- The skirt and the knit cardigan are the last two pieces in our capsule wardrobe.

And these are great pieces to really understand the benefits of this concept.

We'll take the skirt base, then cut and tape a bit to see what else will result.

Wow, so many options, and of course, you can get creative with a cardigan as well.

And now that we have completed our capsule wardrobe, we'll look at several trendy fashion add-ons that can really modernize the looks of our pieces.

All today on Fit 2 Stitch.

♪ ♪ - [Man] Fit 2 Stitch is made possible by Vogue Fabrics, Colorado Fabrics, Quality Sew and Vac, Sew Town, Tulsa, Oklahoma and Fort Smith, Arkansas, Kai Scissors, Sew Steady, Bennos Buttons, All Brands, Cynthia's Fine Fabrics, and Clutch Nails.

- So when we talk sewing and when we talk fun and we put sewing and fun together, these pieces are going to be your most fun.

And the reason why is because I know all of you well enough to know that you worry about fit.

You just worry about fit, you worry about fit, you worry about fit.

But this fit is so easy.

We're gonna do a cardigan, and when I say cardigan, that cardigan should be a knit because that's what's gonna make it really simple.

And we're gonna do a skirt.

And the skirt's gonna be a knit also.

It doesn't mean we can't do it on woven, because I'll give you some, lots of options, but we're gonna start by doing them in knit.

So we're gonna bring Jeannie on because you're gonna see, we're gonna make fit easy, we're gonna make it fast, we're gonna get through it, and then we're gonna play, and we've got lots of ideas for you.

Hi, Jeannie.

- Hi.

- All right, so tell me, you first off, and this is the, kind of a big puzzle that always plagues everybody.

So how'd you pick your size?

- Well, I originally picked it based upon the cardigan pattern that I have because it fits me great.

- And it's a knit.

- It's a knit, yeah.

When I made it up, nothing was fitting right.

And you usually every time I make-- - Fitting meaning length, circumference, depth.

- Depth, yes, the length wasn't too bad, but the circumference and depth was just way off.

My arm holes were like-- - So everything was wrong.

- Everything was way off.

- And that was a little red flag.

- Yes.

- And you said, Jeannie.

- Something's wrong.

So what I wound up realizing, after I was told that, with the cardigan, it really should be based upon what you would have a jacket for, not what you would have a sweater, so for the negative ease.

- Sure, because you don't want it pulling, you want it to have a little bit, you want it to almost be equal to your body, is that fair?

- Yes.

- Size-wise.

So when we talk about circumference, don't go too small on a cardigan because it'll just be small everywhere.

- Yeah.

- And you don't, you want a knit, but you don't want to rely on that knit.

You really don't want to rely on that knit for mobility, movement, not necessarily, just as it is, because you're gonna leave it open, you don't want that negative ease.

- Right, so once I did that, everything looked a lot better.

- Okay, good.

- So I don't have as many changes to the pattern now.

- So maybe red flag to yourself, if you've got so many things going wrong, maybe just make a different size.

Just try it, before you start making changes, if there's that many.

And it's a learning experience.

You kind of have to trust and sometimes we just don't know.

But you know, there's nothing wrong with failure, there's nothing wrong with doing it again, we're just gonna do it again and figure it out.

So in this case-- - I found I kept quite, what am I doing wrong, what am I doing wrong, I was blaming myself, which was a mistake, that I didn't make the right size, but.

- You weren't doing anything wrong.

- Right, I was, yeah.

- Except choosing the wrong size.

That sizing is really important.

So just pay attention to the clothes in your closet, pay attention to what you like, and then go from there.

All right, so once we get it made, and she's made this as her trial, you know, and sometimes, we do what we call like a wearable muslin.

And really, that just means that we're hoping, crossing our fingers that it will be nice.

So this is a beautiful, I mean, I love the color on you.

She's got the seams to the outside and the reason we put those seams to the outside is simply so that the changes will be more accurate as she goes to sew them onto the machine.

So this is what we're gonna do.

We're gonna make changes really simply.

Again, with your cardigan, because your circumference is already there, this is a princess seam, there's really no length adjustments to worry about, as long as we're okay with where the dart is coming.

