Self Assembly Required

DIY dressmaking + crafts with Emily

A DIY leopard wrap frill skirt

Did you know that leopard is considered a neutral? It totally goes with everything apparently (and there was even a talk at the Fashion & Textile Museum on it)!

I thought I’d try my hand at making the most neutral skirt I could – a frilly maxi length wrap skirt! (That was sarcasm by the way in case you didn’t get it… 🤣)

I was hugely inspired by Shauni of The Magnificent Thread and Elisalex of By Hand London‘s recent frilled wrap skirts for this make. They’ve both made beautiful versions with different methods and in slightly differing shapes – Shauni’s was a more slim fitted pencil shaped wrap whereas Elisalex went for a full circle.

I opted to keep mine somewhere in the middle with an A-line style. I used the skirt part of the Vogue 9252 pattern (which I used here) with some adjustments!

I shortened the skirt by another 10cm more than I’d already done so. I also reduced the curve on the front piece so that it was a little more angled. I added a long rectangular gathered frill to the hem and added a waistband too!

Instead of having the skirt tie together, I went for a button and trouser slider to hold the skirt together. I felt it looked a bit neater than ties (plus I was running out of fabric at this point and didn’t have any to spare for it!).

The fabric I used was a poly crepe leopard print from Fabrics Galore which I picked up at the Knitting and Stitching show in October. I spent some time dithering between getting this one or the Stoff & Stil viscose but ended up with the poly. The upside of using polyester is that it’s not going to wrinkle as much and when you’ve got as much skirt as I do here, you’ve got to think about these things!

I’ve found that I keep tripping on the hem of this skirt! I’m very tempted to shorten it a bit to a mid calf length just so I’m less accident prone!

The frill isn’t as dramatic as I wanted it to be. That’s the problem when you’re trying to skimp of fabric – it’s easy to end up slightly short!

It’s not perfect but I weirdly love it anyway. I’ve worn it loads already!

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