The "shifting skies" skirt

“This is a city of shifting light, of changing skies, of sudden vistas.  A city so beautiful it breaks the heart
again and again.”
Alexander McCall Smith, 2006

This skirt has been in the works a long time. It has become a bit of a Sew Weekly theme hotpotch over the moths. It was originally inspired by the Local Colour theme back in March. The idea was to make something that said something about where you lived. Debi, my fellow Edinburgher was off that week so I thought I should show Edinburgh somehow. Well that was then, it then got tinkered with during the UFO weeks, and then I added some machine embroidery as part of the Embellish This week, and now it is finished, it actually fits in nicely with the current week of To dye for!

So, back to the beginning we go. I think in many ways I completely failed to do Edinburgh any justice, so most of this is going to be about Edinburgh rather than the skirt! Until recently there was a building in the city centre that had big quotes about Edinburgh printed in the windows. The quote above by Mr McCall Smith has always been one of my favourites, as I feel it really sums up Edinburgh's weather, which is a really important part of the city's atmosphere. Due to the proximity to the sea, and the crazy hilly nature of the city (for those that don't know, Edinburgh is built on and around the remains of a volcano) the weather is VERY changeable and can be dramatic and beautiful and then just plain miserable all within half an hour!

Here are some lovely pictures from Flickr to demonstrate:

Craig Walton  http://www.flickr.com/photos/41234132@N06/3822997654/ 

Sunny and beautiful

elementalPaul http://www.flickr.com/photos/elementalpaul/839543993/

Stunning and changeable

katya zharova http://www.flickr.com/photos/zharova/897321169/

Uh oh, its going to start chucking it down!

So I wanted to make a skirt, which was grey, definitely the standard colour of Edinburgh, what with all the old stone buildings and cobbles and crazy clouds. I decided to use the cotton sheet I had dyed initially as part of my weeping angel Halloween costume, that had gone the wrong colour (it was meant to be a dull grey but came out a blue/grey with a slightly massive scale uneven tie die effect, mainly due to me know making the effort to dye it properly as it was only for a costume).

Edinburgh is also somewhat notorious for its unpredictable winds, I have never been anywhere more inclined to blow your skirt over your head on a day with no wind at all seconds before! This is mainly a result of the crazy weather and the fact that the city, due to the hills, is built on several levels, so you can be walking along a normal road with normal height buildings and then realise the whole thing was a bridge bounded by high rises, half of which you cant see, which has another road running across underneath. This does tend to lead to unexpected drafts. I considered making a tight skirt so this couldn't happen, but then I thought, what the heck, I will embrace it, so I made a circle skirt instead. I have also made a flouncy underskirt to wear under this to accentuate this effect, but I need to make it a few inches shorter.

looking down off George IV Bridge onto the Cowgate,  Erke http://www.flickr.com/photos/erke86joc/4258668352/

the Upper Bow and Victoria Street   - Mach 3.25 http://www.flickr.com/photos/mach32/5479441904/

So, the skirt. I followed Casey's tutorial for circle skirts (she is now also doing a circle skirt sew along), which was very straightforward. I didn't bother with a pattern for the middle, I folded it into 4 and kept cutting strips off the middle until it was the correct  size (I had learned from a sad exercise with the underskirt that not erring on the side of caution with this leaves you with a really big useless piece of material with a really big hole in the middle of it..). I managed to get this just about right, easing the skirt into the waistband was pretty successful, I only have one really wrinkle..shame its right at the front.. sigh, never mind!). 

I then considered doing some machine embroidery. As I don't have a clever machine, by this I mean using a stitch on my normal machine to do things it wasn't designed for. I tried out all the stitches on different lengths to see what they looked like (quite interesting in itself!)

I decided to go for the weird almost hexagonal stitch second form the bottom on the right. It is possibly meant for smocking.  I then sewed some lines up form the bottom of the skirt to random heights to give the skirt a bit more interest. 

So all in all, a pretty simple skirt, considering how long it took me to make it! At least I can now say that I definitely hung ti long enough to stretch out! It is very comfortable however, and swirls beautifully.

Roswell week day 7 (sort of), So long Sarong, Agnetha's legs and other stuff

Ok, so I fudged this, as I couldnt get anything done at the end of the week, I included Sunday afternoon too.

Roswell Week Day 7

Item completed - So long Sarong

State before Roswell Week - taken in at the waist but not shortened

Reason for abandonment - The hem was all over the place and I couldn't be bothered to get my flat-mates to try and fix it on a stretch material. I also thought the waistband looked terrible, but on reexamination, it actually looks fine. I think the stretch fabric had warped my mind a little!

