DIY: Tank Dress with Pockets!

Posted on | May 11, 2010 | 20 Comments

At long last, I present a tutorial for the tank dress I made a few weeks ago before the end of the semester blindsided me. I’ve been seeing these tank+patterned skirt all over the place lately, but frequently they were too short or too short-waisted for my particular proportions. After some googling, and studying the really excellent skirt tutorial and t-shirt dress tutorial at Ruffles and Stuff and the skirt with pockets tutorial at Freshly Picked, I decided that even my fairly rudimentary sewing skills could handle this project.

And since I celebrated my height yesterday for Dress Your Best week, it seems appropriate to post a sewing project prompted by my need for a longer-than-in-stores dress.

Supplies:

a tank top
2 yards or so of patterned fabric
scraps of a coordinating fabric for pockets
matching thread
disappearing fabric pen or chalk

Steps:

1. Measurements. Take your measurements for the skirt portion. Measure your natural waist. Stand in front of the mirror and measure your desired length. To make our math easy, let’s say that my waist is 30 inches and my desired length is 22 inches, plus 1 inch for seam allowances and hemming. (Okay, actually it should be more like 1.5 inches, but I was willing to sacrifice a quarter inch.)
2. Then, put on the tank top you’ll be using. Standing in front of the mirror, use a disappearing fabric pen to mark the smallest part of your waist or wherever you want your skirt to begin.

3. Measure and cut your patterned fabric. You’ll need two identical pieces 30 inches x 23 inches.

4. Pocket time! Freshly Picked has a handy pocket pattern, or you can simply fold a piece of fabric in half and draw around your hand, leaving about a half inch allowance all the way around.

Pin and cut out a pair. You’ll need four total pocket pieces.

5. Take your pieces of skirt fabric (30×23″), measure three inches from the top edge, and pin a pocket piece to each side, right sides together.

6. Use a 1/4″ seam to stitch the pocket to the skirt piece. Repeat for all four pieces.

7. Press the pocket pieces open.

8. Pin the skirt pieces together, right sides facing each other. Sew a 1/2″ seam along the edge, going around the pocket.

9. Turn the skirt right side out, press your seams flat, and marvel at your pocket-making prowess.

10. Hemming. Turn and press your bottom hem 1/4″, then turn up 1/2″, press, and stitch. Nice and clean.

11. Tank top time. Remember that mark you made on your tank top? Pin the layers of the tank together to keep things in place. Extend the initial mark across your tank top and (deep breaths) cut. A few tips: measure up from the hem of the tank to your mark, then duplicate that measurement along the width of the tank top, measuring from the bottom. Connect the dots and cut on the line. Also, when I do this again, I’ll probably cut a quarter inch above my initial measured line, to accommodate the stretching/sagging that will occur with the added weight of the skirt.

12. Gathering the skirt. Set a long stitch length on your machine and stitch a 1/4″ seam around the top edge of the skirt. Gently pull the end threads to gather. Carefully spread the gathers evenly around the skirt waist until the width of the skirt waist is the same as the width of your cut tank top.

13. Putting it all together. Here is where things get a little tricky. You need to pin the skirt and tank together, right sides facing each other. I matched up the side seams of the skirt with the side seams of the tank and pinned those first. Then, I evenly pinned the rest of the skirt together to the tank, trying to avoid puckering. You can pull or ease out the skirt gathers as necessary.

14. Stitch the tank and skirt together using a 1/2″ seam. You’ll be sewing just outside of the 1/4″ gathering stitch. Be careful not to stray, otherwise your gathering seam will be visible in the final product.

15. Ta da! Flip everything right side out and try it on!

A note of warning. My tank definitely stretched some during sewing, meaning that it doesn’t hug the narrowest part of my like it used to. I, of course, just used a stretchy belt to solve the issue (a sash would also do the trick) and that usefully covered any awkward puckering too.

If you’re worried about being able to get the whole contraption on easily — given the whole knit + woven situation — I’d bet that you could actually sew in a wide elastic waistband to join the woven skirt with the knit tank, adjusting measurements accordingly. Basically, follow the skirt tutorials I linked to above that have a wide elastic waistband and then attach your tank to the elastic waist rather than the skirt itself. You’ll have a strip of visible black or white elastic, of course, but you can either enjoy the colorblocking or cover it with a wide belt.

I can imagine so many fun variations on this. A striped tank with a floral skirt. A graphic print tank with a solid skirt. An analogous color combination of tank and skirt. An embellished tank with an attached skirt. None of my old tank tops are safe! And, yes, I just may go raid the sheets and table cloth section of my local Goodwill to build up a skirt fabric stash.