A dart should really come below the bust point, so I'm just gonna back that up just a little tiny bit, just to bring it below the bulge.

We really don't want it to be visual.

If it comes too far into the bulge of our bust, it'll just get too visual, and that's not what we want.

We want it to be there as a tool, but nothing else.

You see, that looks a little cleaner and a little neater.

All right, so then, again, that depth issue, those gaps, I'm gonna start at the shoulder seam.

And because there's some gaps here, we're gonna just clean that up.

We're gonna pick it up at the shoulder, we've done this before, we'll change the muslin so that you can easily see, and we're gonna taper to nothing right there at the base of the neck.

The good news is, by now, this is all feeling more familiar to you and that is a good thing.

Here, because Jeannie is busty, we're going to make a little dart.

And whenever we make a dart in that position, it's just saying the original dart that was there is not large enough.

So that's why it's there.

And if it's too much fabric, it'll push up and gap at the arm hole.

And so if there's gaps at the arm hole, it has nothing to do with the arm hole.

It has everything to do with either the shoulder seam being too square and dropping or the bust dart not taking enough fabric away.

But because I don't want to sew this, I'm going to look as to see where can I take it so that I don't have to put it in the final garment.

And look, there's a princess seam right there.

So I'm gonna go right to that princess seam.

Which is, of course, a reason we love princess seams.

And we're gonna take it all away.

And you all can't see the bottom of this, but what you'll notice about the bottom is, the bottom's hanging straight now also.

And that's not really the most important part.

It's this upper part that really makes a difference because if it doesn't fit well, it's just not flattering.

The neckline looks fine, I'm good with all of that.

Let's look at what I did on the tissue and transfer it back.

I'm gonna measure down under the arm hole, I'm gonna measure how large that is.

So it's about an inch down, and it's about one inch.

So I take it right there.

And look at that, it tapers to nothing.

So I'm gonna tape that down.

Then I'm gonna go to the back.

And because I have to take an inch here, I have to take an inch out of the side seam because it has to match.

I can't just take an inch out of the front without balancing the back.

But if I don't see any visible signs of anything that's wrong in the back, just take in an inch all the way.

And it will just balance the seam.

Then, if I want the cardigan to be longer, I can just add at the bottom.

Worry about getting the bottom balanced and then add the length that you need whenever you need it.

And you can see how clean that's hanging now, rather than going into her body.

If you want to, then, you can angle the side seam, you can take it in a little bit, but those angles in the back there will really help that garment hang clean and straight like you want it to.

So take the inch there, and on this particular, this is the back, I'm gonna actually do it all the way across, and that's what I've got here.

The shoulder seam, I angled it just a little bit here to nothing there, and I'm gonna do that as well.

Both front and back.

Thank you, Jeannie.

- You're welcome.

- And the sleeve, we already know it's fine, we're not even gonna worry about the sleeve.

And the reason we know it's fine is, we actually took from her knit top that we did earlier.

So don't keep doing those knit sleeves over.

Bring your knit sleeves forward and use the same arm hole and the same sleeve.

All right, thank you.

- You're welcome.

- Okay, so in this case, what I wanna do, because I angled that shoulder seam, I do want to drop that arm hole down just a little bit.

Because I already know that arm hole is the right size, I know the sleeve works, and so once I re-angle that shoulder seam, I'm just gonna drop the arm hole down and we are good to go.

So see, that was not bad at all.

Just usually, it's a little bit through the bust, it's a little bit through the shoulder seams.

And so many times, with our knits, as long as we have that circumference correct, we're in good shape.

Okay, so now we get to play.

See, I told you, the fitting's done, we're gonna take a look at these mannequins because we've got some great options on the mannequins, but I'm just gonna tell you how we did it and how it's done and you can follow along.

Okay, so it's always fun to witch out woven and knit.

Remember, we said, it's a knit cardigan.

but it doesn't mean the front piece has to be knit.

So in this case, I did this in a leather and I did the body in a knit.

And so you see, you get that really nice contrast between the print and the solid.

The solid usually done in the middle as a focal point, but you could do the solids on the side and a print in the middle, that would work well also.

Really, typically, I'll make the decision by what is my knit and what is my woven, what's my fabric that I have available.

