Finished Object - Spinning Apron

I feel that calling this a spinning apron makes me seem like a saxon maid who is sat outside her mud hut watching the chickens and spinning away. That may be completely historically inaccurate, and I apologise, but calling this anything other than a spinning apron would just be lying.

For some time now I have had a small amount of fabric sat in a box waiting to be sewn into this apron. I didn't know what sort of apron or what style of apron it was going to be. I just knew I wanted something to keep the fibre from sticking to my jeans when I was spinning.

In the past few weeks I've been missing my sewing, and it was only when I finally bought myself an iron that I felt able to get back to it. I find an iron so so helpful it was a little odd to even try anything without it. While scrolling through youtube videos, I found one of Juliet Uzor's videos on how to make a circle skirt apron and I thought that would do. I'm not sure how I feel about it at the moment, I'm not really one for skirts, never been able to feel comfortable in them, but if I didn't get this sewn I don't think it would have got made at all. So I went for it.

Juliet has a free pattern for the apron on her website Sew So Natural, you can gain access to her resource library if you sign up to her newsletter. The library gives a printable PDF pattern. My only problem was that I don't have a printer, and I wanted to make the pattern there and then. So I got my maths head on. I know that I wanted half of a circle skirt, which as the name suggests is just a circle. Good old Pi came out to play. Let me run you through a quick drafting method for making your own.

First of all you want to take the measurement of your waist, or where ever the waistband of the skirt is going to sit, that could be around your hips if you want to. This measurement will become the circumference of inner circle on your pattern.

We now need to find the diameter of that circle, we will call the diameter "a" (as on the diagram). To find "a" we use the equation: diameter = circumference ÷ Pi. If my waist measurement was 74cm then I would calculate: 74 ÷ 𝝿 = 23.55 (Nerd alert, I do everything to two decimal places/three significant figures, you don't have to, round up to the nearest whole number to make it easy!) I used a scientific calculator because I have one, but if you don't then you can use the approximate figure of 3.14, you don't have to be super accurate.

So brilliant, we have measurement "a" now measurement "b" will be the length of the apron. This one is down to personal preference, I held a tape measure at the point I wanted the apron to sit and then measured down the length I wanted it to be. You will want to consider the amount of fabric you have and how the pattern will fit on to that fabric too. I decided that my length was going to be 45cm, which was really as long as I could possibly get out of the fabric and don't forget to add a little bit for hemming at the top and bottom.

The piece of fabric you will cut will be half of the circle. Just like the top part of the circle above the green line on the diagram. I got out the fabric and folded it in half to trace out the measurements for the pattern. Starting at the corner on the fold, I measured down the radius of inner circle along the edge with the fold. The radius being half of value "a" that we worked out earlier, then on the other side coming from that same corner I marked out the radius again. Then from that corner I marked the same distance out in an arc around that corner. This then marks the inner circle on the fabric.

From that first arc you can then measure down the length you want the apron to be including seam allowances for the top and bottom hems. Mark out this distance at regular intervals along this arc to make another much bigger arc further down your fabric, and you'll see the general shape of the apron start to take place.

Now I didn't really have enough fabric for this project, and I am actually making it out of an old blind that I found in a charity shop. So I decided to do a little bit of historical piecing and cut another couple of small pieces to stitch onto the sides to make the full skirt, else it would either been very short, or a really odd shape. I think it worked well overall though, and it being only something to keep the fibre off my legs while spinning, it really did not have to be the most perfect thing. I'm loving all of its imperfections and perfect functionality.

The waist ties that keep the apron on are the next thing to tackle. I'm pretty sure I bodged these and I'm not entirely sure how to explain how I did them, but I'll give it a go. The most easy thing to do here is to just hem all the edges of the apron and sew some ribbons to the edges next to the waist line and go from there. (I'll definitely do that next time) But I tried to make some ties with the fabric I had leftover from making the skirt.

 I used as much length as I could, which wasn't quite long enough, and cut them into about 4" wide strips. I turned the strips right sides together and sewed along one of the short sides. The other short side I placed right sides together over the waist of the apron, with the short side lined up with the edge of the apron. Each side of the strip was either side of the apron fabric. I then sewed along that short edge attaching the strap to the apron. That was the most complicated bit, and there probably is a much better way of doing it that maybe one day I'll discover. So after all that strap wrestling, I pulled the strap right side out and gave it a press, turning under the bottom raw edge and going along it with a bit of top stitching to hold it all inside. Then simply repeat with the other side... :P

Next time I really am just going to use twill tape or something similar as the straps, as these were so much effort and to be perfectly honest are not really that great. The apron has been put to good use though and I am happy that I've finally got around to making it. More spinning and less cleaning of my clothes from now on! ;)