How to Make Cut Outs on Skirts

Decorative cut outs on costume skirts create such a fancy and unique look.

And even though these cut outs make your costume look professional, they are pretty easy to make!

In this video, you will see how to make these small cut outs and still keep your skirt nice and sturdy.

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To make cut outs, you need:  

• Interfacing – you can use light to medium weight interfacing.
• Paper
• Skirt – For belly dancing costumes, cut outs are often made in snug parts of a skirt. So a straight skirt or mermaid skirt that is snug around the thighs would be a good skirt to use.
• Your sewing tools – see Resources page for the tools I use 🙂

How to Make Cut Outs on Skirts

First, draw the shape of the cut out you want to make on a piece of paper and cut it out. This will serve as your cut out pattern. (If you have an object that you can trace as a pattern, you can skip this. For example, I used the bottom of a bottle etc for making circle shapes for the black skirt.)  

Then, place the pattern where you want the cut out to be on your skirt, and trace the pattern.  

Take the same pattern, and trace it on the interfacing. Then cut it about 2.5 cm or 1 inch away from the line.  

Now place the interfacing on the right side of the skirt. Line up the lines on the interfacing and the skirt, and pin it in place.  

Then, sew right along the lines. I used black thread in this demonstration, so you can see, but for yours, use matching colour thread 😉   Now, take your scissors, and cut out the inside of the lines. Be careful not to cut the stitches, and try to cut a few mm or ⅛ in or so away from the stitches.

Then flip the interfacing towards the wrong side of the fabric, then place pins all around. This creates a nice, clean edge for your cut out.  

Then go back to your sewing machine, and do a top stitch at whatever seam allowance you are comfortable with.  

Just trim the excess interfacing on the inside, and now the cut out is ready to be embellished.  

If you want to add mesh to the cut out, just take the same pattern and cut out with a couple of centimeter seam allowance, just like we did for the interfacing. Then pin it to the back of the cut out, and do a straight stitch around it. You’ll be able to see the stitches from earlier, so just follow the stitches.  

If you remember, this is a mermaid skirt I made in my last weeks’ posts. Because the fabric has the polka dot pattern, I created a few circle cut outs to match the polka dots. I used the same technique I showed above, and did some beading (the twist line technique) around the cut outs.  

It is a bit hard to see, but the above picture is a cut out with thin black mesh. Mesh is optional, but I personally like the look of mesh filled cut outs, and it makes the cuts outs sturdier. You can do beading on the mesh, so it gives you more options for your design as well.  

Hope this post sparks new ideas for your costume making. If you liked the post, please share it with your belly dancing friends and help me spread the word. And also, sign up for the Sparkly Belly newsletter from the below link to gain access to the subscriber only page called Sparkly Belly’s Secret Studio. On that page, you can get more DIY belly dance costuming ideas and a growing collection of free patterns.  

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Thanks for reading, and keep sparkling! 😀

P.S. Pin! <3