Time spent as an UFO - about 4 months

Time used to finish - about half an hour, after I had fixed Agnetha (see later)

"chump" factor felt for not having done it sooner - not too bad, whilst I only had to re-hem it, it was MUCH easier when I could use Agnetha. 

This is yet another item from the productive Shelter trip when I first started sewing. When I picked it up I thought it was a skirt, but I then realised that it was actually a rather odd sarong. I say odd, because more than half the material was in the front fold, so the whole thing was really weirdly unbalanced wight wise, and I am not really sure why you would want such a heavy jersey sarong.. (it would make more sense as a wrap skirt but that wasn't the way it was attached at the front. 

I cut it off the waistband, and cut the skirt into a rectangle without the odd tie bits from the front. I then sewed it up with a side seam, and reattached it to the waistband. So far so good, except that I somehow had managed to sew it on totally crooked so the hem was all over place. Plus I had forgotten to shorten it. At this point I gave up. I think my fear of stretch fabrics got the better of me. 

And so it sat for several months, even through the previous Spring Palette Challenge, when I planned to finish it and then continued to ignore it! 

But Roswell week was the line I wouldn't cross! I was puzzling at how to fix it, as my flatmates are a little cautious about hemming things, and the stretch made it more difficult. But then I had a brainwave, which I shall come to later, and managed to make Agnetha a stand! so I just popped it on her, chopped off the bottom and zigzagged it. Result. 

It isnt a very complicated refashion or skirt for all that delay, but it is a pretty cute jersey skirt, and I still love the colour and fabric. 

Item completed - Agnetha

State before Roswell Week - body made, but no stand (body phase 1, body phase 2)

Reason for abandonment - I couldn't think what to make a stand out of, I was considering a hat stand or something but I hadn't got round to doing anything, plus I couldn't think how to attach it. 

Time spent as an UFO - only a few weeks since I finished her body

Time used to finish - about 10 minutes once I had worked it out!

"chump" factor felt for not having done it sooner - ok, plus if I had tried before we got the new beds I wouldn't have had lots of spare plastic packaging to use. 

I couldn't work out how to make Agnetha a stand, which made it tricky to do dresses or skirts on her. We have been moving stuff round our flat a lot and as I shifted and tidied I found a lamp that I didn't need in the hall. It was just a standard IKEA lamp, but it had a very heavy base, and I realised that it would probably be robust enough to support Agnetha without continually falling over. Also, as it had big lamp bit on the top, I could use that to anchor the whole thing. I just stuffed the top of Agnetha with some plastic bags (we had some beds delivered and so we have had a lot of plastic packaging lying around!) and then popped her over the lamp. I then just filled up the gaps round underneath with more plastic bags and taped up the bottom. She leans very slightly backwards but is otherwise perfect! Also I marked my knee height on the pole with tape to make hemming easier. I am extremely pleased, she looks very fine and isn't as scarily huge looking now that she is the right height (though admittedly she now does appear to float magically in the air..).

Item completed - Napkins to match the Christmas picnic rug 

State before Roswell Week - had made one, 3 left to do

Reason for abandonment - Ran out of time before going to give them to my bro, and promised I would make the rest later

Time spent as an UFO - since Christmas

Time used to finish - about half an hour

"chump" factor felt for not having done it sooner - high, I should have done these ages ago, they aren't even slightly difficult. 

I also finished pinking the seams of the Christmas Dress, which was shamefully overdue. 

The Portobello dress

Last week I had to go to Portobello, a little seaside town on the edge of Edinburgh, to get my car MOTd. As it was a lovely day and it was going to take a while I wandered up and down the beach, read some of my oceanography book in the local library, ate a delicious but rather over priced burger and hit the many charity shops! Overall, as with all charity shops, you could tell the proportions of the local population- down in Portobello there are clearly a lot of old ladies who like to wear slightly shapeless things. In one shop however I spotted a shapeless garment in a lovely blue and purple flowered fabric-perfect for my Spring Palette, and my love of bright flowery patterns. I snapped it up for £3, a bargain! (more so than the MOT- turns out I needed a whole new set of tyres. Ouch!)

When I got it home however the scale of the task became more apparent. The dress, as well as being utterly shapeless, was also too small across the bodice. You can see the gape in the picture but what isn’t so obvious is the way it pulled me in about 2 inches around every button from the side. Super flattering. The waist is also far too high and big on me, the armholes were too tight, the neckline doesn’t work and the whole thing is clearly far too long (that glamorous “midi” length that is very fashionable right now. apparently –in any case it is definitely not for me!). To clarify the horribleness of the item, when my flatmate Lindsey saw me in it, she burst out laughing and now still laughs whenever the dress is mentioned. So clearly some work needed to be done!

