On my sewing table

Thanks to Creativebug.com, a huge source of creative inspiration to me, I have made myself busy sewing clothes. Back when I was a teenager I did some trousers and tunics and so, but for many years I never even thought of making my own clothes. I didn't think I could make them look professional enough to actually wear them in the end. 

But a couple of months ago I discovered Cal Patch's class Pattern drafting on Creative bug and I was hooked. Since then I have sewn t-shirts, leggings and soon skirts. This is on my sewing table right now and I will finish it this weekend, only the hem is left.

It is made of a dark blue fabric with an orange stripe in it. It is a really short mini-skirt. The pattern is from Jenny Hellström's book Sy! Urban Collection. It is a great book for beginners as well as more experienced seamstresses, I think. All pattern are rated based on its difficulty. This skirt is called Mary skirt and is actually a 5 out of 5 on the difficulty scale. But the instructions are easy to follow and I'm pleased with the result.  What is left to find out is whether or not I'm actually going to wear it. Mini skirts are not my everyday choice... One project is never enough though. In parallell I'm working on another skirt. It is a bigger project since it is completely handsewn. It is a technique developed by Nathalie Chanin and she demonstrates it in a class over at Creativebug - where else?

The skirt is made of four panels, like this one. It consists of two fabrics on top of each other. On the top layer a pattern is created and then the two layers are stiched together by tracing the pattern. Then you cut out holes in the top layer to reveal the bottom fabric. 

In the picture above you can see both the front and back of the panel. The knots are on the back side. In many of the designs that Alabama Chanin sell they put the knots on the front as a design element.

The pattern to this skirt is from one of the books that Natalie Chanin has written called Alabama Stich Book. It is great!

The book comes with a stencil of the pattern that I used in my skirt. I made a large stencil from the small one in the book, by tracing it to a big sheet of sturdy felt.

  

With this big stencil I transfered the pattern by applying black fabric paint with a sponge onto the top fabric. 

This project is a bit time consuming. Both making the stencil, transfering the pattern to the fabric and then all the handsewing takes time. But I think the result so far is promising. Hope the skirt fits in the end!