skirt Archives • Page 2 of 2 • Jessica Smith Creates

March 17, 2015August 19, 2018

Emerald Circle Skirt

During one of the big storms that hit the South this winter I started dreaming of a wool skirt. And then I remembered my plans to make another circle skirt, this time out of a real color.

Grey is a great color, but it’s not someone’s first thought when you say “Pick a color!”

So I went online to the magical land of eBay and got this great emerald wool crepe. This one’s a nice weighty fabric with a loose weave and a lovely texture.

This time I made a 3/4 circle skirt, since the fabric already had enough body, and twirling would be dangerous enough.

I just had acquired a bunch of mystery fabric, and done of it was stiff and canvas like, so I used that as interfacing, since I always forget to obtain heavy interfacing.

And pockets. I put in (drumroll please: tssssssssssss) two pockets! Not one, which is acceptable, but two. Cause I love pockets!

Everything was going perfectly… until the hem. Now, I should have known better than to attempt using my rolled hem foot for such a thick fabric… but I don’t learn. So after an hour of attempting, I gave up.

My piles and piles of vintage bias tape called to me, and I found this nice goldish beige. I’m pretty sure it isn’t the original color, as I think it just aged that way, but I love it!

So I attached this lovely double fold to the bottom and called it a day!

I think I’m in love with this skirt, and I’m proud to wear it for St Patrick’s Day!

Of course, though, it’s now quite warm out. Oh well!

September 8, 2014August 19, 2018

Insanity

** Full disclosure: This insane night was in reality in June… I’m just slow on the picture front**

You know how the night before something big, say prom or job interviews or the first day of school or the last day of school (please stop me now), you immediately rethink the status of your closet? Please tell me I’m not alone here…

I’ve noticed that since I’ve moved towards the equator within the northern hemisphere I’ve been wearing skirts more. Perhaps its the fact that I’m dying from the heat, although I’m quite a weakling when it comes to heat shtuff. Perhaps its that I’m not at home, and that when I leave the house it’s pretty much just for actual reasons, like food shopping and getting a new drivers license and and being an adult is difficult. Needless to say, for all I’m a jeans and t-shirt girl, jeans are just not wearable in heat. Skirts are, though shorts come in as the close second.

So now I’m rambling. But what I am trying to do here is stall a bit. Because tonight I’m endeavoring to document my insanity and give you all the play by play of tonights “entertainment.” I am planning to make three skirts tonight, in the hopes that one will satisfy me tomorrow.

7:30 – The planning… and 8:00 – The time I realistically started this blog post.

I’ve had the deep purple fabric the longest out of all of these, but in reality it’s been just over a year. I got it while abroad in a remnants bin of the only fabric store that I visited there. It’s really only a half meter, so I’ve been debating what to do, since I wanted to make a blouse. There isn’t really enough for a blouse though, so swishy skirt it is! This is going to be my *fingers crossed* easy one. I’m thinking simple gathered skirt with a black waistband… Now I need to find a zipper.

The black interlock in the middle is meant for an A-line skirt… Or that’s what I’ve been telling myself. It’s going to have a waistband, since I realize that I pretty much only wear things with waistband (sorry culottes).

The gold, which happens to be the same gold as I used for my Belle dress, would also be for an A-line skirt. Maybe I should start with this one.

8:20 – The setting up of supplies

Now’s the time to get out the iron and the ironing board, the scissors and the rotary cutter, and realizing that I haven’t eaten dinner. It’s been a long day, and I shall now pause to reconsider my life as I make mac and cheese… or maybe some leftovers. Leftovers sounds easier.

8:45 – Back on track: ironing

That purple fabric… grr. I hate ironing non-quilting cotton items. I think I suffer a bit from i-learned-to-sew with-the-most-maneagable-fabric-itis. Put I shall press on! Hee hee… I’ll shut up now.

9:00 – Cutting out

For the purple skirt I’ll be gathering all of the fabric in, but I still need a waistband! Need to cut that. Also, cutting out the gold A-line… need to do some measuring there I guess!

10:00 – Sewing of the gold skirt

The internet is distracting. All I wanted to do was find out the basics of knit A-line skirt construction, but no, the internet was much too exciting… Perhaps an episode of Criminal Minds involving twins contributed. It’s hard to keep storylines straight when the same actor plays a set of twins…

But I did find a post from ikat bag which discusses precisely what I was interested in! And it shows pockets! I’ve definitely told you of my love for pockets, right?

11:15 – Sewing of the purple skirt

The gold skirt took a while, and its not hemmed, and honestly the waistband needs to be shortened and reattached, but all in all, not bad. I very much dislike unpicking, so I’ll fix it in the morning. It’s easier then.

