Curved Seam Skirt: Love it!

Thank you very much to everyone who chimed in with their feedback on my prior post about this skirt. As a result of your thoughtful comments, I decided to give this pattern a shot and made up a "quick and dirty" muslin this weekend to test out the pattern --- without any alterations to see how it would fit.

Well, all I can say is that it is a very flattering design and those curved seams are just beautiful (the pattern is well drafted so the curved pieces came together easily). I love how the back slit is offset to the right and not placed down CB like most skirts. I'm sorry about the quality of the photos, but it rained all day today and we were house-bound --- yellowish lights!



So now the length. I made it as-is and pinned up the recommended hem allowance (about 1.5 inches). Here is the original length.



I pulled up the waist a bit above my natural waist as it seemed to fit best that way, so I may need to take some length from the top. The length ends up mid to lower calf, but because of the narrow/slightly pegged shape at the hem, I don't think it looks too bad. It kind of looks retro in a '30s/'40s sort of way, I think.

Here's a version pinned up an additional 1.5 inches.



The below-the-knee length doesn't look so bad, at least not as bad as I originally imagined!

Thank you again for your wonderful feedback --- I am now officially in love with this design and am looking forward to making it in a cool fabric!

Curved Seam Skirt: Conflicted

Well, I've been hemming and hawing about this skirt from the September 2010 issue of Burda.

Image from here.

After a rather painful session deciphering the "new and improved" Burda pattern sheet, I took an objective look at the skirt design and asked myself, "is this going to work for me?" In hindsight, I guess I should have thought of this before I spent the time tracing out those pattern pieces!

I started measuring the pieces and realized that the total length of the skirt is about 27 inches, which is tremendously long for someone who is 5 feet 1 inches tall on a good posture day. Looking at the photo, I guess the skirt is meant to fall below the knees, but that length is really unflattering for me. Typically, skirts that are 22 inches in length (maximum) work for me, which means I would need to somehow eliminate 5 inches from this pattern. That's a lot!

I don't think I can just lop off 5 inches from the "non-curved" skirt pieces (the bottom sections of the skirt patterns) because the proportion of the curved sections to the non-curved sections would get out of whack --- I think it would end up looking funky. I don't think I have the energy to calculate and re-draft the curved pieces to maintain the original proportions, but any opinions would be appreciated. Perhaps this skirt is so cute that it would be worth trying to manipulate the curved pieces?

What Happened to the Burda Pattern Sheets?

Yes, I realize I'm late to the party here, but I just pulled out the September 2010 issue of Burda to trace out the patterns for the skirt and coat from my previous post --- and was absolutely shocked!

Earlier this year, I recall some blogs commenting on the format change of these pattern sheets that made it much more difficult to trace. Well, now I know what they were talking about! I literally stared at the sheet for quite a while, trying to make sense of it all. The original format was already pretty difficult to read, but it looks like they condensed two very large sheets of patterns into one, making it even more challenging. I managed to trace out the skirt pieces, but I felt so tired afterward that I couldn't muster up the energy to trace out the coat pieces. Ugh, I guess I'll just have to get used to it!

Too Late for Batik: Moving on to Coats

I can't believe how quickly time is flying by. I noticed my beautiful pink flower batik fabric is still lying in my sewing area --- it never turned into a tunic or a skirt, and now, with the calendar advancing to mid-October, it seems ridiculous to sew anything batik!

So, perhaps it is best to save the batik for next spring and shift gears to start thinking about winter items. I flipped through the September issue of Burda and found a number of very cool projects, including this skirt, which SewTawdry beautifully made recently.

Image from here.

I am also really drawn to this coat from the same issue. I love the architectural style --- the clean lines and shapes. I'm not sure how it will work on my petite frame, but I'm willing to give it a try. I'm not sure about fabric choice --- it says to use coating fabric that won't fray, and I'm not sure what that would be. I would appreciate any ideas!

Image from here.