How do i figure out how much fabric I need to use if i want to sew in pleats?

Question

im sewing a skirt from scratch and i want to add pleats or gathers at the hem....my hip measurement is 92 cm....could anyone please help me?....any helpful answers will be greatly appreciated. Thank You

Answer 1

A lot does depend on the kind of pleats, and how many or deep you want them to be.

I think I have made skirts where the fabric width at the hip was 1.1 times the hip measurements, and where it was 2.5 times the hip.

For a beginner it is a good idea to buy/get a pattern of the kind of skirt made for the kind of fabric you prefer.
Or you can measure a ready made skirt that fit and suits you and work from there. A little different to suit the fabric you have or buy is good, but try to keep it the same general weight of fabric as the skirt you have as sample.

If you have fabric you want to use, you can try to pin pleats and fit it on.
Heavy fabrics need deep pleats, with thin fabrics you can use many smaller pleats.

Answer 2

You need to figure out how much fullness you want at the hem -- typically you'd use 1.5x as much fabric as the measurement, but there are a lot of confounding factors -- couture garments might be *extremely full*, but the fabric is usually carefully controlled -- e.g.: http://www.fashion-incubator.com/mt/archives/pattern_puzzle_collar.html

When working with pleats, you need to think about the depth of the pleat required. In solids and many prints, you can pretty much do what you want, but when working with stripes or plaids,
you might want to pleat a particular color out of the stripe, or "pleat to the sett" --- e.g.: http://giftshop.scottishtartans.org/kiltpage.html or the red and white skirt here: http://www.fiftiesweb.com/fashion/fashion-ws.htm

As someone else mentioned, you need deeper pleats on heavier fabrics than you do on lighter fabrics, and you need less fullness in stiff fabrics than on drapier ones.

Pleats require 2x the depth of the pleat+1x exposed fabric.

If this sort of design elements intrigue you, borrow a copy of Collette Wolff's Art of Manipulating Fabric -- it's a masterful study in surface texture, pleating, gathering, smocking, and many other things that can be developed by working with fabric.
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Manipulating-Fabric-Colette-Wolff/dp/0801984963

Answer 3

Its math, you figure out how much fabric to go around, then figure out how far out you want the pleat to go out and back in. multiply the pleat length by the number of pleats you want in it and add that to the original length.