it really doesn't matter, unless you're selling this as Dior. |
Next fold the fabric around the elastic one turn and get ready to sew round two. You should have the cut edge of fabric on top, the elastic in the middle, and the rest of skirt on the bottom.
This will be just like round one, but a little easier. Still stretch the elastic as you sew, but instead of trying to match up the edges as you go along, this time you just have to tug occasionally at the left side of the fabric in front of the the needle to keep the fabric folded smoothly over the elastic. It will tend to creep over to the right.
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| Stitching round two of the waistband. |
Cut your thread ends and you're good to go, if you started with smooth fabric. If you have fabric that unravels a lot or that has a nasty edge, repeat one more time: Turn the fabric over the elastic, hiding all cut edges, and stretch and stitch with zigzag all around.
So that's it. I was going to model the skirt, but I ran out of time for photos. I'm going to post this before I loose my nerve. I hope to have a photo of me in it to add to the next round of Visible Monday with Patti of Not Dead Yet style:
Visible Monday
