Another Princess Skirt

Hello, you may remember my late Victorian gingham project inspired by this photo, which I seem to have abandoned. I made the blouse and the skirt. I must admit the skirt was a failure. I managed to get some more of the same linen fabric for a new skirt. Then I experimented with a princess skirt, which again didn't quite turn out as I had hoped it would. However, I felt tempted to give it another go using the gingham fabric. I got really excited when I found this princess skirt pattern in an 1804 drafting book because it had pleats in the back. I didn't use the pattern, only the idea to adjust my existing princess skirt pattern. I bought 2 meters of fabric, plus I had 1 meter left from the first project. At first I wanted to use this white striped cotton sateen for the lining. Then I found this cotton and although later I realised I hated it, I decided to use it. This time I interfaced the whole skirt with cotton canvas. I pre-washed everything and one of the canvases I was considering creased terribly in the wash so it was out of the question. Another came out of the washing alright, but stretched out of shape during ironing. I also burnt it. The third was the winner. It hardly creased and it ironed easily and kept its shape perfectly. You're asking me why I didn't use tarlatan, well I wanted to be able to often wash my skirt. I cut the edge of the two pieces of the main fabric clean and joined them at first by basting them, then machine sewing them together. I couldn't sew in a straight line, but no one will see it and you can't tell where the two fabrics were joined. At first I drew all the pattern pieces onto the canvas. This is the center back panel with extra fabric for the pleats. I had a difficult job because I only had 2.6 meters of fabric so I had a hard time fitting everything on it. I used the canvas pieces as a pattern to cut out everything from the lining and main fabric as well. This all took me 6 hours. It was a very heavy heap of unassembled skirt, I was rather worried about that. Fortunately, when sewn and worn, the skirt does not have much weight as it's better distributed. The waistline wasn't marked on my original pattern and at first I misplaced it, but when I was cutting the gingham fabric I idealized the mistake so cut it an inch higher. For some people it might be obvious, but for us clumsier ones it's important to point out that you are supposed to hide where you pieced the panel. You are going to treat the three layers as one, so you need to secure them. At first I basted the interfacing and lining together along the edges. Then I added the third layer to main fabric. Basting took me about 10 hours. I didn't use padstitching because I suffer from constant back pain anyway. Why add to the discomfort? I think the center back panels should be padstitched though, so the pleats look pristine. I marked with colored threads where to match the seams, still I often got confused which was the next panel to join. I had to draw a guiding line because it's a bit difficult to keep the right distance from the edge with an antique machine. I used a machine again because hand sewing 3 thick layers kills the joints in your hand. And 7 gauze is my limit, here I had 9. I pressed the seams. The center pleats started to make sense. The drafting book doesn't offer any help in how to actually sew the skirt. I sewed all the panels together except the front panel. I also left a gap for a side placket. I turned and basted the seam allowances but did not file them yet because I was lazy. Please accept my choice of word. I basted the seam of the placket to temporarily close the gap. I attached white twill tape in the waist area. It helped to keep the skirt on myself while I was trying to fit the front panel. I'd made a major mistake. You remember last time my first mock-up turned out funny. I had already cut the front panel from the canvas and lining when I realized I used the pattern of the first mock-up. I had no choice but to cut the main fabric as well and hoped I would be able to come up with a solution later. I was quite satisfied. By the way, this time I didn't bother about matching the text because the weave of the fabric was uneven and this pattern strained my eyes. I don't think the result's that bad. I pinned myself into the skirt. Then I opened the placket again. I needed a longer placket so I unpicked quite a few stitches in the seam. The point of pinning myself into the skirt actually was to determine how long the placket should be. I cut two strips that were longer than the gap for the placket. One needed to be less wide, I trimmed it later. I tend to use the selvedge edge. The wider strip goes on the left hand side of the placket, right sides together. I folded it in half. I stitched down the edge on the wrong side of the skirt. The selvedge looks messy but at least you don't have to turn the edge so the seam will be less bulky. The narrower strip goes on the right hand side of the placket. I trimmed the allowance of the strip very short. I turned the whole strip to the wrong side and stitched the edge down. I added hooks and bars. I didn't have enough of them but a new order might arrive any day. Now that I had a proper placket I could fit the front panel properly. I mean I did what I could but remember I hadn't cut the right pattern. This is how far I've got. I hope I can pull myself together and finish the skirt in a week.