Lil Boo Blue's Cascading Ruffle Skirt, Adapted

This skirt by Lil Boo Blue is the first thing I bookmarked when I started learning to sew, and I am finally making it! I love the vertical ruffles and jagged ends. The ruffles fall because of the way they're cut, there is no gathering. For an example of gathered ruffles, see my tiered ruffle skirt post. (Recognize the yellow sparkle material?)


See, the strips are cut in a sort of a horseshoe shape so the inside edge is shorter than the outside. When you straighten the shorter edge or let the ruffle hang, the extra fabric from the longer side naturally folds creating a ruffle.

I unknowingly created this type of ruffle in a knit lace scarf. Knitting short rows creates a spiral, but I preferred how it looked straightened out with a rolling ruffle to one side.

Back to the skirt! LBB's pattern is for a size 4/5 but my daughter is a size 8. LBB includes a printable template for 1/2 the ruffle, so you print two, cut them out and tape them together at the fold mark. I measured the inside edge of the template and estimated LBB's version would be around 10" long, but I wanted mine to be 13" long to fall just above the knee. The key to the ruffle is the curve, so, instead of just adding length, I printed a 3rd template and arranged them like this:

Check out LBB for the tutorial on making the skirt. I'll just show my adaptations.

I repurposed a tank top for the skirt, and found that I needed to space the ruffles 1" apart so there wasn't too much blank space showing through.

I used around 20 ruffles altogether. To find the "top" of the ruffle, I recommend starting from the middle part of one of the rounded ends so you get more "hang". I started sewing where the inside/straight edge begins and those rounded ends just kind of laid there, so I ended up pinning them up inside the waistband.

I made a fold-over waistband that was much more complicated that it needed to be, so I won't get into the details. The important thing is to make sure the fabric for the waistband stretches sideways, and to arrange the ruffles before you attach the waistband. I laid the ruffles so they were all facing the same way and covered gaps if needed.

Anyway it is super cute! My daughter's jaw dropped when she saw it -- always a good thing!

Next on my list... Asymmetric hemline!