Genre Mash-Up: Steampunk Sailor Mars - Pt 5

As mentioned in Part 3, the finished skirt was a little limp and lifeless... and anime skirts are almost always full bodied and full of movement. This skirt requires a petticoat.

After looking at many petticoat tutorials, I became frustrated with the amount of math required.... I hate math! So, I decided to wing it. Again.

I measured the total length of the finished red pleated skirt. I cut a piece of lining that is the same length. I used the full width of the material, and will gather the waist and finish with a drawstring. This will allow me to adjust the waist to fit whatever corset I might be wearing with it. I stitched up one side and hemmed the skirt, so what I am left with is a hemmed tube.

I cut two pieces the full width, and half as long. (My lining is about 30" long, so this layer is about 15" long). I stitched the sides of these two pieces together so I have a tube that is now half as long and twice as wide as the lining. Hem this also, because it is much easier to hem before all the tulle is added. Next, I cut a piece of tulle that is the same size as this layer. This, I stitched flat to the top edge. Because this will be gathered, I didn't bother gathering the tulle before sewing it to this layer.

Next, cut strips of tulle. I cut them to 12", the full width of the material. I now have a nice stack of 12" x max width of tulle. I took each piece to the sewing machine, and with my longest stitch available, ran a straight stitch up the centre of all the pieces. So, if you look at the strip, there is a long stitch line the entire length of it, dividing my 12" strip into two 6" sections.

Once all the pieces of tulle have their line down the middle, I pulled one of the threads to gather the pieces. I now have a pile of slightly gathered tulle strips.

Laying my lining flat, I pinned the gathered pieces of tulle along their stitch line. The plan is to have the edge of the tulle hanging over the edge of the lining by about 1-2". This will hide the lining and allow for the ruffled edges of tulle to stick out slightly from under the skirt.

I repeat for the shorter layer. Once the gathered pieces of tulle are pinned securely to the lining pieces, I stitched them down over the long gathered stitch I had earlier. This will leave you with a ruffle sticking out up and down. Fold down the top half so it hangs down over the edge of the lining with it's bottom ruffle, and there you go! Two layers of gathered tulle, and you only had to do it all once! I hate working with tulle, and this just saved me the trouble of having to go through the gathering and stitching once! Yay!

Once all the tulle is stitched to the lining pieces, it is time to put it all together. I ran another long stitch along the top of the short piece, where the single layer of tulle is, and pulled the thread to gather, like I did will all that tulle. Once I had it gathered to fit around the inner lining, I stitched it in place. Once the waist band is pulled tight, the layers of gathered lining and tulle puff out nicely!

This is what it looked like putting all the layers together! Quite the mess!

It gives the overskirts the much needed volume! It was a huge relief, because with the convention only two sleep away, I was starting to enter panic mode!

Much better with added volume!