Cabro Creations ~ the blog: No pattern skater skirt

Today I thought I would share a simple sewing design instead of card making.

This can be made up in less than an hour !

The skirt needs no special equipment or pattern just a simple tape measure, a pen and a regular sewing machine ( or overlocker if you prefer)

Measure your waist and the length you want the skirt to be.

For the Skirt you can use Either stretch or woven fabric but the waistband will need to be a stretch fabric or ribbing.

First of all take your fabric and fold it into four, the shortest side will need to be just a little shorter than your desired length, The bigger the square the longer you can make the skirt ( although it can be shorter )

Measure your waist and divide that by 4, add 1" to allow ease of getting on and off ( more if you have larger hips.)

For this skirt I needed a waist of 28 - 30" so needed a measurement of 7 1/2" plus a little ease to get through. Take your tape measure and lay it across the corner that has the fold and place a mark where the tape is approx. the measurement you want it to be.

Take your tape measure and measure down to the mark you just made, for me this was 5"

Using this measurement hold your tape into the corner and make marks at regular intervals while turning the tape like the hands of a clock, be sure to have the end lined up with the corner each time

Take these marks and join them in an even curve as I have done here at the 5" mark

Measure your fabric to find the shortest side

Mine was 19 1/2" at the short side so I knew that I could not make the skirt longer than 14 1/2" ( the 19 1/2" less the 5" I had already marked off)

Take your tape measure to the top as before and mark from the corner at regular intervals at your desired length . As I said mine was at the 19" mark as I could not make it any longer but you may have a bigger piece of fabric.

Join the marks together as before to make a neat curve

double check you are at the corner with all the folds and no raw edge and then cut along the two curves

you should now have a large circle with a hole cut out of the middle, the hole should be your desired waist size plus however much you need to step in and out of it.

Mark the inner circle into quarters with pins.

The easiest way to do this is put one pin in and fold it in half, place another pin opposite the first pin

Fold in half the opposite way so the pins are 'kissing' and place another pin at each of the sides

Cut a rectangle of ribbing or stretch fabric twice the width you want the waistband to be and the length of your waist size less 20%. As I said before I wanted a waist of 28 - 30" so my rectangle was 24" I just estimated the width as it didn't need to be exact. I didn't add a seam allowance as I did mine on the overlocker but you may need to add a seam allowance on each edge

This is my rectangle laid out

With right sides together stitch along the short side using a stretch or zig zag stitch or overlocker

Fold the waistband in half lengthways , as you can see it is half the width when added to the skirt.

Mark the waistband into four and match up with the top of the skirt

Add more pins in between stretching the waistband to fit the skirt as you go. I add lots of pins inbetween as they do tend to drop out as you stretch it.

I find it easier to work from the inside when stitching around

Using a stretch stitch/zigzag or overlocker stitch the waistband to the skirt taking care to catch all three layers . Genty stretch the waistband as you go and line the edges up together ( beware of the skirt rolling underneath the needle as there is a lot of skirt so you will need to ease it away from the needle as you go)

Flip the waistband up and it is almost finished