Pillow Skirts

I am perfectly pillow-sized, as it turns out: My hips are an even better match for the size of a pillowcase than my bust. So, building on my pillow case shirts series (?) I made a little skirt.

This is more of an exploration than anything. I used a very thin and flimsy Target pillowcase, and I don't think I'd feel confident actually wearing this one out- so it's most likely destined for disassembly and reuse. But, with a case made from bulkier fabric and a little more caution in the seam work, I think the proof of concept would hold up.

This does also mean that I could make a matching set out of a pair.

Process

First, I chopped a few inches off of the top of the pillow (Note: I would later decide that this was a mistake.), and tried it on. I tried to gauge the approximate length I wanted the final skirt to be, and where I wanted the waist to fall. This pillow only had one seam in it, so I decided to center the seam in the back of the skirt, for ease of zipper and slit insertion.

My (pillow-sized) hips are pretty wide compared to my (smaller-than-pillow-sized) true waist, so I knew I was going to need to take it in quite a bit at the top. I first tried pinning along the edge of my body while I was wearing the skirt... and then I realized I wouldn't be able to take the skirt back off.

It didn't occur to me at the time that I could just pin one side of the fabric instead of pinning both layers together, so I just marked the ends and started the side quest of putting in the zipper first.

The started with selecting a zipper that was about the right length and color that I wanted. I got a bunch of old zippers for free when I picked up my sewing table off of Facebook Marketplace a few months ago, and this one was from that stash. Then I ripped about a little more than the length of the zipper from the center back seam.

After the seam ripping I had a couple of lengths of the original thread still intact, so I decided to quickly hand sew the zipper in with that thread (again, this is a proof of concept garment!)

Now that I had my escape route I sewed the darts in the side waist, leaving an inch or so at the top to fold down for the hem.

I folded the fabric at the top twice to make a rolled hem, and then added some topstitching. The decision to use white thread on this project was moooostly driven by not wanting to wind a new bobbin, but I also thought the contrasting topstitching was kind of cool.

After another try-on, I added another set of darts at the bottom, as well as a slit in the back so it wouldn't explode if I tried to sit down.

It's a skirt! It ended up a little bit short and/or the slit is a bit too long, so if I did this again I'd probably start from closer to the full length of the pillow, rather than chopping off a bunch right at the beginning.

I don't love this skirt, and honestly, I'm not into this concept as much as the pillow shirt, even though it's a lot more straightforward. But it's a fun puzzle and a pretty quick project, and maybe the right pillow will come along.