2/19/12: Vogue Dress Turned Skirt -- My Audrey Hepburn Skirt

I finished my Audrey Hepburn skirt late last month for my sister Bernadette, which really was a great feat for me as it was untouched since spring. And now I bring you some much awaited pics of the final piece:

{ the front }

{ the back }

{ the kick pleat in use }

{ the kick pleat without movement }

Isn't our new kitten so cute? ;)


Let me clear a few things up about this skirt. First, this skirt was actually based off of Vogue 9668, a dress pattern that has a wide midriff piece and a tapered pencil skirt.

I simply removed the bodice portion of the dress and eliminated the unique, pointed style line that was part of the midriff. I also changed the slit in the skirt's BACK to a kick pleat by using McCall 7332 (which came from my mother's stash), as inspiration:

{ photo source: Vicki Vintage Patterns on Etsy }

Yeah, a maternity pattern. Never thought I would use it!

So right around now you're asking, "So what's up with the white fabric? Where's the pink floral twill that was planned?"

At the beginning the twill was absolutely on board this venture, but before I cut into it I wanted to test drive my drastically altered sewing pattern by using some leftover stretch gabardine I had on hand. Turns out that Bernadette wanted to keep the muslin! Soft gabardine would do that to anyone. . .

I am really, really happy on how this turned out! The twill fabric may never be used with this design--she's happy with the gabardine--however, McCall 5591 and the twill fabric are still high contenders for the making of the Judy Holliday skirt.

 We just have to wait and see what Bernadette decides.

Now let's see more about the construction of this skirt.

{ skirt back midriff, or as I was calling it when sewing, yoke. It has two darts on either side of center. }

{ skirt front yoke }

{ skirt's back kick pleat closed }

{ kick pleat open }

 And this is how the kick pleat went together, for those who are interested:

The pleat extension goes up the entire skirt length and reaches the waist seam. Other kick pleats have the extension stop just above the pleat, which leads to the necessity to topstitch the pleat in place. I like the type of pleat I chose and I wanted to thank Jan from the JanMade blog in helping me decide! We talked about this over email.

{ invisible zipper closure. Inserted without an invisible zipper foot. See how to do that by following my how-to }

{ hook and eye }

{ the interior. I fully lined this skirt mainly because the gabardine was slightly translucent. I bought the lining from Denver Fabrics a couple years ago. I believe its a rayon/polyester blend. The yoke facing is lightweight batiste cotton. I chose this fabric to reduce bulk in the waist area }

{ lining slit }

{ lining hem. I used a 1/2" narrow hem }

{ skirt hem. I folded up the wide hem and sewed stretch lace to the edge. I thought this would be a good choice because the fabric is stretchy. I also edgestitched along the fold }

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Did you notice the white bolero Bernadette is wearing with the skirt? Matches doesn't it? That's because it is made with the exact same material. I made it in December of 2010, as a Christmas gift Catherine and I gave to Bernadette, and it appears to me that I haven't blogged about it. How did that happen? I did make a slight mention of it in my 2010 review of projects, but that's about it. The pattern I used to make the bolero was McCall 5006.

I bought it as an ePattern from sewingpatterns.com because I needed to make it fast and couldn't wait on shipping. The pattern has lots of options, as you can see from the photo. I chose to do the pink one without the applique. What I really like about the pattern so much was the fact that all the pieces--even the sleeves--were underlined. Makes for easy-peasy finishing.