New 16th Century Garb

First, the polonaise is still coming along, I have gotten to the tedious slow part of sewing in the boning to the bodice and then I will finish the back with a couple bows, once that is completed I will post pictures. I took my time on the project and enjoyed it greatly I had no event in mind to wear it to so it has been my "go-to" project. I will most likely wear it to the Old Sacramento Easter Bonnet Promenade this upcoming April. Of course that means I need a truly fantastic hat to go with it. So, we'll see.

So onto a new project.

I have had a 16th century doublet gown in mind for well almost 10 years now. Ever since my mom bought me several yards of dark green velvet that was on sale at a fabric store in Reno. The design has been there in my mind and then changed a bit once I got my hands on Moda a Firenze 1540-1580. This book is full of lovely portraits and lodes of inspiration for the lover of renaissance fashion. Here are a couple of examples  of 16th century doublets that I am using for inspiration.

The riding habit from Shakespeare in Love. Though not a historical outfit, I do really like the doublet in general. I plan to have my skirt be a yellow tapestry fabric that took me forever to find. So this image Gives an idea of having the doublet different from the skirt.

 Portrait of a Noblewoman

Lavinia Fontanai, 1580

I enjoy the gold embroidery on this one. I do not plan to have my front in the open style however this portrait is one that I find myself coming back to over and over again.

So, why the new gown? Does a costumer need a reason. Sometimes we do, especially when we lack time to do all the things that we would love to do. I have a dear friend who is getting married in April. Since I mainly spend my time at Faire playing Irish I have not been able to justify putting together another nobles outfit. This wedding is going to be themed and garb is appreciated so Bingo I now have an excuse/reason to spend time on a new gown that will not get a lot of wearing but one that I would like to have anyway.

I have decided to start with a new set of stays/corset. I have decided to use a commercial pattern and review it as I sew it. I started this past weekend and will upload the pictures and first part of the pattern review on my next post which I promise will not take months for me to do. The pattern is the Simplicity 2621 and I am going to do my best to not alter it too much. If I find that the pattern does not give me the desired shape and fit that I would like then I am prepared to make the effigy stays as well.

It occurred to me that many of the people that I talk to don't have the first idea how to make a pattern or find a pattern for historical garb. So I figure if I use a commercial pattern that anyone can find and buy, maybe I can provide a few tips so it wont be so intimidating to get the foundations for your 16th century garb more accurate.

Closer to Completion 1870's Polonaise

Little by little as I have had the time I have been chipping away at this little project. It is finally taking shape. I managed to wrestle my camera away form my son for long enough to get a couple of shots of the progress.

Side view with the one sleeve attached

Front view. Still wants for buttons. 

Meanwhile I have other events approaching as well that each have their own costume needs. I am extremely grateful that I actually completed my Irish gown back in June so for the Faire this weekend I do not have any last minute sewing for my out fit. 

Polonaise Is Moving Forward

My Polonaise gown has been living on my dress dummy silently mocking me. It is sewn together, fits me perfectly, just missing sleeves and trim. I would not have believed that trim would be such a problem, and yet as I have stared at this piece for several weeks, I have not been inspired at all to complete it. So I have gone through pages and pages of illustrations and photos from the 1870's waiting for something to jump out at me. And here it is finally day before yesterday this fashion plate spoke to me.

I am just going to do a simple navy blue box pleated trim. I spent so much time trying to find the "right" lace or the "right"tassels or the "right" ribbons. But I am going to just let the trim be simple so the lovely plaid shows through. I will use hooks and eyes to close and false navy blue buttons down to my waist and allow the sides to hang open at the hips much like the gown on the right. I will also add a bit more trim to the bottom of my skirt to tie them together.

So a lot of boring cutting, sewing and pleating for the weekend. On the bright side, I really need to practice my box pleats.

On another note, my eldest son has borrowed my camera for his yearbook class and so now I have to track it down so I can take pictures of my progress. Ah the joys of motherhood.