I decided that in order to keep it as a dress, I would have to put in a waist section to drop the gathered skirt down to an appropriate level. I would also need to cut a lot of the bottom, so there was conveniently some fabric available for that!  I therefore divided the dress into three sections.

The bodice was the first thing to tackle. As it was it clearly wouldn’t do up, and the neckline needed to be changed. I decided, mainly through opening it up until I could breathe, to create a mock open shirtwaist top, by having most of the buttons open, the neckline cut down accordingly and put in an insert panel in a contrasting colour. This proved slightly fiddly, mainly as every time I cut off a bit I didn’t need so that I could see what I was doing, I immediately realised that I did need it. sigh. I also realised half way through that I could only sew in the insert panel on one side otherwise I wouldn’t be able to get it on and off. After a little thought I decided to use the buttons, sewing them onto the purple inset and then having buttonholes on the outer layer. This just about creates the impression that they are just attached to the outside layer like the rest of the buttons. (I’m not at all sure I explained that very well..)

To offset this trying experience however I had some pure joy-namely my new bias tape maker. I asked for one of for Christmas from my mummy after seeing the how to on the Colette Patterns blog. Instead of the regular sew hundreds of strips together approach I made the tape strip using the continuous tape method again from Colette Patterns, which worked like a dream, much less hassle than the other way (which I also tried as I didn’t make quite enough the first time!). After that you just poke the strip through the little folder tool and it pull it along, ironing as you go-frankly I was sceptical, thinking it would be fiddly and awkward, but it was AMAZING! I now love making bias tape. I used it to trim the slightly larger armholes I cut. Super easy, worked like a breeze, looks really good.

Then I had to make the waistband section. I had already measured how wide I wanted it to be. I think that flat waistband sections sometimes look a little bodgy, so I decided to make a pleated one, inspired by the beautiful wedding dress sewcountrychick had made using this tutorial. Basically, you just fold the material up, and then iron fusible interfacing on the back. For extra stability I also sewed up across the pleats in various places. It worked wonderfully, and looked really nice.

All I had to do then was sew the three bits together, and put on some buttons on the waistband section. Luckily, what with the one I cut off in the middle and the ones I cut off the adjusted neckline, I had exactly the right amount to do the waistband and insert buttons. Result!

I am fairly pleased with the final result, it’s certainly much better. As usual I am not entirely convinced by myself in gathered skirts, it just emphasises the sudden jut out of my hips, and the inset panel pulls slightly more than it did when I assembled it. But never mind. It‘s a nice dress for summer and very pretty fabric. Plus it gave me lots of button and buttonhole practice. And was only £3!

"Sack to slinky" dress refashion

At last-the slump is broken! Admittedly not with any of the many UFOs I have been avoiding, but with a new refashion I bought last week, but nevertheless! And its even navy and white so it fits with my Spring Palette!

The dress (£2.50 from Shelter) was about 3 sizes too big, and really shapeless. It was a "killer" combination of squared necked shapeless smocked elasticated bodice with an over large tulip skirt (and lets face it, those are only flattering if they fit). But the fabric is really cute, with white outlined flowers on navy, and it had nice pin tucks and buttons on the otherwise underwhelming bodice!

As you can see, the original dress, was a misshapen sack that bore very little resemblance to my figure. Massive round the waist, no bust definition, weird baggy back where the smocking kicks in (very tight round the top and bottom, huge in the middle-sorry no picture of this wonderful detail) and no indication of where my waist or hips would even be. And the neckline sits in a very odd place and makes the whole thing just look weird.

Flattering huh. I look like I weigh about 3 stone more than I do!

Luckily though it was very easy to fix! Firstly I just undid the top button and folded down each side to make it a lovely curve v-neck. I then pinned out some pleats under the bust, along the line of the existing princess seams which led to the existing front pleats, so they are now bigger. I also took 2 inches off each side and did an odd scooped tuck out of the centre back to make it less poofy.

The end result is a little tricky getting it on and off, and a little tight under the arms when I reach forward, but otherwise I love it! I shall be wearing it this weekend down in London with my beautiful friends Shrob, Sarah and Sally. Clearly, as has been proved before, there is nothing like a self imposed out of nowhere deadline to make me do some sewing!

