I picked out three yards of this yummy banana interlock knit. It is 60″ wide so it’s a great size to use for things that need a larger piece of fabric like a maxi dress or skirt. I whipped up this wrap around skirt in no time. It’s easy to put together and since it’s a knit fabric you won’t need to worry about raw edges. Here is what I did to create this look along with some things I learned along the way. As much as I love sharing final products, I also love sharing where I messed up to help others from having to go through the same mistakes.
Materials:
-Knit Fabric of choice
-Measuring Tape
-Scissors
-Pins
-Calculator
This skirt is three main pieces: The waistband, the top skirt (which is a circle skirt), and the bottom skirt(which is just a rectangular piece of fabric). Let’s go over how to do measurements for these pieces first. Please note, I ere on the side of “larger” so things can be cut back if necessary. It’s always better to have it a little too big and make a quick cut than to make something too small.
PLEASE NOTE: You are just plugging in 3 measurements you take (your waist, the length you want the top of the skirt, and the length you want the bottom of the skirt) into the following equations. Write them down and then use your calculator to get the final measurements. It might help to copy and paste this part and separate it into the three sections to focus better on each one.
–The waistband piece is going to be 7″ wide and the length should be your waist measurement x 3. I had to sew a few pieces together to get this length.
–The top half of the skirt needs to be figured out with a little bit of math because you need a circle. Here goes….
First you need a circumference which will be:
Then you plug the circumference into this equation to get the Radius.
Now, we know the Circumference already and we know that pi is approximately 3.14. So we plug those in to get the following:
Radius = 48″/6.28
Now that is needed for cutting the circle out. To get how big a piece of fabric you need to cut out this circle, you need to do a little more math.
You now need to determine Radius + Length (Length = how long you want it to go; I measured from my waist to my knees)
7.6″ + 15″ = 22.6″, which I round up to 23″.
–The bottom skirt piece is a rectangular piece. To determine this measurement you need the circumference of the bottom of the circle skirt. The best way to determine this is using the following equation:
So the piece of fabric needed to be cut is 144.5″ by the length I needed to make it go to my ankles, which was 21″. I actually didn’t have quite enough for this length, but I was able to cut out a piece that measured 120″ by 21″. It worked out because I could stretch the fabric and I had ended up cutting some of the length off from the top part of the skirt anyways (talk about that below). In hindsight, having more fabric would have made it flow better but it’s still good!
1. Go ahead and cut the square piece out using the measurements you determined for the top part of the skirt (ex: 46″ by 46″).
2. Fold fabric square in half.
3. Fold fabric in half again the opposite way. You will have two “folds” of fabric and two sides that do not have folds.
4. Mark for your first cut from the corner where the two fold sides meet. This will be at the waist. Mark your 1/4″ circle to cut with chalk. The line should be the same length (the radius) from the corner all the way across.
The second cut you make will be made at the radius + length point from the corner edge. Use chalk to mark this line for easy cutting.
Cut skirt piece out after marking.
5. Open your now “donut” shape fabric piece. Cut down one side to open it. Wrap the waist part (the smaller circle) around your waist and make sure it doesn’t over wrap. You want it to wrap around your waist with one side coming to one side of front waist and the other overlapping going to the other side of the waist. If it is too big, trim some fabric off to your liking. I had to trim about 4 inches off on each side for my preference. It added to much fabric to the underneath side that wrapped under.
6. Right sides facing, sew the bottom skirt piece to the bottom of the top skirt piece.
7. Fold skirt in half, wrong sides facing. From top, cut downward at an angle similar to image above.
and then sew on the waistband. That would be super easy! Thanks again to Organic Cotton Plus for the fabric! You can also find them on
I would love to make this skirt, but I, and many, many other people, I am sure, do not have a clue as to the math that is used to cut this out. It has been years since I learned that kind of math and even then I did not get it very well. Is there any way you could interpret this for most people? Actually trial and error would work better I think. Thank you – the skirt is really great!
I totally get that! It looks a lot more complicated than it is 🙂 I promise! You are basically just plugging in your waist measurement and the lengths you want the skirt to be. So once you have those measurements, use your calculator to get the numbers. I will try to break it down a bit more in the instructions. The top portion you are just determining at what place you should make your 2 cuts and then you are determining how big a piece of fabric you need to cut it out. That way you make sure you have the fabric you need. I have tried to make circle skirts and things similar without doing this and it never turned out well, so I always use these equations which I learned from other places. Another option is to just gather a large piece of fabric and add a tie around the top and call it a day 🙂 I just find the circle skirts more flattering, especially on those of us who have hips and a butt 😉
Thank you for your help. As I said before, the skirt is so cute and I appreciate your sharing!
I love the shaping on this skirt!! I’ve got a Craft Gossip post scheduled for later this morning that links to your tutorial: http://sewing.craftgossip.com/tutorial-knit-fabric-wrap-skirt/2014/03/27/
–Anne
You are the best!!! I appreciate you sharing so much 🙂
Love it! Also I want your hair 🙂
haha I would give it to you if I could 😉 Thank you