Next I need a really awesome hat....

Back from Costume College

I am a terrible blogger. It's been two weeks since Costume College and have not posted anything.
I also have a few more projects and updates I've been chipping away at that I have not
posted anything about. I have a little time today so I am playing catch up. So here's the scoop from Costume College.

Steam punk was the theme of the weekend which meant they would have a track specifically for Steam Punk classes. I like Steam Punk, however there were other classes that I was more interested in and my two roomies were all about the Steam Punk so I figured I could always pick their brains.

I did not get many pictures. Unfortunately... Which was my mistake. I did take several from the fashion exhibit which I am happy to share.

I learned a lot while at Costume College, not just about the sewing and such but about how to go in the future and get the most out of it. For example:

Lesson 1 - When I signed up and received my catalog I chose 4 limited classes because I wanted to feel as if I was walking away with something. In the future I will probably only choose one limited class and then attend as many of the shorter classes I can that interest me.

Lesson  2 - Take my camera everywhere and have others take pictures of me as well.

Lesson 3 - Pack more costumes than I think I will need. I really only packed a couple of things, I figured that I would wear street clothes most of the time. *Wrong* Costume College provides such a great opportunity to be able to wear my various things "just because". I had been worried that I didn't really have a lot of "Steam Punk" garb, however the majority of the costumers there were actually wearing 18th Century garb.

I am still so thrilled that I went. I learned some tricks and tips and saw so many gorgeous costumes from all different eras. Total win! I will be there next year!

So without further ado, here are some of the very few pictures that I actually had on my camera from the event.

Steam Punk display at the beginning of the exhibit. Surprising how much can be done with a toy gun and some paint.

Nice and cheery bonnet.

I just loved this bustle gown.

And the equally awesome back.

Lovely Kimono. I have several friends who wish to include Asian inspired fashion into their Steam Punk persona's.

Gorgeous example of a bustle gown made from Saris. She said three Saris died for this gown. I think it was well worth it.

I did bring my 1950's style dress and so when we had lunch at a 50's style diner, had to get the photo opp.

I wore my 1870's bustle gown skirt with my brown paisley corset and hijacked Robert's coat I made him last year to the Gala. I ended up forgetting my bustle so I had to use a folded up towel. The down side to that is that is squished me all weird and I ended up needing to leave fairly early in the evening because it ended up rather painful.

I still had a terrific time though, dinner was great, the company was great, just all around worth it. I would recommend the trip to anyone who enjoys costuming on any level.

Dessert and it tasted as good as it looked.

A Lei From Laurie

Last weekend I helped to throw a baby shower for the lovely and talented Laurie. And as a gift she brought me a Lei from her trip to Hawaii. I have always wanted one of these. I have no idea why but it's kind of been on my list of cool gifts to receive. I am kind of full of fail in that I have never been to Hawaii even though two of my sisters have lived there for extended amounts of time. I keep meaning to plan a trip but work and kids and life just seem to go in different directions. Perhaps now that the husband is done with school and life is settling down a bit we can actually plan a real vacation.

I realized upon receiving the Lei that it wasn't exactly going to last. Which kind of made me sad. I thought about ways to dry it, but then realized that then it would be another fragile memento that would end up being kept out of reach of cats and kids. So I decided to take a few photos of it. The cool thing is it matches a linen I had bought the weekend before that I am thinking of making a dress out of. A modern dress... can't quite think of a way to pull off anything remotely historical out of the fabric.

So here is a beautiful Lei and some fun fabric for a future project.

A new life for a gown from my past

As my polonaise has been slowly taking shape one question has been at the back of my mind. What will I wear it with. Strangely the colors and texture are not as easy to find complimentary fabric as I would have thought. While wandering through the fabric store gazing at anything blue, yellow, or off white I was tickled by the memory of a gown from years ago that was light blue and navy blue. I had decided to trim in navy blue anyway so I pulled out the old gown when I got home.

