Happy Hippie, or Make Skirts, Not War!

Yesterday, Mr Putin declared war on Ukraine. Now, more than 6000 military men have invaded my country's territory without a legitimate reason. Since November 2013, the people of Ukraine have been standing against the regime of corrupt politicians and government and now, just when we thought that everything was over and we were about to turn over a new page in our history - but also while we are still weakened from the previous conflict politically and economically - Putin has struck.

When I made this skirt and went out to take the photos, I was not aware of the war. Only when I read about this in the news feed on my phone, I rushed back home to follow the events. Therefore, I have named my skirt the Happy Hippie skirt. On my personal Facebook and Twitter pages, I've already called Putin names starting from all letters of both Cyrillic and Latin alphabets and sent him to all sort of exotic places. Now I want to tell him to do something more useful with his hands than signing declarations of war! Why not start sewing? Maybe somebody would cast him for "The Great British Sewing Bee"!

I took the pattern, a front pleat pencil skirt,  from the March issue of BurdaStyle but chose not no add a visible waistband. Instead, I attached a petersham ribbon, sewing it to the skirt's edge and then turning it to the inside of the skirt.

The gorgeous sparkly fabric, Crinkled Copper, comes from the Tessuti Fabrics online shop. I was right to immediately purchase three metres because the following day, this crazy fabric was sold out.

As for the qualities of the fabric, it's stretchy and feels like something in between neoprene and a heavy knit. If I had used woven fabric, the skirt would definitely have required a slit, but due to the elasticity of my Crinkled Copper, I don't feel any restriction in movement when walking.

Sparkly bag

The Effervescence cardigan,  designed by Olga Buraya-Kefelian

It was the very first time in my life to sew with such an unusual fabric and I had to make a few choices in regards to the treatment of the seams, the lining and waistband, First off, I decided not to use any lining. The fabric behaves like neoprene but at the same time has a knit-like structure. Before cutting, I pre-washed it by hand in lukewarm water. As a result, the fabric neither shrank nor got distorted. Although the fabric wrinkled only slightly, I ironed it with a warm iron on a "Synthetic" setting.

The biggest challenge for me was when it came to pressing the seams. I had to regulate the heat on my iron from hot to warm; a very hot temperature would distort the fabric while too low a setting would not do the job at all. As a result, some seams were pressed better than others, as you can see from the photo below.

With two metres of this fabric left, I need ideas for the next garment. It has to be structured with very few seams.

Currently, the two good candidates are this cropped bolero coat or these cigarette trousers from Ralph Pink. What do you reckon?