In the first course of the Fair Fit Method, you will learn the foundational skills used to make all Fair Fit garments. In Learn and Make the Fair Fit Skirt, you will learn beginner draping skills and how to analyze your body shape, size, and proportion to pad out your dress form to create an accurate fit. This aspect of the course will help you learn how to utilize a form better, and benefit your sewing practice and how you make to all garments moving forward.

The Fair Fit Method Sewing + Design- A Look Inside Learn and Make the Fair Fit Skirt

We will also dig deep into skirt fit and the most common fit issues. In our first project, you will learn how to determine your own unique body length, circumference, and foundational principles of proportion that will help you create a flattering custom skirt.

This course will give you a foundation in draping, pattern fit, body proportion for your lower half, as well as the core principles as to how Fair Fit garments are made. It is the prerequisite to Learn and Make the Fair Fit Dress, and sets up your skills for all upcoming Fair Fit Method courses and pattern variations.

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This class is approximately 8 WEEKS - CONCEPTS COVERED:

I say approximately because all of my courses can also be self paced and you can have the course forever so you can go at your own speed.

Understanding the Fair Fit Pattern
Choosing Your Skirt Design - Pencil, A Line, or Pleated
Learn the Fair Fit Raw Finish Sewing Method for your First Skirt
Understanding Skirt Fit
Introduction to Draping for the Lower Half of Your Body
How to Measure Your Body For Draping and Pad Your Mannequin for your Lower Half
Understanding the Shape, Proportion, and Ratios of your Hips and Waist.
Pattern Adjustments and Alterations for the Skirt
Learn the Fair Fit Clean Finish Sewing Method for your Second Skirt

Skirt Fit Specifics

The reason why it's important to learn the bottom half of your body first, before learning the top half, is that the same proportions you will learn with the skirt will apply to the dress. I see students struggle with cutting out and assembling a dress in the correct size because a lot the time their lower half is a totally different size and fit than the top half.

Separating the two regions of the body and focusing on them one saves you from an overwhelm of information, and the lessons learned will apply to all garments you make moving forward. Learning your natural waist and its relationship to the placement of the skirt band is very important as this will help you fit your future dresses and change the proportions on other commercial patterns. Depending on the design of the pattern, it can hard to customize where your waist should be. That is what leads to skirts that twist and turn when you wear them.

The Fair Fit Method - A Look Inside Learn and Make the Fair Fit Skirt

By focusing on your specific body proportions for your torso, waist, and hips, you will learn a more effective and comfortable placement for the skirt band and shape of skirt you are draping.

All of your Fair Fit garments will be draped. After the pattern is finalized, you will move onto your second skirt, choosing either another pattern variation or implementing the sewing methods taught in the course. Learn and Make the Fair Fit Skirt gives you an introduction and ability to practice beginner draping skills, before we move on to more intermediate and advanced draping in Learn and Make the Fair Fit Dress.

Customizations in the Sewing

Fair Fit Pencil Skirt in Clean finish By Lori Stieb

Sewing is a huge area of focus in all Fair Fit Method courses, and you will be learning very diverse methods of sewing that will build upon each other. Learn and Make the Fair Fit Skirt is a perfect opportunity to focus on the two most essential sewing techniques used in the Fair Fit Method. Since a skirt is less involved to make than a dress, this is the perfect time to focus on sewing and the core methods before moving on to more advanced pattern variations and sewing techniques.

In this course, you will learn the two fundamental sewing methods used in Fair Fit garments, raw finish and clean finish. For our first garments, you will learn the raw finish method, as it allows you to customize the draping and the pattern without sacrificing the first garment. For your second skirt, you can use the Fair Fit clean finish method after you finalize the fit of your skirt.

Raw Finish

The raw finish method is used to help you create a working muslin to customize the fit, proportion, and the pattern. While you are using this first garment sewn in this method to learn, you also get to keep and wear the muslin, as opposed to a garment you have to just toss out.

I personally love the raw finish method and am seeing it a lot in contemporary ready to wear. I know it pushes the comfort zone of sewists used to a more refined approach, but students and testers who have taken advantage of this method to explore and experiment by working with unconventional materials or mixing up their fabrics, like our tester Brooke and her Ikea dress. The raw finish method helps you have a light touch with your expectations for your first garment since its already raw, there is less of a tendency to over analyze and perfect.

Clean Finish

The clean finish method is a mixture of sewing, turning, and pressing. The clean sewing method will definitely enhance your material handling skills and coordination because you will learn how to force the fabric to the seams in order to get a clean finish result.

It's a little bit more time consuming, but the final result is very beautiful and offers the opportunity to find ways of featuring the contrast fabric in interesting fashions.

Fair Fit Pencil Skirt

The course will teach you how to drape and shape a pencil skirt- which I've found can honestly be a hard skirt to fit. With this part of the pattern variation, you will see how to customize the skirt band and backside in ways that you just can't with a commercial pattern.

The alterations learned will help you down the road with future pencil skirt projects, should this become your preferred skirt style line.

Fair Fit Aline Skirt

The A line skirt is my favorite skirt to make as it is pretty much universally flattering and the easiest to drape and fit. With this skirt, you will learn how to drape and smooth the lines, customizing the fullness of the skirt as it relates to your desired design as well as your unique proportions.

This skirt is one of the best to play with lengths as well, because you may find you want to change the height of your waist band, or the length of your skirt, and later down the line add more panels and bands to create more customization.

Fair Fit Pleated Skirt

After you make a pencil or an A line skirt, you will have the chance in this course to make the pleated version by customizing the A Line skirt pattern and learning how to drape pleats into your skirt and add them to your band.

Fair Fit Circle Skirt and Bands

Later down the road in June, we will do another skirt focused class where you will get the Fair Fit Circle Skirt and Band Patterns and learn how to do more sewing customizations with this pattern set to add to your dresses and skirts.

If you are interested in taking courses in the Fair Fit Method, the next opportunity to enroll begins soon. You can visit https://www.fairfitmethod.com/ to learn more and read all about the program and full curriculum. If you want to know right away when enrollment opens again, sign up below and you will receive email updates, articles, and notifications when registration begins.

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