Burda Style 08-2012-111 and stash control

Thank you for the very kind comments about my daughter's formal dress. We are very proud of her, and making the dress was a very fulfilling project.

 We are back to normal sewing now, and the school leaver has a job - the same job she has had for the last few years,just more of it! Naturally, the wardrobe of a school uniform wearing girl is not adequate for the average office worker.

  

 Here is her new skirt, a pencil skirt from Burda 08-2012-111, which was the most recent iteration of a pencil skirt with waist darts (rather than panels). I used to think there was a pencil skirt in every issue, but clearly I am wrong.

This particular skirt was a little odd in shape IMO, having strangely puffy hips in proportion to the knee clenching taper, but fortunately, this was easy to adjust to a less exaggerated angle at the side seams, and here it looks like your average skirt, after work, next to a gosling.

 

The skirt is lined (cotton batiste), has a back kick pleat and there is really nothing else to say about it.

 You may recognize this embroidered cotton/linen fabric, which I used for my younger daughter's dress just recently. I bought the fabric specifically for "a dress" but 3m was way too much for the pattern we ended up choosing and this is not a colour nor print I would wear myself. Most of my burdensome fabric stash is actually remnants, which always seem too small for any pattern that takes my fancy, so this time I was determined that the remnants would stay out of the stash. Unfortunately, the pencil skirt did not use it all up! I was left with a few odd pieces, which just would not creep under my "I could use this" fabric detection meter and make it into the bin.

  

 Here is the scrappy apron that solved my problem. No pattern needed, I draped it on my dress form which is why it is rather oversized on my daughter. The top is pieced and darted, with a machine embroidery stitch over the seam to break up the big blank black patch, and the pleated pocket, waist tie and neck band are cotton canvas remnants - machine embroidery stitch used here too to make them look like sections of the same garment.

There is none of the black fabric left, but the 0.25m oddly shaped scrap of canvas is still lurking about......