Steps to Measure a Skirt: Waist: Measure along the waist, make sure its laying flat on the ground when taking this measurement. You will be folding your 4.25 meters into 4 layers of length 40 inches ( or more if you are taller than 5 feet 4″). This length will give a skirt which is 39 inch long Flared elastic waist gathered skirt pattern. The first pattern given below is for a skirt cut lengthwise. Long Flared skirt sewing pattern & tutorial Step 1 Mark the pattern for the long skirt. Hip: This is the widest part of the hip, Measurement is taken approximately 7–9 inches (ca. This is a very simple tutorial to sew an elastic waist skirt which has minimum gathers around the waist unlike other gathered elastic skirts but with great flair , all made with just one and a half metre of cloth. Skirt measurement example. Waist: Measure along the waist, make sure it's laying flat on the ground when taking this measurement.