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Circle Skirt, Fast, Faster and Fastest

The goal: a circle skirt with an elasticized waist or yoke. The raw skirt body will be cut, a casing for an elastic waistband applied on top, and the skirt hung for a week to allow the bias to stretch. Then the skirt hem will be marked, cut and sewn.

These instructions work because circle skirts cannot be cut to exact measurements the first time: there is too much bias. After the first cut and the initial assembly, skirts should be hung for at least a week to stretch out, and during that time entire sections of the hem will become several inches longer than they were cut. After stretching is complete, the final hem is marked, cut and sewn. Therefore, there is no advantage to being too particular about the initial cut.

The fast description of the fast way to make skirts for dancers with hip measurements of up to 45"

Purchase washable fabric that is at least 42" in width and 5.5 yds in length (if I'm dyeing it, I get 6 yds).
Pre-shrink it (or dye it).
Rip /cut a 5" wide waistband from one short end. This will be applied to the skirt top as a casing for elastic.
Skip the pattern making and cut two half-circles with a radius of 43" using the fan-fold technique
Sew the half-circles together and press the seam allowance open.
Create a waist opening template.
Mark and stay-stitch the waist opening and then cut it.
If pockets in the side seams are desired, add them now (bag pockets recommended).
Add the waistband and elastic and let the skirt hang for at least one week.
Mark the hem while the skirt is on the dancer using a standing chalk marker.
If the skirt is too short (a rare occurrence) I lengthen it [see lengthening techniques].
Sew a narrow hem and finish the waistband.

The detailed description of the fast way to make skirts for dancers with hip measurements of up to 45"

Design considerations
Create Your waist opening pattern
How Much Fabric do you need?
Choose Your Fabric
Cut Your Fabric
Sew your Skirt
Hang the skirt to stretch.
Hem your skirt.
External web sites with circle-skirt patterns.

Design considerations:

The standard circle skirt is made with 2 half-circles. 'Pro' skirts are often 3 half-circles. The more half-circles, the heavier the skirt will be. If you are working with a normal or heavy-weight fabric, do not use an elastic waistband if the skirt contains more than 3 half-circles - the weight is likely to pull the skirt to your knees. Use a reinforced waistband with a secure closing (hooks and eyes recommended) or tie closure.

If you are making a 'Pro' skirt, your end goal is to position one seam at your center back, one seam over the top of your right leg, and one seam over the top of your left leg. This means there is one entire half circle in the front between the tops of your legs. This makes it easy to have slits that show off your legs, if that is what you want. It also makes the skirt seams look balanced.

If you mount your circle skirts like ballet skirts - that is, attach them to 'underpants' (trunks) made of woven fabric - your skirts will not ride up or twist, no matter how hard you dance. It also solves the problem of what to wear under the skirt - as long as your 'real' underpants are a little smaller than the trunks! Yes, you CAN wear harem pants under a skirt mounted on trunks.

The Costume Goddess reminds us of how important it is to HANG YOUR SKIRT BEFORE HEMMING IT. Frankly, she's too conservative. If you hang it for only a couple of days you will almost certainly have to rehem it! What a drag! Hang your skirt for at least a WEEK and you won't have to redo 17 yards of hem because the bias in the skirt kept stretching out after you hemmed it. If you don't have a week, and your fabric is washable, you can try wetting it thoroughly and letting it hang until dry. (The weight of the water helps expedite the stretching). Good luck!

If you need a circle skirt in a hurry, consider making a gored skirt. Make a gore pattern from one-sixteenth of a circle and then mark the grain line right down the middle... This eliminates a lot of the bias (and stretching of bias). Sew 12 - 16 of these gores together and you will have a very circular-looking skirt. It will drape differently than a 'real' circle skirt (because there's much less bias in it) but it will flare out very nicely.

Patterned and napped fabrics (such as velvet) can be problematic. Sometimes they need special handling to prevent the fabric from destroying the skirt's appeal or to keep the pattern from neutralizing the shape and making it all blah. I have made skirts with 16 gores in order to make a 'circle' skirt out of napped velvet. Another option is a 6-gore skirt with an a-line shape and half-circle gussets inset into the seams -- that gets you a big skirt fast while keeping the the patterns / stripes/whatever from taking over the skirt.

