Skirt Development

When I made up the toile for the second skirt design, I really liked how the style lines and silhouette worked together and so I decided to develop the idea further.

I first added pleats along the yolk as I felt this would draw in the waist more and accentuate the silhouette.

I then created two box shapes out of separate pieces of fabric and placed them around different areas of the skirt, experimenting with alternative shapes and silhouettes. I found that adding the extra fabric could create a more structured silhouette (left), and could also add extra volume and shape to specific areas such as the hips (right).

These experimentations helped me to create a lot of design developments. I feel I'm really getting into the idea of experimenting on the stand. It's very useful to see an idea in 3-D form directly in front of you so you can see what elements stand out as possible further developments.

Skirt Construction On The Stand

Fitted Pencil Skirt

Today we constructed both a fitted pencil skirt and a traditional, more voluminous skirt. It was interesting to learn that both of these skirts, despite their differences, are made from the same block. 

The block for a skirt comes in two pieces, when creating a pencil skirt the pieces must be joined at the bottom to create minimal excess fabric. A small gap at the top will be formed, but this can be nipped in at the waist when on the stand.

As can be seen when placed on the stand, the skirt would be fitted from waist to hem.

Traditional, Voluminous Skirt

When constructing the traditional skirt the blocks are placed so they meet at the top and form a wide gap down the centre.

This gap, when transferred onto the stand, then creates a much more voluminous skirt silhouette.

I really enjoyed today's exercise and feel I gained a lot of knowledge on how we can manipulate pattern blocks to create different silhouettes and add volume.