This was a natural form gown made about 10 years ago using all Truly Victorian patterns.

If you look closely at the bodice you will notice that some of the buttons have been replaced with little flowers. This was an emergency fix after the dress was hit by a truck. Luckily no one was in it at the time.

You see years ago I ran a children's birthday party business. We planned and threw tea parties, princess parties, pirate parties, fairy parties, you get the idea. This was one of the tea gowns that my partner Wendy made for me.

Well it happened that we had a booth set up at a baby fair. And we had the gown on a dress form as part of our display. Upon leaving the gown went into a trunk with our money, candy, and paperwork. As we were driving away people kept honking at us. Then we hear a thunk as we pulled onto one of the busier intersections in Sacramento. To our horror we discovered that we had left the trunk on the top of her car and it was now sitting in the middle of the road and people were swerving to avoid it. We pulled over just in time to see a very large truck hit the trunk and my gown attach itself to the front of the truck and keep going.

We were able to salvage the bodice except for the buttons that had popped off at impact and the underskirt. The over skirt was found 4 miles down the road covered in grease.

So this gown was put in first a bag, then a box and kind of forgotten about. Until now.

 Close up you can see more of the grease on the over skirt.

Right now I only have a use for the underskirt, I have always loved this dress because it was my first attempt at making an actual historical gown. Not that we knew enough about fabrics and such but still it looked great and felt wonderful to wear.

But now I have a decent underskirt to go with the Polonaise that I have been working on. I don't think I can bring myself to tear the bodice apart. I may reuse the lace from the over skirt though.

I can not help but be in love with this plaid.

Things pinned together to get an idea of how it's going to look. The fabric has a nice life to it. I haven't even put ties in it to get the bustle to take shape, this is just over my bustle.

So this is where we are. The project is coming together nicely I am extremely happy with how it's looking.

Polonaise Progress and Stumbles

For the 4th of July I had a 3 day weekend, which is a wondrous thing and with my job almost never happens. This meant a ton of time for sewing. This realization hit me and I went into a sewing fever. I jumped right in to pinning the mock up for my polonaise... and something didn't seem right. Then it hit me, I hadn't bothered laying out the part of the pattern for the actual back of the skirt because it's not something that I would need to alter.

Oops.

So I had just enough fabric without the back skirt and there was no way I would have enough with it. So I sat with my piece of fabric laid out on the living room floor turning pieces this way and that way trying to figure out a way to solve the puzzle.

I ended up deciding to shorten the entire thing by about 10 inches and I will have to be clever with the sleeves, but I managed to cut out the body of the polonaise.

Then I carefully cut the canvas to interline it with. Then sewed the back together.

Ta Daaaa

oops left my ginger beer in the background...

Just for the record I am not trying to match the plaids.

(I still have flashbacks from the stripes on my day bodice.)

Then it hit me... trim? Oh right, I forgot to get trim, you can't have anything Victorian without some form of frilly something...

So... Had to go to the fabric store. The fabric store is a very dangerous place for me to go, and because it was the 4th of July weekend, EVERYTHING was on sale.

I walked away with 3 new patterns, and four new fabrics. After staring at trims until they literally closed the store on me. I decided that I will do a thin maybe one inch thick navy blue rouching as my main trim. So I bought the fabric and made my way home.

Here's a closer shot of the bottom of the back, it's wrinkled because it's just pinned at this point to my dress form. I am hoping that the navy blue will pop just enough with the other colors.

So now I have a ton of rouching to make which effectively put the interesting parts of this project on hold temporarily. So I started and finished another fun project over the weekend. Another post coming soon.

In the meantime here are a couple of polonaise pictures that I am in love with.

I'm not exactly sure where I found this picture. I spent a lot of time online looking for ideas for my Polonaise and I just found this one pretty adorable.

This second one came from the FIDM Blog

http://blog.fidmmuseum.org/museum/

On the blog there are some amazing detail shots of this one.