Pleated Maxi Skirt!!!

So I am back at it again! Another D.Y.O (Do Your Own) tutorial. First off I would like to thank everyone that took the time to look at my last post, I hope you enjoyed it. My new project was not the easiest but you can still do it, no patterns are required to make this pleated maxi skirt. The materials I used are based off my size and height. I am a size 6-8 at 5'1 1/2. I bought 1 3/8 yrds of the chiffon and 5/8 yrd of the jersey knit, used a yard of elastic, a sewing machine , iron and cloth cover. I had a little too much of the chiffon but I'd rather have too much than too little. To get the length of  the skirt just measure the length from you waist to your feet. To get the width you want to take your waist size or measurement and you can double that. **I'm still working on doing these tutorials so sorry if a few tips are missing, this project was long so I tried to make it brief.
                                                                                 
                                                                             Enjoy!!!

1. First step once you have all your materials is to pleat your chiffon fabric. The pleat size is up to you. I chose to do about 1 1/2 pleat. You are going to iron the pleats in and go in a accordion style folding. (I used to hair clamps to hold them in place when folding.)

2. Using the hair clamps really helped me when folding to fabric to pleat the fabric. Also when pleating/ ironing the chiffon you do want to use a cover cloth when ironing the pleats that way you don't burn the fabric.

3. At this point I have finished pleating my chiffon. I am now making the mini skirt that goes under the chiffon out of jersey knit. I used an existing skirt to figure out the skirt size it wanted.

4. Once I had the desired size and length of the mini skirt I went ahead and hemmed the bottom of the shirt. I made a 1 1/2 inch hem.

5. & 6. Once I had my hem measured out went ahead an pinned it so I could sew it next.

7. I sewed the hem down.

8. Once the hem was sewn down I sewed the sides of the skirt together. 

9. I cut a section of the extra jersey knit to in the waist band.

10. I put the cut piece of jersey knit with my pleated chiffon to make the opening for the elastic to go in. I used to elastic to measure out how much width I would need.

11. I then sewed it down, still using the elastic band as reference. I left extra material along the seam so I could sew the mini skirt to.

12. Once my band was sewn together, I took my elastic and used a safety pin to feed it through the band.

13. I am feeding the elastic by feeding the safety pin through. ( pinned the other end of the elastic to to the opening.)

14. I have fed  the elastic all the way to the end.

15. Then I took both ends of the elastic to sew together.

16. I took the mini skirt and pinned it to the extra fabric below the band and sewed it together.

17. I did a rolled hem on the edges of the skirt so they didn't fray.

** Instead of closing the skirt I left it open to create a thigh high slit by over lapping the fabric when sewing the waist band which can be seen in the pictures below. Enjoy!!!

I also have another little side project going on. I have started making glass bead bracelets!!! I want to eventually make other pieces like necklaces and earrings too but I thought I'd start with bracelets. I have been  receiving good feed back about them. I have sold a few of them, they're only going for $5 right now. As you can see they look great when you stack them so you may want more than one. You can purchase them from me or go to my Etsy shop www.etsy.com/shop/Probs3125

Enjoy!!!

 

Feel free to subscribe to my blog, leave a comment or you can email me at Ashlea.symone@gmail.com .

Printed Shorts Cuff D.Y.O (Do Your Own)

The shorts from Pinterest

                                                                                                                                       

This is one of my first D.I.Y. postings so bare with me I'm new to this. I have posted the steps I took to make shorts along with some pictures of the completed shorts. I got the idea to add the print to the shorts from Pinterest. I have made jean shorts before from old pairs of jeans so I figured why not go the extra step and spice them up.

1. Cut the jeans into a good short length you would prefer. I left  few inches on mine because I knew I wanted to cuff them.

 2. I cut out my printed fabric... 4 inches wide and 22 inches long making sure it fit all the around the jean and space to give.

  3.I took the fabric and pinned it to the shorts making sure the the wrong sides were pinned together. ( the printed side should be facing you)

4. After pinning the fabric down I used my machine and sewed down the fabric along the side seams to hold the jeans and fabrics together.

5. This next step may be a little tricky. Once the fabric is sewn to the shorts, I turned the shorts back inside and I put them on so that way I can roll them to the perfect cuff. Then when I had my desired cuff, I sewed the cuff down making a single stitch on top of the cuff to hold it in place.

