Gathered Rectangle Skirt (Semi-Tutorial)

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I've got a super simple make for you this week - if you hadn't already guessed from the title of this post, it's a gathered rectangle skirt! This has got to be one of the easiest makes out there, and it's a great way to pimp up your wardrobe, particularly if you're a fiend for vintage style items like I am.

I had just over a metre of cotton poplin leftover from another project, and I'm all about using up my fabric stash these days, so it was time to put it to good use. I measured out roughly 3x my waist measurement (my favourite ratio for full but not-too-bulky gathers) by about 25" (24" length + 1" hem allowance). I didn't have the yardage to cut this out all in one piece, so I cut out 3 panels, a front and two back pieces, with the front piece being roughly equal in size to the two back pieces put together.

I then cut out a waistband measuring my waist + seam allowance long, by about 4" wide. And, of course, I also cut out some pockets, because no skirt is complete without pockets.

I added each pocket piece to their relevant side panel, then sewed up the side seam and around the pocket edges. I left the back seam for now, as this was where the zipper would go.

Then I put my sewing machine to the longest stitch length, and sewed two rows of gathering stitches along the top of the skirt, making sure to keep these stitches within the seam allowance (we don't want them to show on the finished skirt!). I always make sure to break off my gathering stitches about half way through, then carry on again following the same trajectory. This makes sure there are more threads to pull when it's time to gather, which makes it easier to control the volume, and less likely the thread will snap under the tension.

Once the gathering stitches were in, it was time to gather the skirt down to the same length as the waistband. Slow and steady wins the race with this one - you really don't want to risk breaking your gathering threads and having to start the process all over again. 

Once this is done, sew the gathered skirt piece to your waistband and press, being careful not to smush your gathers too much! Then fold over the seam allowance on the remaining long edge of your waistband and press. Most sewing patterns tend to tell you to fold your waistband in half before you start sewing, but I always find I get a more accurate result if I do this now, once both seam allowances have been accounted for (one sewn, one pressed).

So, once you've pressed your waistband seam allowance, press the waistband in half lengthwise, so that it is now pressed into what will be its final position.

Using this foldline as a guide showing the top of the skirt, it's now time to put in the zipper. I pretty much always use invisible zippers, but I know some people hate these, so I don't see why ordinary zippers wouldn't work just as well. Once that was done, I closed up the centre back seam and whipstitched the remainder of the waistband into place. And that was that.

I didn't think to take photos of this process at the time, so apologies if this semi-tutorial doesn't make much sense! All in all, this project only took me a couple of hours to make, which strikes me as the sewing equivalent of a bargain in terms of the sewing-hours to usability ratio. When so much of what I make tends to be bright and bold and not that compatible with very much, it's nice to have something pretty simple for a change, that should work well with quite a lot else in my wardrobe.