circle skirt variations tutorials – pixie skirt and more!
November 14, 2009 by Lex
Filed under 3 Pin (Moderate) Tutorials, Clothing, Sewing, Tutorials + How Tos, WhatTheCraft.com Tutorials
If you don’t know how to make a circle skirt yet, check out the Circle Skirt tutorial first, because all of these skirts build on the basic premise of a circle skirt.
dress by SmarmyClothes.com
Difficulty:
Variation 1 – double full circle skirt
Instead of cutting 1 donut with a center cirumference of 36″ (the number we used in our examples), cut 2 donuts with a center circumference that is half your desired waistband measurement. In this example, each hole should measure 18″. The desired length (16″ from our example) should stay the same.
Cut the donuts open (red line).
Variation 1
Lay the donuts Right Sides Together, with the cuts lined up. Sew the donuts together as indicated by the purple dotted line. You will wind up with a very full and flouncy circle skirt.
Variation 1
Variation 2 – handkerchief hem or pixie skirt
Cut the center “waist” hole out of your fabric, but leave the edges square. Now you have a classic hanky hem skirt!
This is a good one if you’re in a hurry, because it’s one less step.
You can cut several of these squares out and layer them around the hem for a different look. Try cutting the a top layer out of a sheer fabric and layer it over something opaque!
Variation 2
Variation 3 – double full pixie skirt
This is a combination of variations 1 and 2, and it might be my favorite circle skirt variation. (The photo at the beginning of this post has two double full pixie skirts layered over one another.)
Cut two squares, each having a circumference half of what you want the total to be. Cut them open, sew them together, and you’ve got a very swishy pixie skirt.
Variation 3
Variation 4 – asymmetrical layered circle skirt
Instead of centering the “waist” hole, cut it off-center. You could do 1 layer like this, and it looks especially nice if you make the back much longer than the front. It has a cool cascading effect. Or you can do 2 or more wonky donuts and layer them over one another.
Variation 4
Jen on Tue, 31st Aug 2010 7:30 am
Thanks so much for the tutorials! Do you know how to do a 3/4 circle skirt?
Lex on Sun, 12th Sep 2010 8:28 pm
Here’s a tutorial for 1/2 and 3/4 circle skirts: http://katiekadiddlehopper.blogspot.com/2010/08/circle-skirt-tutorial-part-2-12-and-34.html
Rainbow_Blues on Wed, 22nd Sep 2010 6:25 pm
For the first one, where you say “Cut the donuts open and sew them together”, how do you sew them together, so where do you sew?
Rainbow Blues
xx
Lex on Thu, 23rd Sep 2010 8:30 pm
Silly me, I made the cut lines white so they don’t show up very well… They’re at the bottom center of each donut, if you look closely, though.
As usual, my attempts at explaining this in words is not working, so I’ve uploaded an additional diagram that should help.
Thanks for the question!
Gina on Tue, 15th Mar 2011 5:57 pm
I love all your tutorials!! I have so much inspiration now, I’ve seen every single one of them =)
I just keep coming back to circle skirts because they’re so simple!
Where you did the double full circle skirt; it is possible to do it 3 or 4 or even looooooooads of times if you wanted. I made some skirts like that with this as inspiration =P
Lex on Wed, 16th Mar 2011 5:49 pm
Thanks, Gina!
I made a skirt once that was the equivalent of a quadruple circle skirt… it really is an awesome effect!
camelia on Thu, 1st Sep 2011 6:07 pm
Hehe I love you for this <3
Anna on Wed, 14th Dec 2011 7:05 am
Very interesting take on the circle skirts. So basically, two circle skirts that are aligned, but not so aligned, right? Thanks for the idea.
Lex on Thu, 22nd Dec 2011 4:08 pm
Exactly! You’re welcome!