The purple fabric is off kilter, though. I don’t think it was the end of the bolt, as both sides are very weirdly off grain. And its fraying a lot…

11:55 – Finally got one side of the purple fabric cut straight, and without further ado I am going to start the waistband process! I figure I’ll worry about the other side (aka hem) when I’ve finished the entire skirt.

12:15 – I managed to sew the one side of the waistband down, and ironed the folded bit in place. I’ll start sewing soon, but have I mentioned that the purple fabric when hot smells like warm almonds?

12:45 – Finished the waistband and put in the zipper… Time for bed.

I hemmed it in the morning, and was all ready for the interview.

Never did get around to the third skirt, but it was since made into my black dress

I have learned that while A-line knit skirts are comfy, there is a greater risk of panty-lines, and it’s not good for sprawling when you want to take a nap… not that I have experience with that or anything…

But never fear, I’ve gotten pictures of the two finished skirts now. So, that was one crazy night!

September 3, 2014August 19, 2018

Swingy Circle Skirt

My friends, this is my first full circle skirt. A lovely grey suiting (maybe wool?) circle skirt!

Up until now, I’ve been worried that I would move too quickly or be in a blast of wind, and then my underwear would show.

This kind of malfunction is quite common in my life… Remember my culottes? I’m going to need to make another pair, because I wore these today, and… um… I’m pretty sure my fellow busriders who were lucky enough to get a seat could see somewhere quite private. And keep in mind I’m short. At very nearly 5’3″, no one except toddlers should be able to see up my skirt. I blame my lack of pre-washing (due to my inability at the time of make, and my obliviousness. There were signs. But it is an opportunity to make a better pair.

This post isn’t about culottes though. It’s about a wonderful circle skirt.

The fabric for this is medium weight. Definitely autumn or winterwear, not summer. And possibly wool. I’m just too chicken to try to burn test it. Comfy wool, not super itchy, if it is in fact wool.

Weight is the key factor for me here, the weight of the fabric keeps this from being indecent. Look at this spinning picture. If we get over the fact that my bangs are creating a hilariously funny blur, I’ll tell you that this is me spinning pretty quickly. East coast swing dance quickly, though not quite jive or quickstep. There is no reason for me to spin quicker. And it’s still got some nice conical-ness to it! I did manage to spin quick enough for indecency, but not on camera and it took too much effort. Never happening again!

What else can I say?

It’s got a pocket? Big surprise there. I’m currently courting the title Princess of Pockets.

I interfaced the waistband for the first time? That was nice. Very necessary with the weight of the skirt too.

I’m very proud of my closure? The invisible zip isn’t very invisible, but for a first-try, I think it’s alright. And if I don’t care, no one else should. And the hooks and eyes. Perfection for me. Granted, I had to use black thread on a grey skirt, so its a bit visible, but four years in the costume shop have taught me my way around hooks and eyes!

That’s all for now, but you’ll be seeing it again tomorrow for a new potential series installation!

May 14, 2014August 19, 2018

First Time in Forever

So I volunteered at the movie theater on campus, and a few weeks ago we showed Frozen.

May I start by saying that I love the movie? There are many flaws, I know, but the songs are so catchy!

And when I saw it I really was looking at the outfits. I think I finally hit the point where I not only admire the costumes of movies and shows and stuff, but that I want to make and have all of it. I’m not 100% sure that’s a bad thing, but I know its not necessarily good either…

For our showing of Frozen, though, I definitely thought it would be fun to subtly cosplay Anna.

I knew I wanted a circle skirt that wasn’t already attached to a dress, specifically one that wasn’t black. I’ve got a flowy RTW black skirt, that honestly I don’t wear often (perhaps due to the fact that I stick out enough on campus that it isn’t worth the weird looks), so my plans for the upcoming black skirt will lead to a shorter and less flowy skirt, more A-line.

But I really like the freedom and comfort of a circle skirt. And now that its been warm, I appreciate the flow and minimum fabric involved.

The fabric for the skirt is a blue crepe. It’s kinda heavy but surprisingly cool, and though I don’t know the fabric content at this point I don’t entirely care. It’s comfy, especially for around the house when I don’t have to care if people see the bike shorts I’m wearing underneath. I do think I need to angle the waistband a bit, but that will happen later, and I need to finish my skinny hem, but I’m thinking embroidery and it’s a long hem. And I needed something to wear yesterday.

On another topic I started on my drapey cardigan objective! Knowing I wanted to do this subtle cosplay gave me a great direction, and a reason to get started. This is a super lightweight rayon fabric that squishes into the size of about a child’s shoe, when given opportunity. Its really so soft and squishy, and comfy.

I’m not done with it though. It will gain sleeves at some point, but I didn’t feel like drafting them at the time, so that will be for after I’m done moving for the summer. Give me a month or so… and then maybe some.