Other changes to my Spring Palette - the " shifting skies skirt"

As I am re jigging my Spring Palette, I am also going to have to not make the Chuck dress just yet. I just cant face another hardcore pattern altering session and a shirtwaist dress is just going to be too much. But it will be next on the list! Instead I am making another skirt, partially to replace the circle skirt that the Wildflower skirt didn't get to become as I didn't have enough material! I was inspired by this week's theme on the Sew Weekly, which is Local Colour - basically to make a garment inspired by your local environment. I was interested to see what Debi would make based on Edinburgh but she is away this week, so I decided to make something. I'm not sure how well it is going (it was the thing annoying me yesterday, but its better now!) so I am going to keep a little quiet about it for now, but its going to feature the gone wrong dyed cotton sheet from my Halloween costume and 7m of navy lining. Here is a peek at progress so far.

Slight adjustments to my Spring Palette- the refashioned "I no longer hate hemming" skirt

I promise I have been working on my Spring Palette, but various stuff what with seeing people and doing essays has meant that it has all slipped a bit. Plus, several projects have just been winding me up! Accordingly I have some adjustments to make to my plan.

The flowery jersey skirt refashion is not going well, for some reason it just wont behave and I keep adjusting it and the rage is getting greater! Currently it just looks like a misshapen sack with an inexplicable hem. So it is being put to one side until I am calmer!

However-I have a replacement! I was wandering through the charity shops on my way home (its so dangerous!) and spotted a lovely white skirt with turquoise flowers in a nice slightly cheeseclothy cotton, with a built in soft underskirt. Perfect! It was however too large in general and ankle length. It was actually quite nice ankle length but I would never have worn it, I find long skirts make me feel like a hippo, no matter what the mirror says! Sadly I didn't take any pictures of me wearing the original that came out, they were all weirdly flashy (I took them near a mirror and it didn't work). However, here is a shot that shows the skirt as I altered it, and the bit I took off the bottom so you can see.

I just took an even amount off it all round, cutting through both the outer skirt and inner. and it hangs beautifully and the hem was perfectly even first time! Result -(and a nice change after the stupid jersey one!). I also took a few inches out of the waist and side seam so it fit.

I wouldn't generally wear it with my shirt tucked as it sits a little low for that to be very flattering but I did so the whole skirt was visible. I like that it looks nice with tights and without, a good versatile spring skirt!

Wildflower Skirt-complete!

I finished something!

This skirt is the first part of the Spring Palette Challenge, and is very simple, just an A-line. I wore it to wander round Edinburgh with my friend Srobana who was visiting me.

You cant really see the shape too well due to it being really windy! I really like it though.  Its very comfortable, really jolly and despite creasing quite easily the creases aren't really visible. Result. I wore it all day and then out for drinking and it stood up well. I was worried the pattern might be a bit much but I think it works nicely. The one with my woolly hat shows the drape of the skirt better.

Spring Palette Challenge (a bit late but never mind!)

I have been really enjoying looking at other people's palettes for the Colette Patterns Spring Palette Challenge. The idea is to pick a palette of colours that are inspiring you right now and create a little wardrobe of outfits and items that use these colours. I have been holding off because I seem to be loving all sorts of colours at the moment but then I realised that whilst I was enjoying the colours, I kept trying to make things in a much more restricted palette-so I had a go at making my selection and working out the projects. Though I'm a little late on the challenge, some of the projects I have already been working on are part of the plan so it is all fine!

Sadly I don't know where I got half these from but some are form modcloth, the Pendrell blouse is obviously Sewaholic, the blue gathered front skirt is by Casey, and the red belt is Tilly's.  

I am planning to make 7 items, using shades of blue and purple and white as a contrast. That sounds rather a lot, but two of them are only belts so should hopefully come together quickly! Plus I originally had 8 items, but a gathered 50s blouse in white with turquoise flowers got cut at the last minute as I was in danger of biting off far more than I can chew! Having said that it might come back in again if I fancy it!

Obviously my Pendrell homage (should I ever get round to finishing it-I have slipped a little on the sew-a-long time frame!) is included, and the Chuck dress. I had this Challenge in mind when I selected the Wildflower skirt fabric and I am going to refashion the turquoise jersey sarong/wrap skirt I mentioned here. In addition to these I am planning an Oolong (great name-I've looked it up just now and its a kind of special Chinese tea) by Colette Patterns, a bias cut dress. It's quite a dressy pattern as its been made up by them, but I'm going to do a more worky/everyday version by making the bodice from white and bottom from navy.