paperbag skirt

I could have bought a paperbag-waist skirt on ModCloth for $50...

But why, when I can make a similar one myself for $10?

Also, it's no longer sold on ModCloth. All I had to buy was 1 1/2 yards of a linen-look navy cotton, $4.79/yd, plus a 7-9" inch invisible zipper for $2.49.

I followed the paper bag skirt tutorial by Suzannah at Adventures in Dressmaking. I just made mine slightly longer than hers. I've probably only made something with an invisible zipper once, and that was in my "Fashion Design 101" joke of a class in high school. So this was my first time attempting it by myself -- and without an invisible zipper foot. I read this post on Sew Serendipity on how to do it and found it really wasn't difficult at all.


The hardest part of this skirt was aligning the pleats so that they were even with each other and still fitted to my waist size. I tried taking it in a bit but it still is kinda too puffy at certain angles, but I really don't want to redo the pleats. If I make another, I'll just start off with less fabric. The tutorial did call for 2x the waist size and it probably could be less.


Sassy blurry wrinkled back view:

By the way, making a paperbag skirt will inevitably make you sing "Paperback Writer" by The Beatles for at least three days straight.