Welcome back to my blog as a Lamazi Maker!
To start with, can we talk about my love language in the form of little polkadots on every piece of fabric I own! I just love polkadots and I feel like they go with everything! That being said, Liana and James of Lamazi Fabrics have so many color ways of these beloved polkadots and there are infinite combos to mix and match together! Mind the Maker is such a nice quality of fabric as well. Let me get more in depth with this below!
I wanted to talk a little about why I chose this fabric for my project. I had heard the quality of Mind the Maker was very good, and I have never been disappointed when buying fabric from Liana and James. Not to mention, there are so many fabulous designs from their collection, what do I choose? The answer, just buy a bunch of them! HA! On a more serious note, when it came down to picking out my fabric for this project, I was drawn to the polka dots. Polka dots offer a feeling of simple sophistication and they really remind me of France, so how could i resist! However, there are so many colors, as I stated above, so I took a moment to think about what was in my wardrobe already and what I was planning to make. This allowed me to pick the color that would most likely blend and allow me to wear it with multiple tops and accessories. In my photo shoot, I decided to be a little bold and mix and match my colors, but the skirt has a nice mustard/copper polka dot, which I have a lot of in my wardrobe. If you go through this process of evaluating your wardrobe and assessing the best color combination, you can strategically pick prints and fabrics that will blend well. I am also a little more brave when it comes to mixing and matching prints, as I have discussed above, so I think a lovely gray/white or black/white horizontal stripe would be lovely on the top! I might try that soon and share it with you all! I hope you enjoy the blog below! Sewing with the fabric was very pleasant and I didn’t run into any problems! Next, I discuss my pattern choice for these lovely polka dots!
Pattern Choice:
For this project, I had so many ideas of what I wanted it to be, but finally settled on the Ready To Sew free Justine skirt pattern. This pattern is very simple and easy to work with. The only problem was that the pockets are patch pockets in the front. This is fine except my fabric was especially drapey and I knew they would just slouch. I didn’t really want that look for this skirt. I decided on inseam pockets and this worked out really well!
Inseam pocket tutorial: I google searched for an inseam pocket pattern piece so I wouldn’t have to draft one myself. I found a good one here and it worked perfectly! I printed the pocket piece out making sure I was printing the actual size from adobe acrobat reader.
I made sure I measured the square. I cut out 4 pocket pieces (2 sets of mirror images) just in the regular fabric. However, you could also use a lining fabric.
I attached my pockets the following way below, but there are several methods to do this:
First, I finished all of the seams around the pocket piece so I wouldn’t have to worry about that later.
I had also already finished the side seams of the skirt as directed in the pattern. Then, in order to make room for the top seam allowance for the waistband, I put the pocket in about 1 inch below the top. I lined it up with the side seams on the front and the back (4 total).
Then, I stitched the pockets on with a quarter inch seam allowance on all four side seams.
I then pressed the seam allowance and pocket away from the skirt and under-stitched the pockets!
I then placed the front and back side seams together with the pockets lining up. I stitched down the top of the skirt into the pocket a bit (about the width of the seam allowance). Then, I left my needle down and rotated the fabric to continue sewing around the pocket. I did this again at the bottom of the pocket and continued to stitch the seam allowance down the rest of the side seam of the skirt. Then I clipped into the seam allowance but not through the stitching above and below the pocket. Then I pressed the seams open below the pocket and pressed the pocket to the front.
From the right side of the fabric I then stitched or tacked down the pocket to the front by stitching next to the seam about 2-3 inches down.
Voila!! You have inserted inseam pockets and can proceed with the rest of the pattern!
Extra tips:
Another tip I have to share is in reference to gathering. I like to use yarn at times when I have to gather a large piece. You can simple use a wide zig zag stitch over a piece of yarn within the seam allowance and this will gather nicely. It’s not quite as nice as 2-3 rows of basting stitches but it does the job!
I also want to share how I drafted the interfacing. You are supposed to interface part of the button placket. Instead of measuring this piece out, I traced over the part of the pattern piece that would need interfacing (where the buttons go) and I created a pattern piece for it. This way its a lot less annoying and I can just cut around my pattern piece for the interfacing.
Notes about this fabric:
I normally make a 37 in this pattern, but I found that this fabric has a tiny bit of stretch (3% elastane and 97% viscose) and is noted to have a slight amount of give in the fabric description. This made the waist way too big. I made up the entire skirt and then discovered this. It is completely my fault because I missed/didn’t notice the fact that it had any stretch. In order to make it fit properly on my high waist, I decided to move the button way over to make it tight at the very top. Because my fabric has drape, it isn’t really changing the look of the skirt. However, I think it would be wise to take note of this for the future. If I had noticed that my fabric does indeed have a little stretch, then I would have interfaced the waistband. Next time I believe I will interface the waistband in this situation. This would prevent it from stretching too much. It is perfectly fine for the rest of the skirt to have stretch and does not affect the fit significantly!
Overall, I am so happy with my polkadot French inspired skirt! I think the fabric was such a pleasure to work with. Until we meet again! Au Revoir! I cannot wait to meet you all with my next make!
Victoria