This particular case, I did the whole thing in a woven fabric.

But I just made a vest out of it.

So instead of doing the sleeves, I completely left that off.

This only has three pieces, it has the front, it has that side piece, and then, of course, the back.

The elastic here is just really for show.

It's not anything other than just gives us a little easing at the waist, just a great look.

So think a vest.

Whenever you have a garment that has sleeves, you can take those sleeves away and you've got a vest.

You can come up underneath, what we did is, we came underneath with the knit T-shirt, and that really works well.

It's a great combination together.

So this one, when we get into styling, can be a lot of fun.

In this particular case, same exact pieces, I've just got my front, my side, my back, and then my sleeve, so I've got my four pieces.

And I did everything double.

So everything's been done twice.

And then what I did is, I just cut the top layer.

And remember that when you are doing any type of fringe, a knit can be cut two directions.

And all you're gonna do is take the fabric that you're using and you're going to cut it a little section in one direction and pull it, and you'll see, one direction will fringe and one will not.

So what you want is to, once you've cut it, and I do it about little half-inch sections, hold it here, and pull.

Just so much fun, it's really fun.

The bottom will tie, there's a little knot, that just gives it a little bit of weight.

And you'll see what a great concept this makes, fringe all the way around.

I then angled how far I cut up, just to give it some movement and to give some ideas.

But most of the ideas I do, I actually see them somewhere and I kind of duplicate them because I like them.

So you don't have to really create these ideas.

Don't think for one minute I created them, but I do like to shop and I do like to look online and you can see them and then you can say, hey, I can do that, and I can do that with this pattern, and it just works really well together.

Then for the cardigan, in this particular case, what I did is, I made the collar wider.

So I just came out a certain number of inches and cut it back.

And it doesn't have to be exactly what I did.

Just recognize that when I change the width of that collar, all kinds of fun things can happen.

This, in particular, is just a really short version.

So it's the same exact, except this time we did it out of a sheer netting.

There you go.

Again, we paired it with our little T-shirt so we're good to go and there's lots of fun things that we can do with that.

Just depends on what you wanna do.

All right, so we now, we're gonna do a few other things with the cardigan, but first, I want to drape the skirt.

Because our yoga skirt is just one of the, again, easiest pieces we can do, and there's so many things we can do with it.

So let's use that skirt on here.

And what we wanna do is, always watch the bottom of the skirt.

And in Jeannie's case, the front of the skirt is lower than the back of the skirt.

And for many of us, it's simply because of our tummies and because the waist isn't straight.

So whenever you are looking at a skirt and seeing that the bottom is not straight, our first instinct is to go to the skirt and chop, chop, chop, chop, chop, and alter the hem.

You're gonna stop doing that from now on in.

So what I had Jeannie do is, we put a piece of elastic.

And what I'm gonna do is, I'm just gonna alter that elastic and I'm gonna pull it up at the front.

Don't you pull it up, I'll pull it up, okay?

All right, so I'm gonna pull it up until I see that the hem is straight.

And once the hem is straight, I'm gonna mark the bottom of this elastic.

And that becomes her new waist.

Now, when you take it off, you look at it and you go, oh my, what happened to my waist?

It's crooked, so is everybody's.

There's not anybody with a straight waist and it doesn't matter anyway.

Walking down the street, I promise, no one will say to you, that woman has a crooked waist.

Especially if your hem is straight.

But if your hem is crooked, see, everybody will know.

All right, so what I'm gonna do now is take the skirt and I'm gonna alter the waist, just like what we did.

The beauty of the yoga skirt, thank you, Jeannie.

- You're welcome.

- Now, what she's gonna do is, she's actually made this all up.

So she's gonna go back and put it on.

The beauty of the yoga skirt is, we have just the front and we have the back.

So this actually can be the same pattern piece.

And we can have the center back and the center front and we have one, two, three, four of these.

But her pattern, where it's going to differ, is in the front where we dropped her waist down.

And I'm gonna use the curve.

We took about an inch out of the front.

And we taper to nothing at the side.

That's all it is.

Her pattern change is just that slight.

Now, the reason it's so important is because we're going to now look at a whole bunch of other options that she can actually do with this skirt pattern.

