Road Trip Skirt

VI may have mentioned that The Man and I are off on a road trip thorugh the Southwest at the end of August. I've been sewing my little heart out, beefing up my hot weather travel outfits. This latest is from Burdastyle May, 2012; skirt #118.

Front view, demonstrating hip yoke pockets

The May, 2012 issue is one of my all-time Burdastyle faves. I've made 4 garments from this issue and I've liked each one. And I have another skirt cut out and waiting, plus I have my eye on a slightly fitted button-up blouse that might fit a couple pieces of stash fabric.

Side view

Burda describes this little item as a mini skirt with deep pleats and hip yoke pockets, which pretty much says it all. I'm a big fan of roomy pockets in a travel skirt.

Rear view

Here's a back view so you can see the pleat action. Kind of a reverse mullet; party in the front and business in the back. Burda wanted me to put two welt pockets back there, but I wasn't about to try that without some third-party instructions. Plus, the front pockets are so nice I can't imagine wanting to throw anything in a back pocket.

Close up of shaped waist-band, copper buttons and front pleats.

I used a denim-look fabric that's mainly tencel. It was a bit fray-ey and slippery to sew, but the drape is nice and it will be lighter than denim, I think. The mid-blue should go with pretty much every top I own.

Another side view

My only change-ups were to omit the back welt pockets and to put the buttons on the outside of the waistband.  Burda wanted me to hide the buttons on the inside and continue the fly topstitching on the outside so that it would appear the zipper went all the way to the top. I kind of like these copper-toned buttons, though, and I figure they carry out the jeans theme of the denim-toned fabric.

Well, one other small mod; I somehow missed the "mini skirt" part of the description, which explains why the skirt came out a bit shorter than I'd reckoned on. Burda wanted me to use a nice, deep hem, but I used lace seam binding to turn up as narrow a hem as possible.

I'd be happy to have another of these skirts, maybe in a pin-whale corduroy for winter. Next time I'll know to add a few inches when cutting out so I can mess with the length to my heart's content.

My pattern review is on PatternReview.com here.