Another Burda Skirt

This is another version of the skirt I made a few months ago. The pattern is Burda World of Fashion 08/06 Number 103.
The fabric is a remnant that came from Trendy Fabrics some time ago, and formed part of a prize won for sewing contest. I think its alpaca, silk and wool. The dark lines are actually a very dark navy rather than black, with green and chestnut colours in the mix also. The fabric goes fabulously well with the very dark navy boiled wool I got last month, which is going to become a jacket. I've included a close up of the tweed, though its a bit bleached out by the flash. Its quite a light weight fabric and a bit loose woven so it stretched a bit when sewn. Made worse by all the inset pieces being on the bias.

I must apologise for the quality of the photos. It was raining when I took the shots and the rain must have got on the lense. It was also very cold and I couldn't bear to be out there too long posing for shots, lest I freeze to death. None of the shots of the back of the skirt came out so I've included a rather poor hanger shot so you can see the fullness.

I put an invisible zipper in the back seam rather than in the side seam, and constructed it a different way from that suggested by Burda. Having made the front unit, I made up the back pieces, including the inset section at the hip. Then tacked the front and back together at the side seams and fitted it, before sewing it permanently. I'd added a quarter inch to the side seams when I cut it out as well as a quarter inch to one side of each side back panel as I didn't want the skirt too tight. In the end I had to take the back seams in at the waist to form a little dart on either side, plus taking a dart in the upper section of the side seams, tapering to nothing, in each case, before the high hip. This fit it to the waist but left plenty of ease across the hips.

I've also added an inch and a half to the length of the skirt because I wanted something a little longer to wear with boots. The pattern had a one and a half inch hem included, and I've only taken a scant hem, so I've lengthened it quite a bit.

The lining was cut from the front pattern piece, plus the side inset piece. At least, the second version was. The first version I cut without the side inset and the lining would only have fit a very small child. I also cut the lining slightly larger than the skirt and gathered it to fit at the waist so the lining wasn't too tight across the hips. I used a cheap poly satin that I'd got from Abhakhan fabrics some time ago. It has a huge pattern of clouds and wiggly lines in burgundy, grey and cream on a brown background.