Self drafted A line skirt with pockets

At the end of my spiral into so many toiles that I nearly lost the will to sew, I started drafting an A line skirt.  Following my Belcarras reset (here and here) I thankfully had the confidence and motivation again to continue with the skirt.

Needlecord A line skirt

I started drafting this skirt from a basic pencil skirt, rotating the waist darts to create the A line shape (I calculated it so that I could remove the front darts entirely) then added in hip slant pockets using the same pocket shape as my Ginger skirt.

A line skirt hip pockets

There were a number of new to me techniques with this make, but I was able to take my time and enjoy the learning process.  The fabric is a lovely soft needlecord from Goldhawk Road and I had a go at flat felled seams as I felt they would work well with this fabric.  I did take a photo to show these seams off as I’m very happy with them, but the fabric doesn’t do detailed shots well, so you might have to trust me that there are two seams here (achieved a nice neat finish at least!):

flat felled seams

The bit that probably took the longest (but also what I’m most pleased with) was the zip.  I thought a lapped zip would work best with the fabric and wanted to try it out.  It is easy to find plenty of tutorials on how to sew a lapped zip, but I struggled to find one that explained how to get the neat finish with a facing that you see on ready to wear lapped zips.  I’d been going through a process of trying to reverse engineer this, when I happened upon this tutorial which got me on the right path much quicker.  Again, the fabric doesn’t work too well for detail shots, but hopefully you can just about make out the neat finish at the top of the zip:

Lapped zip detail

As I think this is likely to be more of a cooler weather skirt, I lined it with a pink/green acetate also from Goldhawk Road (I drafted the lining to be a little bit wider than the skirt around the hips to be on the safe side since the needlecord should have more give than the acetate).  For the facing and pocket linings I used some cotton from a decent stash of fabric that my grandma kindly gave me.

Needlecord skirt

Overall I am very pleased with this skirt – I enjoyed taking my time over the new techniques and getting a neat finish. Plus, the fabric is lovely and soft to touch, it has pockets and I think that the shape of this would lend itself well to a few more skirts in different fabrics/colours that could become easy work staples.

2 thoughts on “Self drafted A line skirt with pockets

  1. Wow the finish is beautiful Alex. I recognise that needlecord when you it on Goldhawk Road!
    As for not getting much wear out of it until ‘cooler weather’ it was hailing with thunderstorms today, so I bet you will be wearing this little cutie over summer more regularly than you think x
    The skirt is very flattering and I love the two-tone lining which picks up on the colours in the cord so well.
    You should feel very pleased with yourself!

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