Border Print Skirt

Last week one of my best friends came to visit. My poor husband had 4 days of not being able to get a word in edgeways! We had a lovely day on Thursday browsing round Manchester’s Northern Quarter and grabbing some lunch in Piccadilly Garden’s. We also visited one of my favourite fabric and craft stores and found this remnant.

“This is a small piece – what could be made out of it?” my friend asked. We looked at each other as she held it up. A skirt of course! It only cost £1.74 for the piece; throw in a zip, some lining fabric, and thread, and the whole thing cost not much more than £5. Plus we were sorted for an activity for Friday (which didn’t involve more shopping)!

Remnant and lining fabric

To make the skirt we used this pattern video (I found the link on Renegade Seamstress) to make a pattern for the lining. The border fabric was trimmed all the way around (saving the top to make a waistband) into a large rectangle, and then I just sewed up one side (leaving an opening for the zip) and gathered the top. This way the border print matches all the way round. The fabric was stretchy, so no need for any back splits.

Then I inserted the zip. This is only my 2^nd ever attempt at a zip – the first was on a sewing project I did for my GCSE’s, so quite a while ago! Lastly I added the waistband – I used the leftover piece of remnant cut to 4” wide and ironed on interfacing to the reverse for strength and to stop it being so stretchy. Then I folded the raw edges in, ironed and stitched the whole thing to the skirt and lining with all the edges enclosed inside.

2nd ever zip!

Just a button hole and button to add on the inside to finish the waistband closure!

I was pretty pleased with my handiwork on this one, I feel a lot more confident about starting to work towards one of my new year’s resolutions (to make an entire outfit myself). Watch this space! :)