Month of the pencil skirt: (Part 3 of 3). The Charlotte Skirt in silk/wool tweed.

Okay, there are three posts associated with this lovely tweed skirt, but after that, I promise: no more skirts!  I’m sick of looking at my bottom half, and I’m sure you feel the same!  Don’t I look grumpy about it?

This final pencil skirt is a project for Britex.  The fabric is a truly incredible silk/wool blend in a very subtle tweed pattern.  The weight and hand are glorious–perfect for a pencil skirt.  The pattern is the Charlotte from By Hand London.  I love the version with the ruffly peplum, but that just isn’t going to fit comfortably into my wardrobe at this time, so I went with the basic slim fitted version.

In addition to some dart reductions at the waist, I added a kick pleat at the back.  (A tutorial for this simple addition will be posted shortly).  Maybe my stride is too long or something, but I’m not sure how a person could walk in this skirt without a back vent or kick pleat, so it was a necessity for me. And even with a kick pleat, I still can’t impress the crowds with moves like this (scroll down a bit to see Shelley in action).   Alas.  Anyhoo, here’s the kick pleat from the inside:

Maybe for Halloween I’ll be “inside out clothing girl” just so I can show it off.

For the hem, I took a page from Laura Mae at Lilacs and Lace and used rayon seam binding, with a hand-sewn blind finish.  (The best part of the underlining, by the by, is that you sew a blind hem to the underlining, not the wool, so it is truly blind!)

The skirt is VERY high waisted, with a wide waistband.  It hurts me to show this picture, but here’s what it looks like:

The upper edge sticks away from my body a bit, so down the road, I may reduce the width of the waistband a bit.   But hidden under clothing, it doesn’t look too bad!