Peplum’s been showing up on garments casual and fancy for the last few months, and we’re loving the flirty femininity it adds to any outfit. We’ve come up with one easy way to turn shirts or skirts into fashion-forward peplum pieces!

This project is slightly more advanced as it does require a sewing machine, and you’ll have to measure yourself to create a peplum pattern. We promise though, it’s not as hard as it looks!

Materials:
 – skirt or shirt (that you’ll attach the peplum to)

– 1 yard of fabric

– newspaper (for making a pattern)

– scissors

– pins

– sewing machine

First thing to do is make your pattern.

Measure around your waist, where you want the peplum to start. Take that measurement and divide it by 6.28 to get the radius of your pattern. For us, the radius was 5 inches.

Now take a large piece of newspaper. Measure 5 inches from each corner of the newspaper and make a mark. Mark one more dot in the center of the two corners. Connect each dot by drawing a half circle.

Measure out how long you want your peplum to hang by starting at the waist line and measure a little bit past your belly button. We went with 8 inches. Make sure to leave an extra inch or so for the seam.

Cut out your pattern!

Next thing is to cut your fabric.

Fold your fabric into quarters so that the left and bottom corner are where the folds are. Place your newspaper pattern on top and cut.

Now you should have a peplum circle! Depending on the fabric you’re using, you may need to hem the bottom.

Next, time to pin!

Lay out your garment and pin on the peplum material. Be sure to pin (and sew) on the inside so that the lines are clean when you flip it over.

The peplum circle will be longer than your skirt or shirt. You’ll be creating small darts to make the peplum pop.

The best way to pin is to start at the center of the garment on the front and back. Then turn the skirt and pin the side seams.

And now it’s time to sew.

The trick to sewing a peplum piece onto a stretchy cotton skirt or shirt is to stretch your garment a bit while sewing. This ensures that your garment will stay stretch and also gives the peplum a little extra body.

And that’s it!!

And yes, you might recognize that skirt from our recent 5 Items, 10 Ways style hack.

For a more casual playful look, try adding a peplum flare to a tank top.

Or go fancy with vinyl or leather.

You can always just go nuts with the patterns.

Or wear all 3 peplums at once!

What recent trends are you digging? Have you tried your own DIY peplum top or skirt? Talk to us in the comments below!

Misty Spinney
Misty Spinney is a hair stylist, makeup artist, and fashion stylist with a strong background in design and deep passion for creativity.