Making a petticoat "full"

What are you making it out of? What sort of effect do you want?

For example, if you want a poly/cotton petticoat with some body to the hem, you can zigzag over thick fishing line. If you want layers of fluff, you need graded layers of net.

Those old (early Victorian) petticoats _were_ heavy. They must have been horrible when it rained and they trailed in the wet. That's why the cage crinoline was seen as a liberating garment.

I don't know what exactly you mean, but I have made a petticoat in the following fashion. I took a strip of fabric about 25% longer than the measurement of around my hips, and about 12 inches wide. I made a drawstring casing on one long edge and sewed the short edges together, making a very squatty tube. Then I took another 12" wide strip of fabric, this one twice as long as the previous, gathered that up on a long side, sewed the short ends together, and sewed it to the long edge of the previous strip. Keep doing this until the petticoat is as long as you want.

liz young

I made a full petticoat for a fifties-style skirt to fit my DSD as follows:

I made a very short (hip-length) cotton half-slip with an elastic waist.

Then I gathered a double layer of stiff net as 'gatherish' as I could make it (ie pulled it up *really* tightly). The width of the net was double the required length from the hem of the half-slip to the bottom of the finished item. I ran a long machine stitch right up its middle, folded it in half along the stitching line and then gathered. And gathered. And gathered. This step was quite difficult because the gathering thread wanted to break. In the end, I did a narrow zig-zag stitch over fishing line. That did the trick!!!

Finally, I whipped the net to the hem of the half-slip by hand. The net was so bulky and so intractable, doing it by machine was going to be impossible. I just safety pinned the net to the skirt in four places and used a double thread and a tapestry needle (blunt0. This was easy and took no time at all.

The resulting petticoat was *perfect* and the circular skirt sat beautifully on it. With this particular garment, it suited me to allow the net to show about eight inches beneath the skirt to good effect. One slight drawback was the cut edge of the net: it's scratchy and snags stockings. The best way around this, I found, was to run a narrow overlocker (serger) rolled hem around it. Twice! This gave the hem body and really covered the nasty snaggy bits of net. (Of course, it would be

*much* easier to do this rolled hemming *before* you gathered the net. Not as I did, when it was gathered up and busy and bulky... Hnnnnnnnhhhh!!!!! =:-0 )

Another way around it might be to finish the net with some narrow lace before gathering?

Anyway, do let us know what you decide to do! Best of luck! ;-D

....

Whatever it takes to get the effect. Something light-weight and stiff, I would think.

I don't have a single, specific look in mind, but generally, I want to make a skirt -- e.g., a circle skirt -- stick out like a cone. One example is a 50's dress, another is your typical square dancing dress. The effect I want is "light and airy." Not quite a tutu, but maybe in that direction.

-- AMM

In article , a_m snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com wrote: ...

Trish's method will give you good results. Another thing you might consider is horsehair braid in the hem. With a circular skirt it wouldn't work in the skirt itself, but in the petticoat hem it would give stiffness at the hem edge only. You could see an example at

by searching for Vogue 8020. The review by 'fzxdoc' of this dress is very thorough, and she uses both horsehair braid and netting ruffles to achieve fullness.Lee

In article , Lee Kerrighan wrote: Correction needed! I misspoke; you have to search for 8020, without the company name, and the reviewer is Kathryn. Sorry about that.

Lee

With a petticoat made as Trish describes, I'd be tempted to make a complete cotton half slip, and then apply the netting to the outside of it, as per Trish's description. No more scratchies on the legs then! That net can be vicous stuff!

HTH

Sarah

Sarah, that's an excellent idea! I didn't have to wear the petticoat I made - my DSD got that pleasure! LOL! She only reported that she removed her pantyhose very early in the evening - never said what happened to her leggies... ;->

What a good idea!

Doreen in Alabama

Just running off at a tangent:

I'd like to remind y'all that the last time crinoline petticoats were in fashion, we wore full slips under them.

I had one that was made of a coarse net that was, for all practical purposes, "horsehair" braid all over. But there were no ends sticking out, so it wouldn't have snagged my stockings even without the slip.

Joy Beeson