19th Century Cartridge Pleated Skirt

Move beyond knife and box pleats!

Learn the beautiful technique of cartridge pleating while creating a fashionable skirt you can wear for 1830s, 1840s, 1850s and early 1860s dressing.

Called gauging in the Victorian Era, cartridge pleating is the method to reduce a great deal of fabric down into a small length by creating tiny pleats. This particular technique was hugely popular in the early Victorian decades being that fashion called for voluminous skirt widths.

Through 5 lessons, this class will cover the steps of starting from scratch with your skirt project through to final closure. A wearable garment is yours when you finish the class!

No pattern needed! We calculate yardage amounts for your skirt in class and cover appropriate fabrics too.

Each lesson has detailed sewing video tutorials along with PDF handouts full of photos of each step and written sewing instructions to accompany what you see in the videos. It's a complete course from start to finish!

This class is for beginning-to-intermediate historical costumers.

You’ll learn exactly how to complete each step in creating the skirt, but you should understand basic sewing techniques including grading, topstitching, and hand sewing stitches such as the running stitch, whip and slip stitch.

The priority of this class is for you to understand how cartridge pleats are created while making a wearable garment. We go beyond the sample board here!

Once you understand the process of creating cartridge pleats you’ll be able to use the technique on other garment areas like sleeves in the 1830s and 1840s and Renaissance/Elizabethan skirts. Even the hem methods taught in class can be used on all Victorian Era skirts - 1830s through to 1900. The skills you learn here will take you far in your historical costuming journey!

Detailed Tutorials:

• Welcome and Getting Started: Discuss time periods appropriate for the project, supplies needed, and fabrics best for your skirt
• Lesson 1: Take measurements, calculate yardage needed for your skirt, and cutting all skirt pieces
• Lesson 2: Sew major seams and hem the skirt; also includes BONUS of finishing the hem with protective tape
• Lesson 3: Prepare the waistband and skirt edge
• Lesson 4: Mark and sew the cartridge pleats
• Lesson 5: Finish the project for a beautiful skirt ready to wear

In each tutorial section you have a chance to ask the instructor questions, post photos about your project as you work on it, and get feedback. Open dialogue with other students working on the same issues can be motivating and boost confidence as you work through your project.

Individualized help and feedback is available through email as well.

Skills & Techniques You'll Learn in Class:

• Fabrics specifically recommended for 19th century skirt projects
• The tricky calculation for yardage required for a cartridge pleated skirt
• Hem facings - the techniques of application and why they are important
• Making a waistband separate from the skirt which makes it easy to re-do a skirt later for another size
• How to level a skirt from the hem up to waist for a perfectly balanced skirt
• Creating various sizes of cartridge pleats
• Both creating the pleats as well as mounting them to a waistband
• What to do with the threads that create cartridge pleats
• Applying a hook & bar closure

Challenge your historical sewing skills. Get started today learning this much-loved technique. Make a fabulous new skirt for your next Victorian event! See you in class!!