Comments

20 Responses to “DIY: Tank Dress with Pockets!”

RB
May 11th, 2010 @ 4:44 am

Thank you so much for the tutorial! I am going to try it soon. I have broad shoulders, so I think I will add an elastic to make it easier to get into.
Recently, I’ve discovered that in addition to sheets and tablecloths, discarded curtains at Goodwill make a wonderful skirt material. You just have to sew the sides together and put an elastic or drawstring in the ready-made tubular gap where the curtain rod used to go in originally. :)
Jane
May 11th, 2010 @ 4:47 am

I am in awe of this. I may well get my sewing machine out right now.
etannen
May 11th, 2010 @ 6:28 am

Gathering, esp. for a skirt, is often easier to manage if you stitch 2 parallel lines of the long stitch instead of just one. I think I might also use 2 parallel stitching lines when joining the skirt to the top. This takes me back to the days of the drop-waist
t-shirt+skirt dresses everyone was wearing (the current version is much cuter!).
Una
May 11th, 2010 @ 8:18 am

Have been waiting for this tutorial! Amazing. For some reason it never occurred to me that you used a tank top instead of making the top yourself. Can’t wait to try it out, especially because the ones I see in stores all have necklines that are way too low for me.
sabrina
May 11th, 2010 @ 8:26 am

Awesome tutorial! I have become pretty good at gathering skirts but haven’t figured out what to attach them too. I love the look of this dress. To the thrift store!! (after finals grading).
Diana
May 11th, 2010 @ 8:37 am

Great tutorial! I think I might have to try this soon… probably when I go visit my parents and have access to my mom’s sewing machine. (I should probably get my own, as they are so useful, but I am really really afraid that it’ll mean I feel justified in accumulating a large fabric stash to go with my large yarn stash!) Anyway, I love the look of this dress, and it looks so comfy and great for summer. Unlike you, I am quite short-waisted, so I find that this kind of dress in stores actually ends up having too low a waist. Plus, I love the high-waisted skirt look, but I have to admit that a high-waisted skirt is not always the most comfortable for short-waisted me, as the tight waistband often tends to sit over my ribs… this dress would also fix that problem!
Sandy a la Mode
May 11th, 2010 @ 9:38 am

THANKS so much for this awesome tutorial! I would love to make one of these, soo cool! I LOVE the yellow skirt pattern you used and it looks great w/ a belt! Now I need to go dig up an old tank!!
elizabeth
May 12th, 2010 @ 11:47 am

How adorable!!!! I need a sewing machine asap-thanks for sharing this great tutorial!
lumikha
May 12th, 2010 @ 1:16 pm

aaghh! i need a sewing machine! BAD!
Round-Up: XXIV « Caffeinerd
May 16th, 2010 @ 5:28 pm

[...] DIY: stenciled animal mugs and an awesome Tank Dress with Pockets. [...]
Flitryss
May 17th, 2010 @ 6:44 am

I love this. I have a long torso and short legs so dresses rarely fit me properly, but I love the ease of them!
Rachel
May 17th, 2010 @ 10:58 am

Wow. I love this! And I would love to link to it if you didn’t mind.
1 June 2010 : academichic
June 1st, 2010 @ 10:47 am

[...] this kelly green tank dress at Gap Outlet when shopping with E. It’s similar in style to E’s. homemade one, but the tank is the same color as the solid colored skirt part, which is cotton and lined. The [...]
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June 2nd, 2010 @ 10:42 am

[...] A tutorial on an adorable DIY tank dress from Academichic [...]
Hope
July 4th, 2010 @ 2:43 pm

Thanks for sharing your tutorials, they are simple and easy to follow. I used the pocket portion on a project today and plan on doing this complete project very soon.
tank dress | think liz.
July 9th, 2010 @ 5:02 am

[...] already had. The only thing I bought was some wide elastic for the waist. I referenced a couple of tutorials to guide me, but really kinda made it up as I went [...]
Katie Daily Style – What’s Black and Blue All Over? « Interrobangs Anonymous
July 16th, 2010 @ 7:13 am

[...] Self-made tank dress by E. at academichic [...]
Hannah Forney
July 16th, 2010 @ 5:13 pm

I am definitely going to try to make this style dress for my 19 month old. I am super excited!!! Thank you for easy to follow directions. OK, gotta go and get my sew on!!!
Hannah Forney
July 16th, 2010 @ 8:12 pm

Just finished my daughter’s dress and I LOVE it!!! The best thing about it is I am so excited to go pick out more materials to make more dresses! I used a onesie for my top and being the amature seamstress that I am tore a small hole in it when I was ripping out a seam but I used your suggestion and put a sash on it. I really like the rocker look so I used a striped pink and white onesie for the top and used some fabric with skulls on it that I had left over from making her blanket. The fabric is white and black with pink bows on the skulls. The sash gave it a more edgy look. THANK YOU< THANK YOU< THANKS YOU!! I LOVE IT!
Lara
August 3rd, 2010 @ 2:36 pm

Wow, great tutorial – thank you!

I think I put too much fabric on the skirt, but I think I might try it again with another fabric/top.

Thanks again!