Hello and welcome to the Gothic Colour channel.
This video is to introduce my ‘Into the
Sunset’ design, with information on how
you can use it to make a gathered, summer
skirt using 1m of printed fabric and
an extra metre (I meant to say half a metre) of plain fabric.
You can also make a simpler version using only
the 1 metre of printed fabric to make a shorter
skirt – I will be explaining how you can
do this during this video.
As usual, I am going to start by talking about
my design and then move on to the sewing.
In the description box below, I have links
to the different sections of the video so
you can easily skip ahead to the section you
are most interested in. So if you are only
interested in the construction of the skirt
then you can go ahead and skip to that part.
The ‘Into the Sunset’ design that is used
in this video is one of three colour variations
inspired by the jewel tones you can get in
nature, as sunbeams go through different materials.
The other two variations are called ‘Into
the Forest’ and ‘Into the Ocean’, and
the design is an abstract, textural gradient
that forms subtle vertical stripes. Links
to all three colour variations can be found
in the description box of this video.
So let me start by showing you the printouts
that I received from my two shops; on the
top are those from spoonflower.com and on
the bottom are those from fashion-formula.com.
Starting with the ‘Into the Forest’ gradient,
we have a bright green gradient that starts
from near-black, working through emerald green,
bright leaf green, finishing in a light chartreuse
at 50cms, before working back the same colours
all the way to near-black to complete the
whole metre of fabric. On these printouts
I am showing, however, you can see half the
gradient since the gradient then mirrors itself.
As you can see on the printout from Fashion
Formula the colours are a bit warmer and have
a bit of an olive green hue. The printout
from Spoonflower is more neutral and brighter
in colour. Next we have the ‘Into the Ocean’
gradient which, as you can guess, goes through
blue hues, starting again from near-black,
going through indigo, a mid-blue and finishing
with a pastel aqua before, again, going through
the darker colours. The main difference between
the printouts here is in the darker colours,
where the indigo on the Spoonflower version
is closer to a purple than it is on the Fashion
Formula one. Finally we have the ‘Into the
Sunset’ gradient, where we have a bright,
colourful gradient starting from near-black,
going through purple, red, orange and finishing
with yellow at 50cms of fabric and then, as
with the others, going back through the same
colours. As you can see, there are very minor
variations in the colours between the Fashion
Formula and the Spoonflower printouts but
such little differences can also be seen over
printing different materials as well. So,
let me show you, for example, the actual 1m
fabric that I got for making the skirt on
this video. This fabric is from Fashion Formula
and it is their 100% bamboo fabric and, you
may be able to see how much darker the orange
colour of the gradient appears on this fabric
in comparison to both the Spoonflower and
the Fashion Formula printouts which are both
printed , if I remember correctly, on different
types of polycotton. The reason I’m pointing
this out is just to give an example as to
why it can be important to get a sampler on
the actual fabric you are planning to use
for your projects as different colours may
come out somewhat differently depending on
the material they are printed on. One last
thing about samplers; the printouts I have
shown you so far are ones I ordered so I could
check the full gradient, to make sure all
the colours look alright. If you order a standard
sampler what you will get is this: a, roughly,
20cms/8” square, so you will not be able
to check the full gradient. So, in case someone
wanted to do so, I have also uploaded onto
my shops this type of gradient tester that
you can see here, which you can order as a
quarter fabric and where you can check all
three colour variants on one printout.
Anyway, let’s move on to materials and measurements
for the gathered skirt.
You will need threads to match your fabric.
I am showing here black and pale yellow, though
I did use some orange and red thread, too.
The needles I used on my sewing machine were
size 75, using stretch needles on my elastic
and sharps on my fabric. You will need elastic
for your waist; I used 1 metre (39 ¼”)
of a 15cms (6”) wide black elastic. This
makes for quite a wide waistband. You can,
of course, choose to go for something narrower
if you want to. For the version of the skirt
I made I also used some black cotton fabric
that was about 155cms wide and 50cms long
(that is roughly 61” wide and 19 and a half”
long) and finally the 100% bamboo printed
fabric which was 140cms wide and 1 metre long
(that’s roughly 55” wide and about 39
¼ ” long).
These were for the skirt to fit on measurements
of 82cms (or about 32”) waist and 104cms
(or about 41”) hips. Of course, depending
on your measurements you will need to make
sure that you have enough elastic and that
the width of the fabric attached to it fits
over your hips.
So, moving on to the construction of the skirt.
Firstly I washed and pressed the fabrics and
I cut the printed one in half along the centre
of the gradient. The plan here is to join
the two sections into a wide tube that
will be gathered to form the lower part of
the skirt. Then I put those aside and worked
on the elastic. Firstly I checked to see how
much stretch the elastic has and decided that
for this elastic and the fit that I wanted
for the waist, I could cut the elastic at
exactly my measurements planning for 1cm (3/8”)
seam allowances.
Since the elastic I used was very wide, it
worked as a yoke – and I cut it that way.
I decided on this yoke to start about 4cms
(1 ½ “) over my natural waist and end at
about 11cms (4 ¼ “) below it - so at around
the upper hip area. The easiest way of finding
the right shape for your yoke is to take your
measurements in halves; I wore a close fitting
top with sideseams that covered this area
and measured from seam to seam the front and
back separately, at: the top where I wanted
the yoke to start, the natural waist, and
the upper-hip area where I wanted the yoke
to end. I, then, cut the elastic in two, making
sure that I could definitely fit the widest
measurements on the two pieces. Then taking
each piece separately and folding it in half,
I marked the 4cms point from the top, to find
the waist position, and then marked from the
folded end half of each measurement. So, to
explain, starting with the front piece, I
measured at the top, half of my top-front
measurement, from the folded end - then 4cms
down, half of my front natural waist measurement
- and then at the end, half of my upper-hip
measurement; so when I cut along my markings
and unfolded the elastic, I would have the
full measurements for the front of my yoke.