Create Your Waist-Opening Pattern

Waist-opening pattern. This pattern is a half-circle with a diameter that gives you enough room to get the skirt up over your hips. Use a compass to draw a half circle with needed radius (see below) on a piece of cardboard or stiff paper or interfacing. We are not going to play with formulas that include pi; this seems to distress folks. Rounding is good enough for a skirt with an elastic waistband.

The short way: if you are a woman with a hip measurement of up to 40 inches, and your skirt is composed of two half-circles, then a half-circle with a 7-inch radius (14-inch diameter) will work for you.
The slightly-longer version: Divide your hip measurement by six to get the radius of the needed opening, then round up to the nearest inch. (40" hip / 6 and rounded up = 7.)
If your skirt uses more than two half-circles, then the circumference of each waist opening in each half-circle will be your hip circumference divided by the number of half-circles and rounded up. Then divide the needed circumference by 3 and round up to get the needed radius to make the pattern. No, not a misprint. Divide by 3, not 6. A forty-inch hip will require an opening of 14" circumference in each half-circle. Dividing 14 by 3 and rounding up = a radius of 5". Make your waist opening pattern accordingly.
Mark the radius, the hip circumference, and the number of half-circles in the skirt on the pattern. You will eventually end up with a small collection of these, so these notes will help you grab the one you need.
Remember:
- The radius is the line between the CENTER of a circle and the edge.
- The waist opening will end up larger than your pattern because of the 1/2" seam allowance that will be used to attach the waist band to the top of the skirt.
- The cut waist will have a lot of bias in it so unless you stay-stitch it AFTER you mark and BEFORE you cut the waist opening will naturally 'grow' a little.
For true peace of mind, test the pattern on a square of material that is slightly bigger than the pattern... it doesn't have to look like a skirt, it just has to show you if the opening is the right size when you pull it up your legs!

How Much Fabric?

The following are ESTIMATES to help you get your project going, and may result in very useful scraps. Unless the fabric is extremely expensive, too much is better than too little, so buy a little extra. Besides, skirts need tops. The scraps from the short version estimate should allow you to cover a bra and make a choli or even a baby-doll top as well.

The short version: an average-sized woman (40-inch hip, 5-foot-six) will need 2.5 yards of 42-inch-wide fabric with no nap for each half-circle desired. This means: 5 yds for a circle skirt. If you are using my Fan Fold Technique, the simplest possible way requires a rectangle of cloth for each half-circle, with no overlapping.
The longer version: Aziza at Zilltech.com gives clear instructions on how to create a skirt pattern and lay it out on fabric, overlapping the patterns to save fabric. If you need a very close estimate of how much fabric you need, I suggest you follow her directions to create a LITTLE paper pattern that reflects YOUR measurements to scale on graph paper. Then make as many graph-paper-patterns as you intend to use in your skirt, and lay THEM out on graph paper that has been cut to scale to reflect the width of your fabric.
- If your skirt design involves applying your waistband to the TOP of your skirt, and your fabric is wider than your hip measurement, add 6 inches of fabric to your total for the waistband and lay that on your 'paper fabric' as well before calculating yardage. If your hip measurement is wider than your fabric, add 12 inches.
- If you are going to clean your skirt by washing it, then add a reasonable allowance for shrinkage. 10% is not too much for some fabrics.

Choosing Your Fabric

Choose drapey, not stiff or floppy fabric; woven fabric, not knits. Trust yourself; if you like the way it drapes and feels on the bolt, buy it. If you don't like the way it feels and drapes, don't buy it, no matter how pretty it is. Notable exception: soft droopy fabrics like chiffon can be made to work if you cut a LOT of half-circles and gather them into a yoke or waistband.
I use natural fabrics whenever possible, not synthetics. Natural fabrics help your body stay cooler when hot. If you think that is no big deal, let me put it this way -- you will sweat a lot less and feel a lot better during an outside summer gig in silk than in polyester!
Can it be cleaned? Sooner or later you will want to clean that costume. That's why I use a lot of hand-dyed silk: I can wash it occasionally on a gentle cycle. You may be happy sending it to the cleaners. Your choice.