***BONUS- If you have extra fabric left over you can add it to the pocket if you want! 

If there are any comments or questions feel free to leave them. Hopefully my directions weren't too hard to follow. I will be doing more D.I.Y. or as I like to call them Do Your Own projects as well so be on the look out!! Enjoy!!

3 dates in 1 week

3 dates in 1 week by ashlea-symone-m featuring river island

* Each item is priced under $50. Three different looks and can be paired with the same accessories. Also a great way to incorporate prints into your style. Enjoy!!!

Tribal Top & Maxi

Tribal Top & Maxi by ashlea-symone-m featuring cotton t shirts

Week 8... Shoe Obession!!!

Week 8! Wow I can't believe it's already been 8 weeks. Time sure does fly by when you're having fun and working. Things at work have been going great. I got the chance to style one of the coming soon shots ( it's the picture that put up letting you know that a new sale is coming in a few days). In between going to work everyday I still manage to go on random fun little adventures. After work one day I made it my mission to find Mood Fabrics. 

Mood Fabrics!!! & Stitch

Just my luck it was a few blocks away from my  internship. I went in there and fell in love with so many fabrics and my mind went crazy with design ideas. I even met the stores dog named Swatch. By the way I plan on starting my own little shop on Etsy, so look out for some garments this summer. 

One of my favorite adventures so far was my trip the the Museum at FIT to see their Shoe Obsession Exhibit." The exhibit is an intimate extension of the body , shoes convey a wealth of information about an individual's sexuality, social status, and aesthetic sensibility, gender and power."  The exhibit features over 150 examples ranging from various designers like Tom Ford, Guiseppe Zanotti, Manolo Blahnik, Azzedine Alaia, and Christian Louboutin to name a few. The various styles of shoes highlight the new concepts, constructions, materials of the twenty-first century. The shoes were amazing but unfortunately I couldn't get any pictures inside the exhibit. 

I also got to see a mini showcase called "The Master and His Muse". It is a showcase of Rosario Rizzo gorgeous gowns he made. They also featured some of his personal letters between him and his wife Rose, who is said to have been his muse to all his beautiful creations. Between the 1960's - 1980's his gowns were on the red carpets and at galas all over. 

That's all for now, check for another post in a few weeks!!

Don't forget to subscribe to Sassonthego !!

Nice Spring Day

Nice Spring Day by ashlea-symone-m featuring essie

Week 4... NYC Fashion Week

       So it's been a few weeks since my last post, so now it's time to play catch up. I have officially been in New York for a month now and sooo much has happened already. I still currently intern at Ideeli. We had an interns breakfast where we got to meet the president of Ideeli Bob Rosenblatt. He told us how he came up in his career, encouraged us to take risks, and don't be afraid of change and  success. I did manage to snag a weekend to go with my friend and a few others to Atlantic City. We had a blast and did a little shopping. The boardwalk and beach is even beautiful covered in snow.

       Then the next weekend came blizzard Nemo. Being in a blizzard is no fun first off, inches of snow, ice and a few power outages. Thank God we made it through, even the blizzard couldn't shut down Fashion Week though.  :)

       This year I was lucky enough to get into a volunteer program and participate in the New York Mercedes Benz Fashion Week. It was an amazing experience.   I mostly helped with set up and breakdown for most of the shows I worked on. I even got a chance to see the shows that I worked on. There were many shows going on this week. I got the chance to work on Alon Livne, Marc by Marc Jacobs, Nanette Lapore and Milly by Michelle Smith shows. All of the designers collections were great. They all had dark blues, plaids,reds, plums and purples. Nanette and Milly's lines both had metallics infused in them, from the shoes to the bags and clothes.  I can't really go into details about everything that I experienced but I did manage to get pics from other sources.

  

Alon Livne- designer pictured with some pieces from his Fall/ Winter 2013 Collection
image: www.what-now.net

Marc by Marc Jacobs
image: www.thesartorialist.com

Nanette Lepore
image: www.newstimes.com

Milly by Michelle Smith
image: www.fabsugar.com

Thats all for now!! Maybe my next post will be a trends forecast mixed with a little Polyvore. So until next time and new adventures. Don't be afraid to take risks and wanting to be successful. Be eager to learn and ready to teach.