I did the same thing with the back measurements
on the second piece of elastic. Next, I matched
the edges of the front and back pieces.
Depending on your shape you may need to ‘convince’
the elastic to match well because it needs
to go into a three dimensional shape when
it doesn’t necessarily want to! In order
to be able to sew exactly my shape, I first
pinned the edges together and then basted
them firmly together, to avoid any shifting
while feeding them through the sewing machine.
Here you can see the seam finished – you
can flatten the seam allowances on the inside
or you can do as I did, which was to fold
both seam allowances towards the back of the
yoke and top stitch them into place, in order
to make the side seams extra secure. When
top-stitching you will need to follow the
curvature of the yoke in order to preserve
it, as you can see here. Then I moved on to
dealing with the black fabric. If you are
more interested in the shorter version of this
skirt, that doesn’t use extra fabric, you
can skip this bit, though bear in mind that
you will need to use pretty much the same
method to attach the fabric to the elastic
as I do with this black fabric. So, firstly,
I sewed it closed to form a tube, I finished
the top of the tube with a simple zig-zag
stitch to avoid any fraying and did a small
hem at the other end. Then, I pinned the fabric
to the elastic. Having the elastic yoke the
right way out, I put it into the fabric ‘tube’
that was turned inside out - this way I had
right sides together. I then started matching
the top of the fabric tube to the bottom of
the elastic yoke. I put the seam of the fabric
at the back and matched it to the middle point
of the back of the yoke. Then, folding across
that point I found the middle point of the
front of the yoke and that of the fabric tube
and matched those together. I continued folding
and matching each section until I felt I had
enough pins to help me feed the stretched
elastic with the correct section of the fabric
through the sewing machine. If the fabric
you are using is much wider than the elastic
when stretched (this will most likely be the
case if you make the skirt using only the
printed fabric) you may find it easier if
you partly gather the fabric first. More on
this shortly. I used a wide zig-zag stitch
to attach the fabric to the elastic... and
here you can see what this looks like when
finished. Next, I moved back to the printed
fabric and sewed up the edges, matching up
the gradient. I then finished the seams with
a zig-zag stitch to stop any fraying and cut
off any excess fabric from the seam allowances.
I also hemmed the end since I wanted the hem
to follow along the gradient; this meant that
the exact length of the skirt had to depend
on where the fabric was attached at the top
rather than depend on the hem. Next, I sewed
two basting stitches along the top of the
fabric at a low tension so I could gather
it. I knotted the ends of the stitches on
both sides and started gathering using the
bobbin threads, as you can see here. I gathered
this to the circumference of the black fabric
that forms the top part of the skirt, which
worked to about 153cms. If you are to make
the skirt without the extra fabric, you will
need to find out how much the circumference
of the lower part of the elastic is after
stretching. If you did the stretch test I
did at the beginning of the construction of
the skirt, this should be easy to calculate.
So, for example, if 20cms of the elastic used
stretches roughly to 30cms then it stretches
by 50%. If the circumference of the elastic
yoke at the high-hip area is, say, 100cms,
then it can stretch to 150cms, so you will
need to gather the fabric to that before attaching
it to the elastic the way I attached the black
fabric earlier. By the way, if any of this
is confusing, do let me know in the comment
section below and I’ll try to clarify!
Going back to this version of the skirt. I
did a fitting of the top part of the skirt
and marked the line I wanted to join the black
and printed fabrics together, making sure
this line was parallel to the floor. I used
a running thread through this line to make
it easier for me to see where I needed to
join the fabrics.
Having the black fabric and elastic the right
way out and the printed fabric the wrong way
out, I put the black fabric into the printed
fabric tube up to the line I marked during
the fitting and started pinning them together,
making sure that the side seams were at about
the same point as the side seams of the elastic,
in order to make things neat. I then used
a zigzag stitch to join the fabrics together.
The zigzag stitch is not strictly speaking
needed here; it was needed on the elastic
in order to allow it to stretch, but I used
the same stitch to create a similar effect
on the seam between the two fabrics, as you
can see here. Next, I removed my basting,
and cut off the excess fabric from the seam
allowance, and then I used the lower part
of the black fabric to finish and strengthen
the seam. I folded the black fabric over the
seam allowance of the printed fabric to cover
it and then sewed it up. The
rest of the black fabric sits under the printed
fabric and works as a lining as you can see
here.
So finally, after washing and drying, here
is the completed skirt! I wanted this skirt
to finish below the knee, but hopefully you
can see how it could also work as a shorter
skirt without the black section. Also, you
could make the skirt so it starts with the
lighter part of the gradient at the top and
ends with the darker part at the bottom.
For my next video I am making something that
will be separate from my 1-metre fabric videos.
It is a 50s style shirt, using one of my animal
heads prints, and it requires much more fabric
than what I have used in my recent videos.
It will hopefully be interesting as a project
– I have to say it has definitely been a
learning curve for me so far and I have only
just started working on it!
In the meantime do subscribe and click on
notifications so you get notified of my next
upload.
Goodbye! :o)