But she's gonna want to get the waist straight first, otherwise, as she makes all these changes, we'll have to actually go back and fit each particular time.

So whenever designers are doing their collection, they'll do fit first.

Once they get the fit down, then they do the designs.

It's much harder to go to the design and then incorporate the styling into that product.

So it is well worth the time to simply be patient, be patient through the process, and understand that I wanna get my fit down, I'm gonna take the time to make a muslin, and I'm gonna go from there.

Okay, so now what we wanna do is, I'm gonna make a couple different skirts with this.

So I'm going to take this front and I'm gonna divide it into two panels.

Now, the original yoga skirt, most yoga skirts are about 72 inches at the bottom.

And what we know about skirts is, the number of inches at the bottom is kind of how we can tell how full they are.

So 40 inches, for instance, is a straight skirt, you know, they consider a really full skirt like 120, and then somewhere in between, that 60 to 80, is what you call an A-line or a yoga or something along those lines.

The yoga skirt is really just a contemporary version of that old A-line, but it's just pushed it into modern times a little bit more then, it is a woven, it's a pull-on, so it's kind of simplified all the process of it all.

So in this particular case, what I'm going to do is I'm actually going to cut it down the middle.

And because I'm doing it one time, I would be doing it for all of my panels.

So I'm actually going to create eight panels.

And that's what created this black skirt here in the front, is I've just got four panels now.

And then what I did with each panel is, I flared at the bottom.

So this skirt has 120 inches at the bottom, but if you notice, it's just straight at the top.

So what you're gonna do is, after you cut this into two, I'm gonna take an add fullness at the bottom of each skirt.

And in this case, I'm gonna kind of use this tissue to show you.

So I don't want to change the top.

I'm gonna add to the bottom.

And then I've got, remember, I've got eight pieces.

So I take my 120 inches, I divide by eight, and each piece is going to have the additional fullness that I need for that amount.

I'm gonna fold this and just kind of use this tissue here.

So 120 divided by eight, well, we'll say, even if we divide by 10, it's 12.

So I want it to be about 15 inches.

So I can measure what it is currently and see that it's 10.

So I'm gonna add five extra inches on each of those panels and that will give me the fullness I need.

So what I'm gonna recommend is that you add two and a half inches on each side.

So there's my two and a half.

And remember that when I'm working with a seam allowance, I can just keep with seam allowances.

And then I'm gonna steal this tissue and do the same thing over here.

I'm gonna add two and a half inches over here as well.

Measure that, and then all I'm gonna do, and you know what this reminds me of, if we go back into some time ago, it really reminds me of the trumpet skirt.

Except again, this is a little more contemporary version of that trumpet skirt.

And so I made my mark, and there's my two and a half inches.

All right, so now all I have to do is connect them to the body of the skirt.

And now I connect them doesn't make any difference at all.

Okay, just connect it up like that.

And so now you see the fullness of that piece.

As I cut this off, we'll be right there because, the reason I'm showing you how to do this is because there's really pretty things we can do with this base, also.

So there I have that base.

And that's what it's gonna look like, versus this one.

And it's just gonna flare out at the bottom, just like this one does.

This peach one, when I originally saw this, this was just over the top, how expensive this was.

Now, it is silk, and it is beautiful.

So it's the same exact thing, it's just done twice, two different layers, and one is three inches shorter than the other one.

And just elastic at the waist.

Very simple, very easy to do, and all your pattern work has been done.

Now, this next one, you're gonna really love this one.

I saw this, expensive.

But what you're gonna see, I'm gonna take it off the hanger so we can really see it, is you are just gonna cut a piece of fabric.

So when I lay this down, what you'll see is, it's literally just, this one in particular is a yard.

So it's a yard wide, it's whatever length that you want that skirt to be, and then if you'll notice, there is the band that goes across.

So just clean and easy.

What you do is, right in the middle, you just cut the size of the band out for your yoga skirt and you just sew it right in place.

And then you can see that you can wear it either way.

You can wear it this way, where the longer sides go, or you can wear it this way, where they come down the center and in the back.

So oh my goodness, it's the ideas out there that are absolutely amazing.