But for now I’ll be frolicking through the summer heat in my Anna subtle cosplay!

December 28, 2013August 19, 2018

Olives and Skirts

I can say with 100% certainty that I have never told you that I like olives.

But I do. I really like olives.

My favorite are black olives. As a kid I would eat an entire can, including the juice. Now, I tend to hold off on the juice, at least.

But I definitely like green olives as well. In fact, when I was abroad I couldn’t find black olives, so I ended up eating a lot of green olives.

I know you’re not here to see me ramble about olives though.

A year ago, or so, I received a bunch of free fabric of varying types from when my friendly costume shop did a stash cleanout.

I got this lovely olive green mystery knit. I used it, along with a funky textured woven fabric, to make a lovely cardigan, with rounded hems and long sleeves, loosely based on this tutorial: Billy Cardigan. Please enjoy my fuzzy picture of it, from when I did a subtle Donna cosplay.

But I still had a small amount of fabric to use up, and in practice for a stashbusting resolution I’ll be making, I wanted to use it up. I toyed with the idea of a shirt, but the fabric is a bit heavy, so I nixed that. Then I thought about a hoodie, but I didn’t think I had enough fabric to make it long sleeved. The idea at the back of my head sprung up swiftly, and I quickly found the folded mini tutorial.

I’m not one for mini skirts, though. I do have one, in olive green corduroy, actually, but I don’t often wear it.

But I do have need for a warmer winter skirt. So when I read in the tutorial intro that the skirt was warm, I was sold.

And then I took a look at the fabric I had. It was a tight squeeze. I had to frankenstein the lining. Three pieces, seamed together. It was too ugly to photograph, but luckily, it never has to be seen! And on top of that, lookee here:

This is all of the fabric I have left!

My skirt ended up longer, so for me it’s a bit of a pencil skirt. But a nice warm pencil skirt.

I followed the tutorial pretty much exactly, though I did lengthen the measurements a smidgeon. You see, I was forgetting at this point that I am short in stature, and that almost anything will end up longer on me. So I ended up taking a bit off in the end.

The other thing I changed was not fully finishing the waistband. I stretched and stitched the waistband to the inside, but because it’s knit and doesn’t need finishing, I left it open on the outside. When I tried it on at this point, I realised that I could make it a high waisted, or a normal waisted skirt this way, to match my mood. It’s snug enough that it’ll stay on without wobbling, so I thought at least for the moment that I would leave it as is.

It has nothing to do with the fact that I don’t have matching thread or anything.

July 20, 2013August 19, 2018

A chipped cup.

There’s no way to have a serger and not test it out with some nice fabric! On a lot of nice fabric!

Since the fabric I happened to have on hand already was woven and not at all stretchy, I wanted to buy some knits, so I could test it on some fabric that needs some of the stretch that a serger gives.

I was going for cheap knits, at first, so I bought remnants of some polyester double knit. The tan, blue, and yellow ones are all pretty scratchy, but I bought them mostly for practice, and to use as muslins for heavier knit projects. The gold dotted one is the one I really wanted. It’s a gorgeous fall gold, and if I wanted to be poetical I would say it reminds me of New England in autumn.

The minute the auction closed on my serger I thought that maybe this machine could give me a chance to try out some ideas for my Belle outfit. I’ve not had much luck with my regular sewing machine with stretchy fabrics, and though I’m working to change that the serger will overall come in handy.

For my real dress, I want a sweetheart necked bodice with a lace overlay, some sleeves, and a skater (circle) skirt.

The lace top to the real bodice is something I am planning to figure out another time, potentially with a coupon and really cheap stretch lace. I’ll be willing to shell out a little more money for better lace once I know how it will fit together.

But for now, I’d like to work on the skirt, see how and where I’d like it to fit, and then the bodice in turn, so that I know how I’d like to make the real dress.

Whenever I actually get around to that.

I started out with this fabric, which I knew I wanted as a skirt anyway, and I definitely wanted to try out a full circle skirt.

So I had folded a piece into a small square, with two folds, and cut out the waist. I then trimmed the hemline, knowing that I probably wouldn’t actually hem it. It is a lovely knit, but I knew that the skirt would already be a bit short on me. When possible, I prefer to give myself a higher waisted skirt. My smallest point around my midsection is pretty high up (as is my natural waist though that’s not quite as high), and I like to emphasize that when I can, which then requires longer skirts.

Then a waistband went on, though I didn’t quite plan it well enough and it came up short in the back. It was really at this point where I decided to think about putting on a bodice. I’m more willing to add extra work to my plate than come up with a simple quick fix for a skirt waistband.

I’ll talk about the bodice in my next post on this project!