The Layer Cake Skirt

It's so warm in LA, it's total skirt weather.

These three fabrics were begging to be together forever, so I decided to whip up a deelish little layer cake skirt for my sweetie pie.

Yummy!  This is a beginner project, you can totally do it.

Get the full Layer Cake Skirt Tutorial after the jump...


The Layer Cake Skirt

For my layer cake skirt I used these three gorgeous Joel Dewberry fabrics I picked up from Fabricworm:
Top Layer: Joel Dewberry Flower Fields in Sunglow
Middle Layer: Joel Dewberry Dogwood Bloom in Sunglow
Bottom Layer: Joel Dewberry Dogwood Bloom in Harvest

First we need to cut our fabric. Measure your kid's waist and cut a piece of 3/4" no-roll elastic 1" bigger, so mine was 19". The rest is sort of up to you, since this will be ruffled it will be forgiving. Here is how i did it...

Top Layer: One strip 44" wide, 4.5" tall
Middle Layer: One strip 44" wide, 5" tall and one strip 22" wide, 5" tall (sewn together at the 5" edges to create one long strip)
Bottom Layer: Two strips 44" wide, 6" tall (sewn together at the 6" edges to create one long strip)

So cut out all your fabric:


Go ahead and sew the strips together for the middle layer and for the bottom layer, so you have three strips, one for each layer.  I used a french seam but in retrospect I don't recommend it, it's too heavy for this skirt:


Start with the bottom layer.  Fold 1/2" and another 1/2" to create a hem:


Sew in place.  This is the bottom of your skirt.


Now sew a basting stitch along the top (a basting stitch is a regular old straight stitch set to the widest width your machine will allow, usually a 5), leaving a long thread on each side so you can gather. Because I did a french seam I had to start and stop at the seam, hence my not recommending a french seam.


Lay the middle layer out flat.  Pull the bobbin thread and gently push the fabric to gather the bottom layer until it is the same length as the middle layer:


Evenly distribute your ruffles/gathers.  Lay the middle layer face down on top of the bottom layer so right sides are facing.


Turn it over so you can see your previous basting stitch.  You could pin but I didn't because I am lazy when it comes to pinning.


Sew in place all the way across just inside the basting stitch:


Finish the edge by serging or sewing with a zig zag stitch.  I am also too lazy to change my serger thread from black to white:


Now it looks like this, pretty.


Sew a basting stitch along the top of the middle layer:


Lay the top layer out flat and gather the middle layer until it is the same length:


Lay the top layer flat on top with edges aligned:


Turn it over so you can see your basting stitch, and sew in place just inside as we did before.


Finish the edge:


Now your skirt looks like this:


It's still pretty long, totally fine.


Lay it right side up.


Bring the two short edges together right sides facing:


Sew together and finish the edge:


Fold the top edge in 1/2" and iron, then another 1" and iron:


Sew in place at the edge of the casing, starting on one side of the seam, leaving a hole, backstitching and the beginning and end:


Feed your 3/4" elastic into the hole with a safety pin:


Feed it all the way around, gathering your skirt, and pull it out the other side of the hole:


Sew the elastic together flat with a stretch or zig zag stitch:


Push it back into the casing and sew the hole closed:


Flip it inside out.


Admire your handiwork!


Sigh, I wish I was little enough to wear a pouffy layer cake skirt like this.


Deelish.