yoke skirt with gathers A yoke is common style line used in a variety of garment styles. It is possible to create a yoke that is only decorative, but very often the yoke seam is used as a dart equivalent. In a men's dress shirt the yoke shapes the shoulder blade area instead eliminating the shoulder dart. In a pair of jeans the back yoke takes the place of waist darts. In this exercise you will complete a pattern for a skirt with a yoke seam. You may choose to also add additional volume to the lower portion of the skirt after patterning the yoke.

In the demo video below I give you a brief overview of the process to create a simple skirt yoke for Front and Back. The yoke seam is a horizontal seam that passes through the dart points. Then the darts can be closed adding shape to the upper yoke panel. This shaping gives the skirt its contour from hip to waist.

You may create any shape to your yoke seam that you choose as discussed in the demo.

After completing the yoke pattern, you may also choose to add additional volume to the lower portion of the skirt. You can refer to the design ideas and pattern instructions in this PDF from Patternmaking for Fashion Design by Helen Jospeh Armstrong for inspiration.

SkirtsWYokes_PatternforFashDes.pdf

Watch the following demo to learn about drafting a Yoke Skirt:

Click NEXT to learn about drafting a Gored Skirt