Spiral ruffle fringe like this is a fun addition to belly dance costume belt or skirt. These are super easy to make and great for using up your scrap fabric. If you have leftover fabric from making a circle skirt, you can make a matching fringe!
Photos from Bellydance.com (affiliate).
So in this video, you will see how to make these spiral fringes with a couple of variations. Let’s get started!
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To make these spiral ruffles, you need:
Fabric – I’m using leftover chiffon fabric from my circle skirt post. For the fringe you’ll see in this video, I will be using 30cm by 30cm or 12in by 12in per strip.
Your sewing tools – scissors, measuring tape, matching colour thread and your sewing machine
Find out more about the tools I use on the Resource page. 🙂
How to Make Spiral Ruffle Fringe with Flounce
First, we’ll cut a circle that is 30cm or 12in in diameter. To do this fast, I just fold my fabric a few times like this, and measure 15cm or 6in from the pointed end, and cut a nice curve. You don’t need to make the circle perfect here.
Next open up the circle piece of fabric, and cut a strip out of it in a spiral fashion. I’m cutting this one at about 4cm or 1.5in wide, which make a strip that is about 130cm or 51in long. If you want to cut the strip to make it shorter, cut from the outside end of the spiral, because you get nicer, tighter curls towards the centre of the spiral, so you want to keep that part.
Then, all you have to do is just finish the raw edges however way you want. I tried using pinking shears to finish this one, which saves a lot of time, but I prefer the look of one that is finished with a sewing machine. I just did a zigzag stitch along the edge.
And it’s finished! You can decorate the strips with sequin trim to add some shine.
Or if you want to add more body to the ruffles, you can use the lettuce hem technique from my post from a few weeks ago. All you need to do is when you finish the raw edge, just add fishing line to the outer edge. It’s a bit more challenging to do than finishing a circle skirt with fishing line, so start slowly.
This is great if you want to create full, luxurious looking ruffles like ones in this beautiful costume.
This beauty is from Dahlal.com. They no longer have this dress, but they confirmed that they can custom make it. 🙂
You can add a whole bunch of these ruffle strips to a waistband or even a piece of ribbon to create a ruffle fringe overskirt like ones in above pictures from bellydance.com. If you have a boring circle skirt, a ruffle fringe skirt will make it look a lot more fun and give more movements.
And here is how to make a flounce ruffle: if you sew on the inner edge, which is the shorter edge, of a flounce strip to a hem or a slit of a skirt, it creates beautiful ruffles. A great thing about a flounce ruffle is that it is not bulky like ruffles that you make by gathering up fabric. So it’s perfect for adding a little coverage to a slit of a skirt.
And of course, you can try making the strips wider or thinner to get the look you want.
Hope you enjoyed this DIY, and if you make your own, please share a photo on Sparkly Belly’s Facebook page. And if you want more DIY belly dance costume ideas, sign up for the newsletter from the below link to get updates and free access to the special page in my blog where I share special patterns and resources. 😉
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Thanks for watching, and keep sparkling!
P.S. Pin this photo to make it this long weekend 😉
Want to make more costuming bits yourself?
This is so simple but looks to good. A great addition to any skirt. i will have to try this one. Thanks for yet another great idea and video. Namaste. Esineda.
Thank you, Esineda! 😀 My pleasure! Yes, a fun addition to any skirt for sure! Hope it works for you. 🙂
I enjoy the points but you leave so much instructions out like: how many times to fold the fabric over, how to attach it to a skirt, what kind of fabric works best, width and length and what the black lines on the circle mean. I love your tutorials, I am a beginners sewer and don’t know a lot.
Thank you for your feedback, Cyrilla! Good points, I’ll try to remember to include those things in future posts 🙂 For this one, you fold over the fabric 3 times. The black lines show how you cut the circle in a spiral fashion. If you look at the paragraph above the picture with the black lines on the circle fabric, you can find the width and length of the spiral strip. I think most fabrics work well, but I do like working with chiffon a lot for these spiral strips.
I would just sew the strips onto a piece of ribbon by taking the ends of the strips and doing a straight stitch, so I have something that I can wear over my skirt (you can see how this looks in the video). This would be the easiest way and also it’s not attached to the skirt permanently.
Hope this helps!
Hi this is very awesome. I have a question. So what is the size of fabric that you are starting off with? You mentioned it is a scrap piece but didn’t mention the size? So is it possible I can buy Chiffon fabric by the yard and cut it to the 12×12? I am trying to find a more affordable approach to making these chiffon curly widow chair sashes. Any ideas or thoughts would be very helpful. I would like to know if your technique would work.Thanks!!
https://www.efavormart.com/products/dusty-rose-chiffon-curly-chair-sash?variant=8081362616366&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIrprDk_eT4QIVAr7ACh2_vwlmEAQYASABEgL4ivD_BwE
https://www.efavormart.com/products/1-set-blush-premium-designer-curly-willow-chiffon-chair-sashes?variant=8203234967598&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIrprDk_eT4QIVAr7ACh2_vwlmEAQYGSABEgKs4_D_BwE
Hi Lisa! Yes, you can definitely buy fabric by the yard and cut it to 12×12’s. I think this technique would work for the chair sashes, but the width of each strip looks wider. One shown in this tutorial is about 1.5 in wide. You can make the strip wider by either creating less spiral, which makes the strip shorter, or start with a larger circle than 12×12 🙂 So it’s probably best to first test with cheap fabric to find the right width and length for your project then work on nice fabric 🙂