My family has a pretty distinctive approach to new hobbies. It goes like this:

1. Have a big revelation: I must conquer this new skill! I’M SO EXCITED!

2. Obsess, obsess, obsess

3. Buy all the various accoutrements that appear essential to mastering the skill, even though you have yet to establish if any of them are really needed

4. Sit on the floor in the middle of your living room thinking “what IS this stuff?”

Yeah, so that happened with me and sewing. The good news is, the fad kept and I am still obsessed! So that’s some progress. However, I did still go through the early stages, as evidenced by my purchase of a gorgeous and expensive piece of Thakoon silk within about 3 hours of buying a sewing machine. I got it from the incomparable Emma One Sock, which is run by a woman who goes around factories buying the ends of rolls of fabric from famous designers – think Marc Jacobs, Alexander Wang et al.  Given how hard it is to get good quality and unusual fabric, Emma One Sock is a total godsend.

However, the second this silk arrived in the post, in 2010, I knew immediately that my skills did not match this fabric. Even remotely.

So how exciting is it that they finally do?!

Yeah, I know!

In a pique of newly found confidence, I decided to make a gathered maxi skirt  following this  great Anthropologie rip-off tutorial. Blinded by optimism, I also decided to line it with purple chiffon, which I’ve never sewed with before. 

And the great news is, it worked, more or less:

I was pleased with the interfaced 5-layered waistband, though the waistband gathering isn’t perfect… Next time, I’m going to follow the Colette tutorial and use three lines of basting stitches to get smaller and more even gathers.