Sunday, December 2, 2012

2nd: DIY Lace Tutu Skirt

Christmas Calendar, Day 2

For the Dancer: Lace Tutu


The dancers always have the greatest skirts, don't you think? My dancer, my photography muse (you'll get to meet her in two weeks when she flies over from Finland <3), is a big fan of fluffy skirts so there was really nothing else I could have come up with for her.

I'm sharing this with you quite early, since this one is probably the most time consuming&challenging DIY my Christmas Calendar will have. But it can be done in a couple of hours tops if you're on speaking terms with your sewing machine :)

You can also use patterned or plain tulle for this skirt, I made a raspberry red skirt earlier this fall.

How to:

You need 
* about 8 feet of fabric (or 2,5 meters), that is wide enough to be enough for the length of two layers (as you can see in the next photo, I had some left over)
* wide stretchy band (black) that is as long as your waist
* satin or other fabric for lining, as long as you want your lining to be + 1/2 inch

(Even if you don't want to have any lining at all, at least have a thin slice of it since it will help sewing the waist band on tremendously; otherwise the lace will keep getting stuck in the machine. If you're working with regular tulle, you should have an easier time without the lining part.)

(I made just a minishort lining in this one, since I know my friend is not too shy about showing some leg.... The skirt can always be combined with leggings/minishorts)

 

Cut out two layers of fabric (my layers were about 24 inches long). I cut out the pieces from the sides, since the edge of the fabric was finished quite nicely so I'll have that edge as the hem. f there is a middle part left, save it for potentially fluffing the skirt up even more later. 

Sew the ends of the waistband together, and try it on to make sure it fits correctly.

Sew the lining piece's ends together, but make sure its "loop" is just wide enough so you can still slip into it (I made this a couple of inches wider than the hips), no bigger. Zig zag all of the lining's edges, so it won't start to unravel.

Sew the ends of the layers together (sew each one separately attaching them to their own ends, not to each other, thus making two separate "loops"). Then insert them inside each other (make sure they both have their seams facing outwards or inwards while you do this, and that both have the hem-edge at the same side). 

 

(Above) Sew them onto each other with the largest straight stitch possible at about 1/2 inches from the upper edge, and don't "finish" the starting point and the end point, just stop really close to where you started. Then, you'll have to start pulling the thread gently from both ends, to crumple it up. Keep on doing this and evening the crumpledness out accross the edge until the crumpled loop is the same size as the lining loop.


Combine all three pieces: You want the "right" side of all pieces to face outwards (meaning that all the seams face inwards). First you have the lining, then the crumpled up skirt layers and finally the waistband on top. 

Since the waistband "loop" is smaller than the lining and the skirt layers, you'll have to just pin it on as evenly as you can (for instance, every 8th part of the waistband is attached to every 8th part of the layers and lining).



(This is how it should look from the inside, remember to check that every pieces' seams are inwards.)

Then you'll have to sew all the pieces together, by stretching out the waistband as wide as the other layers as you go (so when you let go the waistband goes back to it's natural state, crumpling up the fabrics even more).

Then just... try it on!

If you still want more volume, here's the part where that extra piece of fabric might come in handy:
Sew the ends of it together, and do the crumpling-thing to it. Then, sew onto the lining to make some extra poof underneath the skirt.



Print tee is from Forever 21.

Fun lace skirts on Polyvore:

Lace&Tutus


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