Skirt sloper

[Syrinx]

Thought I'd take advantage of the free craftsy courses for Suzy Furrer's sloper classes.

Started with skirt as figured the easiest.

Watched course, got my paper out, drew it all. Cut it out. Went to do the "essential" trueing and I'm having issues.

My very top waist corners don't match, the low hip area and traight to hem match, and the low hip to waist don't match, but half on back and half on front.

I'm not sure if this is because I'm a weird shape as my increase from high to low hip is 4" without ease and 4 1/2" with ease. I've triple checked my measurements everywhere and they are all correct.

Do I make up a toile with the mismatch? I'm unsure where it could have gone wrong.

Here is a pic of them laid out on my cutting mat - you can see the weirdness between the high and low hip and the waist mismatch. Any ideas?

[Syrinx]

Made it up in calico. Medium weight so thought it would be good option.

Fits lovely around the waist and high hip but I can't work out the issus at the low hip. Probably due to the weird mismatch previously mentioned.

So the "fit" is fine, there's just a bubble of fabric at the low hip, it's only an inch, maybe two long and above and below it the fit is fine, excellent actually, particularly the waist to high hip which I always have to faff with on commercial patterns.

I imagined I'd have issues with the curve from high hip to the low hip, but that itslef seems alright, it's the movement from the low hip area to the straight side seam. To my darksider brain I can't work out the 3 d ness. It's a perennial issue I have with nearly all patterns I have involving a fitted skirt. I don't know if I should take fabric out, but then I lose ease and I don't think that 1 1/2" ease over the bum is overly generous so I'd rather not. Or perhaps I need to grade my curve lower and hit a point on the side seam below the low hip point?

I've drawn out another, neater, sloper but have left that part as yet undrawn. It's neat enough that I'll wait for help, and the muslin was good enough that aain, I think I just need help and outside eyes here. Annoyingly my dress form is still an inch shy on the hips to match me so I can't use that for fit, though I have got a pic for you all on it.


So you can see the space I need to make the curve fit from high to low hip.


Sat on the form - good fit to waist and high hip


Can see the bubbley bit here on the side. Like I said, my form is a good inch short of being my measurements there so not the most helpful picture but I couldn't get a good one on me!

[eclectic]

Hi @Syrinx , I draft the skirt block a little differently as in I don't use the high hip measure, if I were drafting this for a client I would certaintly use the high hip but I would transfer this into the darts so that I dont get an awkward side seam. Usually I would curve the side seam out so that when it hits the hip/straight seam it has then blended or curved into that area and doesnt cause the 'bubble' you are getting... by your picture its quite a V so that is perhaps why its happening

[Syrinx]

So a longer wider dart? Then curve from waist to lh?
Sorry it's all a bit mushed in my brain after a whole afternoon of staring at it!

I figured this would be a good block to use as I know the difference between my waist/hh/lh is a fair amount (less at the minute as there's an extra couple of inches on the waist!). Damnable wide hips.
I was just so thrilled at the waist to hh fit I didn't think about fixing it there.

[Ohsewsimple]

As @eclectic says, usually when there is a fairly big difference between hips and waist it is best  to take the excess at the waist in darts rather than sloping the side seam in.  You can use more than one dart.  More darts can be better than bigger darts.  Put them where needed. 
The side seams are generally slightly curved from the waist to the hip to give a nice shape. 

This also applies to dresses where the hips and bust are different sizes.  Taking the extra in with darts prevents drag lines from forming. 

[Syrinx]

Now you say it it makes sense. Just means a bunch more maths for me!
I really like the single dart look so I'll see if I can make it work or stick another in.

More taken in on waist makes the waist pattern wider and side seam shallower and thus easier to curve right? (half a bottle of rosé down at this point

[BrendaP]

More taken in on waist makes the waist pattern wider and side seam shallower and thus easier to curve right?

Yes. 

In effect the sloping side seams at the sides make a pair of large darts.  Take some of that dart out and transfer it to darts above your hip bones (front) and buttocks (back).  Also smooth out the side seams.

[Manuela]

@Syrinx, just my 0.02 cents, I would:
- move the front dart toward the side seam, it looks best (and has the most use) when it sits on the hip bone
- keep the front dart at max.10cm length and don’t make it deeper than 2-2.5cm (except if you have a fuller belly)
- if there is a a notable waist to hip ratio, do 2 darts (on each side) at the back - the one nearest the CB should be longer and deeper than the one closer to the side seam

[Syrinx]

So I've dug out my french curve (instead of my flexible) and laid it over byt it's still giving me that reasonable sharp join at the straight down part below lh. The hh measurement is 4.5" below the waist, so if I added in a dart to give more hh width it would be a very long dart which I think is probably not a great idea.

Looking at the whole add in a dart thing - I could do and it would make the waist part move further out over the hh, but I'm not seeing how it will help with the sharp angle from hh to lh unless I'm being very very stupid (quite the possibility!). My very non pattern design brain is saying why not just take the end of the curve down past the lh. But I think that may lose me some ease right?

Sudden idea - could I do one of those weird double ended darts over the hip, under the waist dart so it sits over the hh meausrement - would give more width to the hh measurement and placement wise could just look like a really long dart.


This problem of waist to hh to lh ratio might be the base of all my fitted skirt problems! At least now I have a reason haha

[Morgan]

The drafting instructions are just a starting template and fir the demo lesson and text book  SF uses the industry standard measurements a starting point  for the depth if the high and low hip. 
Measurements and shape are different things and on a real person the low or full hip lands at different levels.  Also depending on how much tum it bum a person has, the distribution of shaping is different   
 
Depending on your shape, you can choose how many and where the darts thexdarts are placed for your shape.
I keep the side seam shape similar for both front and back and with with as little curve as I can get  away with.  The fabric suppression usually ends up with at least one dart at the front (sometimes 2 narrow ones) and usyslly two narrow darts on the back.  Two narrow darts tend to work better for me than a single wide dart, especially as I'm quite flat at the back.   Also if there is a cb seam I like to contour that and lose one of the darts. 
I like to keep the side seam on front and back as similar as I can if there is a side zip fastening.  Otherwise, it's quite common to have slightly more curve on one of the front or back edges above the low hip level.