Trying out the golden rule

No, not that one! Today, I got my nerd side out and decided to apply the golden ratio to my peacock ensemble:


Steph from 3 Hours Past the Edge of the World did this with one of her sewing projects and I thought I'd give it a whirl. So, here's how I figured this out.

I measured from the shoulder to the hem of the top giving me a=22 inches. Then I plugged into the formula a/b=1.618 and got b=13.6 inches. b is the measurement from the hem of the top to the hem of the skirt, not the measurement from the waist of the skirt to the hem of the skirt. We only care about the parts that are visible. Plugging a and b into the other equation a+b/a, I got 1.618 back. That means the math was done correctly.

If you're not sure what should be a and what should be b, try swapping the values. If you assign 22 inches to b, you get a=35.6 inches (which is almost 3 feet!). Since 22 inches is still the top measurement, that leaves a=35.6 inches for the visible length of the skirt. As I'm only 5'4", that's not going to work.

Then I pinned the skirt up to see how I liked the length. (Please ignore the wonky side.) The bottom arrow indicates about where the unhemmed skirt hits me. It's loooooong! And I'm short. While I'm not a huge fan of my knees, I do like the length.

I'm really excited about this outfit! I just have to add a hook and eye to the skirt and do the hem! I'm also considering making a self fabric belt (see the line on the labeled image). The top is a bit loose from the waist to the hip so a belt will help show off my waist. I love my waist and feel odd (fat...) when it's not highlighted.