I’ve been feeling the scuba trend for quite a few seasons now, and recently got my hands on some blush pink wetsuit/ne0prene fabric and knew it would make a great skirt. I experimented with this process and made the template from scratch, so it needed a bit of tweaking here and there, but I found neoprene to be a really simple fabric to work with, particularly given you don’t need to sew any hems, and it was stretchy enough to not have to put in a zip, yay!
Wearing: Gap Tee, DIY Skirt, Zara Heels, Dylan Kain Bag
You need:
- at least 2 metres ( 2.5 yards) of scuba/neoprene fabric around 0.5cm thick (1/4 of an inch)
- craft paper
- a pencil
- super sharp scissors
- pins
- a sewing machine
- matching needle and thread
How to:
1. Draw and up and then cut out this pattern onto craft paper. Note the pattern isn’t to scale as it will end up being bigger than A4.Just sketch it onto paper and make sure the dimensions are the same. You may also want to modify it slightly for length by adding a few cm/inches to the wider part of the template at the bottom.
2. Work out how many pattern pieces you need. They are 10cm (4 inches) wide at the top (the part that goes around your waist) so what you need to do is work out how many panels you need to go around your waist. Remember you will lose some room when you sew the seams so if need be cut an extra one. I cut 8 but ended up only needing 7 when I sewed it all together. Cut your chosen number of rectables out of neoprene bigger than the template.
3. Stack them together and pin the template on top.
4. Cut them out around the template.
5. Make sure to match the template carefully!
6. Placing the wrong side together, pin two pieces of neoprene together.
7. Pin the rest to the edges all the way around.
8. Sew all the edges together making sure to reinforce the beginning and end stitches.
9. Sew the final panels together, you won’t need a zip because you should be able to get it over your head due to the stretch in the fabric. At this point you will want to check where it sits on your and perhaps add or remove panels, I ended up removing a panel and sewing the last seam together because I wanted it to sit high on my waist.
Voila.
Btw, have to say I’m loving my new bag from Dylan Kain, a super cool brand created by my sister’s friends who live between Melbourne and New York. I have my eye on this backpack too, although, having two black leather backpacks would probably be a bit over the top (or would it…?).
Photography by Sarah Deutrom
