If there is a quintessential example of my approach to patchwork--heavier fabrics, relatively structured--it would probably be the long A-line skirt I made last summer.
I decided I would put aside my propensity for structured patchwork and try a more "normal" approach of sewing strips of squares and gathering them into tiers for a skirt.
It worked out nicely.
Not, of course, without annoyances, most of which were from trying to make sure the same print didn't end up too close to itself from one row to the next. I had to make adjustments a few times, which required picking out the stitching and overlocking, but, by the time I got to the point where I knew I could make that mistake and stopped overlocking until I had compared the sewn strip to the one it would be attaching to, I had stopped making that mistake.
That isn't saying some of the prints didn't end up close to themselves, but the way they are doesn't annoy me as much.
We won't talk about the side seams, though.
I knew that was a risk, and I was fine with it--the only reason this has side seams, and not just full-circumference strips gathered to each other, was so I could add those pockets...which I second-guessed myself on and they ended up a little low, but it's fine. Lesson learned: the top of the pocket opening goes above the second tier seam, not at it.
The blue small floral and butterfly print was one of the last chosen, after I had been happily die cutting everything else as much as possible, then realized that approach wasn't leaving enough fabric to make waistband.
I feel like it deviates most from the overall feeling of the rest of the prints, but it still works.
I did and (do still) have enough of the paisley--seen below in the photo showing how the hem looks--that I could easily have done the waistband with that, but...didn't wanna.
There are several fabrics in this skirt that I had been saving for just the right project, but the weight or prints weren't quite suitable for doll clothes, so they had been in the small yardage drawer for years--gazed upon fondly, but always passed by. There were, I realized, absolutely no reasons not to use them all up in this, so I did. The paisley is something I've also been holding onto for a just right project, but I couldn't convince myself to use it all in this.
I serged all the seams inside, as well as the very top and bottom edges, just to keep them from shedding too many threads while I worked on everything else. (Hello, plain off white pocket poly cotton pocket bag.)
I hand rolled the hem as I stitched it, using the serging width as a folding guide.
I had a lot of doubts going into this. I die cut as many pieces as I could stand--ended up being about 300, to be made into two skirts...well...it had started as one skirt, but I got about 120 pieces in and realized that the core print I was coordinating things around would actually work better if I pursued a different colorway, so I split things up went for two different aesthetics. This skirt is the second set of prints.
The doubts started after I played around with row layouts, to use the 149 of each set of pieces I'd die cut. I figured arrangements for possible skirts five rows long, six rows long, and seven rows long. I then had to rearrange things to put an even number of pieces in each tier, so I could split them into front and back to give the side seams for the pockets. I wanted this skirt longer, so seven rows, and that ended up with 12 squares all around the top tier, or a maximum of 48" width (it turned out to be closer to 45" once sewn, because I made slightly deeper seam allowances.) I was doubting that 48" would be far enough above my waist measurement to make a nice gather (this was, as Jillian Ventners says, the body image/brain raccoons being dishonest and misleading.)
I also had doubts about the very slight amount of gathering that would be needed between tiers. I generally set the ruffler for a lot more gathering. A lot more. This felt...so insignificant as to be nonexistent. I was limited by the amount of squares I had cut, so I couldn't set the ruffler as I liked and just go.
But! It still flares and swirls nicely, so maybe I've learned that the gathering doesn't have to be quite so much to still be effective, especially over so many tiers.
I actually put a lot of the less desirable and more askew cuts in the back, but I think the overall mix distracts from that.
The doubts gave me a lot of hesitations while making this, but, now that it's done, I think I probably won't feel the same way when I make the skirt from the other set of fabrics I cut, since I now know the things I worried about ended up not being issues at all.
Even though I do have shirts to coordinate with this (including a sweater I thrifted over the summer, not that there will be any temperatures anytime soon to allow for that), I think I may make use this as an excuse some quick knit shirts from some of the larger pieces of the fabric scraps I'd used for the sleep shirts. I also know it's good to balance the involved projects with the fast projects, even though I...generally don't do that... Still! Onward to more relatively neutral shirts, and then more chaotic patchwork!
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