I’ve only sewn velvet once before and that was nearly 40 years ago, I still remember the struggle to stitch the satin lining to my midnight blue full length velvet cape, three times I had to unpick and start again!! However I still love my cape and still occasionally wear it – one advantage of a cape is that even if you are two or three stone heavier, they still fit!! So with all this in my mind, I didn’t hesitate when I saw some beautiful teal cotton velvet with 25% off! This was the fateful trip to Sunny Bank Mills in Farsley as a friend who rarely sews wanted to go fabric shopping – she didn’t buy anything but I bought nearly 15 metres of various fabrics, none of which I needed 🙂

I bought three metres of the velvet, it was about 54″ so I had a good length. I decided to make another skirt in Vogue 9090, I’ve used this pattern several times, only last month I made a tweed skirt…

Despite downsizing from the previous skirt I made, I can still pinch an inch on the waist, so it sits below my waist, rather than on it. I decided to downsize one more size to a 12. Luckily there were two sets of pattern pieces so I was able to cut out a size 12 whilst leaving the 14 intact.

The front of the skirt has a centre seam, which I usually miss out and cut on the fold, unfortunately the velvet wasn’t quite wide enough for that, which meant I had to cut all the pattern pieces out individually on a single layer of fabric. I hate doing that as you can’t pin all the pattern pieces on at once, know they fit fine and they’re all correctly aligned and the right way up, you don’t have that final scan before cutting…and yes, I made a mistake!

I cut the first front and back, pinned on the second front but when I went to pin on the second back I realised I had put the side seam on the straight grain, instead of the centre back! My heart sank – these problems rarely occur on fabrics you don’t love! I did for a moment wonder about cutting the other back the same, as I had to weigh the difference in the sheen of the nap against how the fabric would hang. I was concerned that stitching a cross grain front to a straight grain back might cause issues. I looked at how much fabric I had left, luckily I had just enough left to cut another back which was almost (near enough!) on the correct grain!

After that panic, it was plain sailing-ish! Velvet is renown for being difficult to sew, the pile can make the two layers move when you’re trying to stitch them together, tacking all the seams by hand first is often recommended. Pressing the seams is also an issue as if you’re not careful the pile is pressed tow much and an imprint is left.

With all that in mind I kept it as simple as I could, I omitted the pockets, much as I love a skirt with pockets, there was a high risk of them not lying neatly. I lined the waistband with quilting cotton as slippery satin linings were what caused the problems when I made the cape. I tried tacking the first seam but to be honest it seem to cause more problems than it helped, so after that I just pinned a lot, used a walking foot and took my time.

I used a pressing cloth when I needed to press the seams and I think a wool mat helped protect the pile too. If you sew a lot of velvets there are pin beds you can buy specially made to iron velvet on, some places recommend ironing on a towel, I kept pressing to a minimum and also used a little wooden pressing wheel to try and reduce the area being pressed.

The zip is hand-stitched it – I tend to hand-stitch all my zips in as I find I get a much neater finish and I’ve never had a problem with them coming unstitched, even on tight evening dress bodices.

To hem a velvet skirt it is recommended you don’t double fold the hem, as it will show too much. I used my usual bias binding technique – I bought a packet of 1/2″ bias binding, the pack had 2.5m in it, plenty, I thought – I had 3″ left!! I did have some pretty flowery bias which I did consider using, it had teal in it so it actually went very well, but it had a pale background and I decided it just wasn’t the style of skirt to have a slightly frivolous hem!! I stitched the navy bias on and then turned it up about 1cm before slip stitching it by hand. It’s worked pretty well I think.

I’m really pleased with this skirt, it feels gorgeous on, it has a lovely swish when I walk 🙂 It’s a beautiful shade of teal, rather than the air force blue it looks in the photo. Maybe a little on the snug side, if I use this pattern again I might do a mix – front size 12 and back size 14! I’ve got my daughters passing out parade at Sandhurst next week, so I might wear it there. I love it!