All You Need to Know About Skirt Hems

What You Will Learn?

• Unless you're going for a high-low look, there's no reason to have a wavy or uneven hem on your skirt or dress. Use this step-by-step video-series to ensure that your skirt or dress looks professionally tailored—or shorten a hem to the length that you prefer for an updated look on an old favorite..
• Whether you're making your own clothes, shortening a hemline, or simply altering a skirt or dress for a better fit, the hem can make all the difference. It's not as simple as cutting the fabric straight across the bottom, but when you start with the right measurements, you're sure to have success..
• Skirt hems refer to skirts themselves or to skirts that are joined with a top garment to create a dress.  Skirts vary in bottom widths, whether they are lined with one or multiple linings, in bottom finishes and in finished length.  Whatever hem finish the skirt had when it came in with is the same hem that it should leave with.  The primary goal when marking and completing a skirt is for the garment hem to be parallel to the floor when finished.  The exception to this rule is when the skirt has an uneven hem such as higher in the front and lower in the back. .
• The Alterations Specialist should never assume that a skirt that is made anywhere would have a finished hem that is even to the floor.  What this means is if you remove 3” from the hem equally all around, the finished hem could look longer or shorter in some areas when finished due to the hem not being parallel to the floor to start with.  An uneven hem can be due to the client’s body shaping the dress when worn (the client’s back hem will look shorter if they have a protruding backside) or due to the material draping less from being cut with the grain or draping more from being cut on the bias grain..