A-Line Skirt tutorial

Today’s project is a basic A-Line skirt. It’s fitted at the waist through the hip but roomy in the thigh. This is important because we’re making it in a knit, and knits can cling. Eep!

I picked french terry because it is a robust knit and very easy to sew. It is thick, non-clingy, doesn’t need interfacing and has a nice weight for a skirt. It also has a nice stretch but behaves much like a woven when under the presser foot. This means it can take top-stitching! I used a universal needle (after trying out a ballpoint needle with surprisingly unpleasant results)!

I started out with a basic skirt pattern. This is my fitted A-Line skirt pattern that I’ve used for all my (woven) skirts. It has darts only in the back. Two important changes were made ​​upfront to convert this to a knit pattern:

1. There is now no zipper. Therefore the back piece will be cut as a complete piece on the fold.
2. There are now no darts. Therefore we will tape shut the darts. 

Common sense will then tell us that, sans zipper, we will need to make the waist circumference big enough to fit over the hips. Let’s go ahead and cut that out then.(Note: My patterns never have in-built seam or hem allowances, so you’ll see a narrow border of fabric around the edge of the paper pattern – that’s the seam allowance I added to the fabric when I cut it out.) Notice , however, an extra-wide allowance near the top of the pattern where extra ease was included to the waist so it might fit over the hips. How clever we are! (Or are we? We will come back to this later.)

Now, beyond this experiment, I am actually going to wear this skirt, so I added functional pockets.

This being a printed knit, I didn’t want to mess up the print by slapping on a patch pocket. SO I made ​​unfaced inset Pocket and matched the Print of the Pocket lining to the skirt. The pocket lining was simply top-stitched to the wrong side of the skirt.

Here’s the construction sequence:

Slash away the edge of the pockets on the front of the skirt. The piece of fabric is still folded, to indicate symmetry.

Face them with a strip of fabric, right sides together (the fabric is still folded to show just the one side). Sew to attach, flip the facing over to the wrong side of the skirt, and top-stitch it down.

Position the lining behind the pocket opening, pin in place (if you’re using crazy-print knit like I am, you might want to line up the print), and sew around the side and bottom edges of the pocket pouch to secure the lining.

This is the back.

Here is the front of the skirt with both pockets sewn in.

That small embellishment completed, The side seams were sewn up and it was time for the first fitting.

Surprise-it was far too loose! This is a knit, so the fabric itself stretched to accommodate the hips. We didn’t need all that extra waist-ease after all!

So lay the paper pattern back onto the skirt,

redraw the original side seam

on both sides

and sew the new (er.. I mean, old / original) side seams. Trim away the excess seam allowance.

Make the waistband -

it’s almost the same width as the waist of the skirt

so that it can be attached with minimal gathers

for a streamlined finish.

Top-stitch on the skirt just below the waistband to secure the seam allowance so it lies flat down.

Fold and hem the bottom of the skirt, and it’s done!

No zippers, no darts, no excess ease, no gathers.

Ignore the sag lines in the pockets – I’d just removed my hands and forgotten to smooth them down.

Here’s the back – zipperless and dartless:

It’s fitted, but stretchy!

I hope these two projects have given you some courage to dabble in knits. Many, many patterns originally meant for wovens can be adapted just a little to work for knits. Don’t be afraid to experiment!

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source: teigland.smugmug.com