I would like to talk about a couple issues that have popped up with 1903 Trumpet Skirt – TVE21 skirt pattern. One which is entirely my fault, and the other is one which I have seen pop up a few times when alterations to this pattern go wrong.
First up, the problem of….. What the heck to I do with the Placket Facing piece? I can’t find it mentioned in the instructions anywhere, what did I miss? Well, you didn’t miss anything. This pattern piece should not be on this pattern. The long story is that I was mulling over two different means of finishing this skirt; one way was with the lining skirt attached to the skirt proper, and the other way was to have a separate lining. In the end, I went with the attached lining, in which case, you do not need the facing piece for the placket. If you choose to make the lining skirt up as a separate petticoat, then you will need the placket facing. I should have deleted the extra piece, but left it on there. I am very sorry for the confusion this has caused so many people. I really need to delete that piece.
Ok, so now to the fun part. On this pattern, I have two back options, a pleated short back, or a long habit (plain) back. Usually, when I give options like this, I like the cover the bases and draw things so it will all mix-n-match with all the option combinations.
Unfortunately, in this case, the pattern ran off the edge of the paper, so I couldn’t do that, and instead of offering pleated back in long or short, I just have the short version. And this has lead to people asking, “can I combine the two and make the long pleated back?” I answer with a simple yes, and leave it at that, thinking what could possibly go wrong? And then I saw the results, and smacked my head on the wall. I never even saw it coming.
At right, is the pattern piece I am talking about, and you can see the two options as drawn. The blue lines are the short pleated back, and the orange line is the long habit back.
This is all my fault, of course. I didn’t clarify, and I should have. The next diagram at the right, with the green lines, shows how to properly lengthen the pleated back to the longer length. Start by extending the first pleat line to the longer length line. Then from that point, run the new hem lines parallel to the original hem line.
Oddly enough, no one has ever asked about making the habit back in the short length. But just in case, here is how to do it. Starting with the short hemline at the first pleat line, continue with a line parallel to the long hemline until you get to the Habit back line.
I think those are all the quirks in this pattern. Hopefully, this will help people get through the pattern without tearing their hair out over either of these problems.