Cutting your fabric:

Clean the fabric the way you intend to clean it in the future before making the skirt.
Waistband: Cut a waistband 5 inches wide and the circumference of your waist-opening pattern plus a couple of inches. Make it too long rather than too short. Ripping a 5" wide piece from selvage to selvage is the fastest way to do this. Or mark with a long ruler and cut. Or make yourself a pattern that is 5 inches wide, with a length equal to the circumference of your waist-opening pattern plus a couple of inches. If your hip is wider than the fabric is wide, rip or cut two 5" wide pieces and connect them.
Skirt body: Lay your fabric on the floor /carpet /pushed-together tables. Using the fabric selvage as the long straight edge of each half-circle piece, mark the shape of your skirt on the fabric, put two safety pins at the center waist point, and then cut. Don't worry about a rough edge; you'll be cutting a completely new hemline after you hang the skirt. My Fan-Fold technique is probably the fastest and easiest way on the planet to mark and cut a circle skirt!

Sewing the Skirt

Sew the side seams together to make the skirt body. If you followed my suggestion to lay the long straight edge of each half-circle on the fabric selvage, you will not need to finish the seams to keep them from fraying.
Waist opening: Match the top center of your waist-opening pattern with the pins at the top center waist of the skirt bodies and trace the waist opening patterns with your marker of choice (chalk, carbon paper, pencil, fabric marker, basting) on each individual half-circle. Stay-stitch (sew a seam) about 1/2 inch on the outside of the marks. This is done BEFORE you cut to prevent the opening from stretching. Then cut your opening just inside the stay-stitching.
Waistband: Having a waistband on the skirt during the hanging period will help keep it on the hanger properly and leaves you ready for the final fitting at a moments notice.
- Using a tape measure, measure around the waist opening at the stay-stitching line.
- Add one inch to this measurement to determine the length of your waistband.
- Cut your waistband and sew it into a circle using a 1/2" seam allowance.
- Center the waistband seam at the skirt back and pin the waistband to the waist opening.
- Sew waistband to skirt with 1/2" seam allowance.
- Iron the waistband flat and topstitch the top edge.
- Open up the waistband back seam on the inside and run some 1" (or wider) no-roll elastic through it.
- Secure the ends of the elastic with a safety pin.

Hang your Skirt

You hang your skirt so that it will stretch BEFORE you hem it to the length you want it, not afterwards!

In the case of skirts made of circles (or the double-square skirt with ruffled hem), you must hang your skirt for a week. Why? Because BIAS STRETCHES, and a skirt with lots of bias in it WILL STRETCH LIKE CRAZY for the first week. If you hem it immediately you will have to rehem it! What a drag!
If you don't have a week, and your fabric is washable, you can try wetting it thoroughly and letting it hang until dry. (The weight of the water helps expedite the stretching).

Hemming your Skirt

We have a separate page on how to hem your skirt.

The skirt in the picture on this page is a circle-and-a-half style made of silk Crepe de Chine and mounted on a black trunk. It hung for four weeks before it was hemmed. It has never stretched out of shape.

External web sites with Circle Skirt instructions.

~Without a pattern:

Read my Fan-Fold Technique here on Ruric-Amari.com.
Kashmir at www.raqs.co.nz provides basic instructions on how to make a skirt WITHOUT a pattern. I think mine is faster, but now you have options!
If you choose to NOT make a circle skirt pattern, be sure to make a pattern for just the waist opening, since a 'little' misteake when cutting the waist opening can force you to change your design.

~With a pattern:

Shira at Shira.net provides excellent instructions on how to make a pattern for the skirt and how to choose the right fabric for a belly dancing costume.
If you choose to make a skirt pattern, make it out of a large piece of plastic (like a drop cloth or mulch cover) and make it a half-circle size, not a quarter-circle size. This allows you to cut your pattern without taping anything together and allows you to mark your fabric for cutting without folding fabric.