This one, if you notice, it has a shorter side on the one.

It's the whole front cut twice, it just goes shorter on the inside and shorter on the outside.

So it looks like it has this little ruffle there, which I absolutely love.

And in this case, if you'll notice, it's just a clean piece of non-stretch.

So when I took that knit that I had to use for the skirt and I had a beautiful piece of lace that was not non-stretch I simply made it like a little apron.

But because it's the same size at the waist, you can't even tell that it doesn't connect at the side.

So again, there's just too many options.

It gets to be too much fun.

So I wanna bring Jeannie back on because she's got her yoga skirt, she's got it all made up to the final product, and she loves it, and she's added just a teeny little wrap.

Is that fair?

- Yes.

- Except, you know what I wanna do with this wrap, let's take it, let's do this way.

- Okay.

- We're gonna switch it his way, because what this does, when you have it on with the skirt, it gives you a much more linear look.

So now she's got fullness with the skirt and fullness through the body, and I just think it looks really nice.

So can we show real quick how to steal that wrap?

- Sure can.

- All right, so what we did is, we cut two pieces of fabric.

That's all it is.

So those pieces of fabric are 32 inches long and they're only 20 inches wide.

And if you notice where it's connected is front and back, which is right in the center.

We connected it, and those two parts are 14 to 15 inches apart.

Then skip five inches and connect it again.

Skip five inches, and connect it again.

And what that does is, when you wear it in the front like this, it gives you little peekaboos.

But when you twist it to the side, and she's got a long-sleeve shirt on right now, but when you do it like with a little tank, the little shoulders peek out and the little arms peek out and it just looks really, really pretty.

And then what I did, thank you Jeannie, really appreciate it.

Then what I did is, I took a fabric.

And with this particular fabric, this has just really, really beautiful edging on it.

So the fun thing about making this wrap is, we can really show off the edges of any fabric, called the salvage, because we can put it down and make that part go right across the neck, or if we shift it, it'll go right up and down the front.

So it's just a great way to show off so many different fabrics, and just simply beautiful.

So it's not like you have to do really complex things.

I wanna go to the sewing machine because I wanna show you one more thing.

On this cardigan back here, and remember, this was, this is not a knit, this is a woven, this is a cardigan that is a woven cardigan, but it's got a little bit of leather trim.

Oh my goodness, love that leather trim.

So I'm gonna show you how we do this leather trim because it's quick and easy and you can do it.

And I think that little bit of leather trim, and again, it doesn't matter if it's leather or a faux leather, it just really, really looks rich.

What you're gonna do, and again, remember that I'm using a contrasting thread.

I'm going to fold it, but not in half.

I'm going to fold it to where it's not quite in half so that when I lap this, the back is caught.

And I'm just gonna stitch a little bit here for you so you can see what I'm talking about because you'll get it.

I'm just gonna lay it in there, just lap a little bit, right over there.

And stitch it right down.

When you're stitching, just use your regular needle, regular foot.

(machine whirring) All right, and then once you've stitched it, I'm gonna turn it to the back and you can see that because it's leather, I can just trim it right next to my stitching.

And actually, it looks like you've stitched perfectly on both the front and the back, but the secret is, guess what, you didn't stitch perfectly on the front and the back.

You actually just could fix it on the back.

So it just makes it so easy to do and again, I love that leather trim.

Use your Teflon foot whenever you're using leather because it really makes, as you're going under the machine, it makes it slide a little bit better.

So a regular needle will work, but do use a Teflon foot.

And then don't use such a small stitch.

You wanna lengthen your stitch because the leather doesn't need to be penetrated as often as you think.

So think we're done?

Not even close.

Next time it gets even better as we make the most of all nine pieces.

Join us here on Fit 2 Stitch.

♪ ♪ - [Man] Fit 2 Stich is made possible by Vogue Fabrics, Colorado Fabrics, Quality Sew and Vac, Sew Town, Tulsa, Oklahoma and Fort Smith, Arkansas, Kai Scissors, Sew Steady, Bennos Buttons, All Brands, Cynthia's Fine Fabrics, and Clutch Nails.

To order a four-DVD set of Fit 2 Stich series seven, please visit our website at fit2stitch.com.