metallic silk damask skirt

With less than 24 hours remaining until Tim and Kelly’s engagement party, I suddenly realised I really wanted to wear my new skirt. Only problem was, the new skirt was at that moment a flat, albeit lovely, piece of fabric with as yet unrealised dreams and mere aspirations to being a skirt. A potential skirt!

The fabric is really beautiful… Cassie and I had seen it in Fabulous Fabrics and mutually admired it… then she secretly took it up to the counter and bought a length of it for me for Christmas. Aah, my daughter is the most thoughtful sneaky fabric buyer, ever! I couldn’t have chosen better myself It’s a metallic silk damask; in the loveliest sunset-over-the-ocean shades of coral pink, gold, metallic gold, navy blue and charcoal, and I absolutely love the slight wonkiness of the stripes! although it did make stripe matching a tiny bit of a challenge. I managed it, but!

I used an old favourite Vogue 8363, modified quite a lot as usual This is a hall-of-fame pattern for me, despite the fact that I’m pretty sure I’ve ever made anything faithfully to the pattern, ever! but I’m totally ok with that. It’s got great bones and that’s enough.

My nearly-always modification is to cut one of the fronts of the pocketed view on the fold, and the back piece with an added seam allowance to the centre back so as to incorporate a zip, and insert the waistband so as to have corresponding closure at the centre back. Also, the shape is ever so slightly pegged, which I did not want for this skirt; so I cut the side seams to be straight below the hips.

Some other mods; well, I point them all out in my video below, but it is a non-speaking video, pretty boring maybe, sorry, because I’m just so awful at speaking, every time I started I’m immediately tongue tied… so I just didn’t. Maybe I’ll get better at this and next time actually speak. However, for those who like The Deets, they are, in the order shown:

I wanted for the skirt front to be unimpeded by the visual distraction of a dart, but at least one dart and/or pleat is actually necessary in this design for a good fit and so you can shove your hands down deep into those pockets without distorting the shape of the skirt… I moved the dart right over to adjacent to the pocket opening. Actually, I fiddled with darts and pleats SO MANY times over, this final arrangement was probably attempt number six, at least, but fortunately I am satisfied with this arrangement, at last! Pleats looked absolutely dreadful… “boinging” out over my tummy in a most unflattering way, but the single discreetly placed dart looks nice. It gives a nice flat front to the skirt, visually almost dart-less, while allowing the room for your hands when shoved in the pockets. Oh, please notice the perfect print placement on the pockets, as well as all the other seams too.
I kept the double darts on the skirt backs, and put my deep forest green invisible zip in the centre back opening. The skirt closes at the waistband with a bar hook and eye.
I added a navy blue polyacetate lining, cut using another old favourite Vogue 1247, and folding the darts in pleats rather than sewing them down. Zip and lining were both from my stash. I attached the lining to the zip tape by hand, and staystitched and cut the lining in a square “box” at the lower end… I’ve written before how I’ve found this has practically eliminated the lining ripping at the lower edge of the zip, something that used to happen a lot with my skirts until I figured out why.
The silk damask frays with all the speed of a raging bushfire, so first thing after cutting I hastily finished all the raw cut edges on my overlocker, using navy blue overlocking thread. I didn’t have enough of the silk to cut the pockets in one piece and still have the print matching at the waist, where the print shows in the pocket opening, so I pieced the pockets to have a self-fabric facing, and the rest is in the lining fabric.

Oh, the party? did I hear you ask? thank you for asking! Yes, so Tim and Kelly are engaged and we hosted a party for them last night. I cannot take any credit for a great evening though, since it turns out that Kelly is a Party Organiser Extraordinaire, and we had the most beautifully styled and decorated party I think this house has ever seen! and Kelly made the most spectacular cake imaginable. And look at this!

This has 150 balloons in it…! and is the brainchild of Kelly, and the combined handiwork of Kelly, Cassie, their friend Georgia and myself. We had great fun, and I feel so lucky that I’m the one who gets to enjoy it in my house!!

I’ve shared the below picture on instagram back in February, but have just realised I haven’t put it here yet, this was The Moment! it’s been such an exciting time for our family and we are sooooo thrilled for our darling Tim to have such a lovely lady as Kelly in his life. No doubt I will be sharing lots of wedding attire spam both here as well as on IG pretty soon…. fair warning!

I was pretty confident I’d have time to get a nice picture of my new skirt, and whole outfit at the party last night … BWAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA! oh dear, *wipes tears of mirth from eyes* obviously when one is hosting a party you’re flat chat … we took precisely zero photos during the party! Kelly has already contacted me, asking if I took any, so we’re planning a little post-photoshoot of the two of them with the still beautiful balloon arch. But I’m totally happy, still on a successful party high; we had an absolutely fantastic time, and I’ve spent most of today cleaning the house and it is delightfully spick and span again. SO I’m even more happy! Craig wore this shirt, Cassie wore this dress. And this is what I wore!