Victorian Walking Skirt Completed

And lo, a sewing weekend was had and much progress was made. I ventured out of the house once to get some essentials, but apart from that, I had my nose to the presser foot.. ok not quite that close. I'm very pleased with the progress I made.

In a previous post regarding my walking skirt, I was concerned with the shortness of the back hem. To solve this, I added a hem of box pleated purple taffeta. I cut the taffeta as a 4 inch wide strip, and set the pleats as I worked with a combination of pins and steam, before sewing them onto the hem of the skirt.


In order to correct the hem shortness which only existed on the back of the skirt, I sketched a chalk line around the hem of the skirt along when the pleats would lie, not where the sewing line would be. This allowed me to position the trim lower along the back hem where it was needed, and a little higher on the front hem.

My original plan had been to create a double line of pleated trim along the bottom of the skirt, and I did pin & pic a few times to try is out. But the simple look of just one line of trim looked so sweet and perfect, I didn't want to go further. Yes, I fail at Victorian accessorising, I am much too plain in my ruffles. 

Here's the finished piece. It's collapsed a little as the underskirt wasn't in place when I took these pictures, but I think she's going to do me a very pretty turn on the grounds of Coopershill Manor this weekend.