Julie's Venetian Courtesan

Photo Shoot

2005-06-24T18:40:00.000-04:00

Okay, since my green dress had the benefit of a final photoshoot on its page, I figured the orange deserved the same honor. I loved some of the pics from our day in Roanoke, but all of them featured me either without complete jewelry, or in glasses. That just won't do. I let my husband, um, I mean photographer, pose me how he wished.

This is our best attempt at copying a vecellio woodcut (lets ignore the fact that I'm way shorter--perhaps she was cheating with chopines?):

And me trying to look engrossed in playing "my"(aka rented) new ren guitar, much like the girl in this pic.

Ah, and lastly, my feasting pictures. I couldn't resist the grapes:

The Orange Courtesan. A Recap.

2005-06-21T14:46:00.000-04:00

As this project comes to a close, I figured I should just sum up my experiences/techniques/etc before I move on to my next endeavor.

Ah, so, the orange dress. Wow, what an experience. I am quite thrilled with how it came out, honestly. There are, as always, some things that could've been better and things I'd like to add/improve someday, but I also am fairly happy with it as is. Sewing this wasn't bad at all, since I'd already finished the green as practice, and thus had the patterns all in hand (and had a looming deadline). So really, this went pretty quickly.

From the bottom up:

1) The camica was the same one as I made for the green dress. Its cotton decorator's gauze (I wanted something even MORE see-through than my hanky weight linen. Yes, I'm a courtesan huzzy). I made it using the pattern from the Realm of Venus. I finished it with hand-done redwork in rust embroidery floss, and an edging stitch in gold thread on my sewing machine. My inspiration was the ruffly bit on the top of the camica seen below.

2) The roped petticoat was mostly for my sanity. Yes, it does hold the skirts out a bit. But only a bit, as my dress fabric is intensely heavy upholstery velvet. Mostly it keeps my overdress's skirts from wrapping round my legs in hot weather, which keeps me happy and sane. The gored pink (ick) petticoat was made with pink cotton shirting. A spiraling ribbon channel was sewn up the body of the skirt. The channel is dark pink grossgrain ribbon filled with two strands of cotton clothesline from Walmart. Someday I'll make a new one of these, as I hate this one--my original plan was to have a red dress with pink bits underneath. But the pink and orange just doesn't do it for me.

3) The corset from my green dress turned out to be unnecesary for my orange dress. Its quite heavily boned on its own, and I don't need the extra heat, quite honestly. There are still questions as to whether the venetians always wore corsets. This way I have one dress that answers yes, and one that answers no. ;-)

4) The dress itself is in an orange cut velvet I found at a locally owned fabric store.

The bodice is side back lacing. I wish I'd been able to angle the lacings a bit more--right now the back panel is almost rectangular. I found this to be the best way to avoid butt puckering from the venetian backpoint, so I'd much rather have rectangular than buttpucker. The bodice is interlined with two layers of white denim which holds the boning (and provides a lot of support itself) and the innermost lining is a burgundy synthetic silky fabric. I also wish I'd made the shape fo the bodice a bit more conical. Somehow in my translation from green dress pattern to orange dress pattern, it managed to both grow larger and get less conical. But not so much as to make me rework it.

The skirts of the over dress are three panels of 56"wide fabric, pattern=matched along the selvages as well as I could humanly manage. There is a seam straight down the center front of the skirt, an idea i stole from Beth, and one that worked well for me so that I could have exactly one whole panel on the centerback part of the bodice, and 2 full panels gathered into the front/side part of the bodice. This means the natural seams fall right under my sideback lacings, which makes for a less grotesque gap there (a lesson learned from the green dress).

The skirt is cartridge pleated onto the bodice. The cartridge pleats are padded out with 2 layers of hideous yellow felted wool (an idea from Semptress), which gives them a nice full look, and also makes the skirt poof at the waist--more subtle than a bumroll, and better than just hanging flat. The skirt is unlined, cuz I was already warm enough, thank you. And the underside of the fabric is pretty. All the guards on the dress are strips of burgundy wool that I found a remnant of.

5) The sleeves decorated with a helical wool guard on dress fabric, inspired by several vecellio woodcuts.

vecellio

6) Accessories:

I beaded a girdle onto copper wire using brass metal ouches from ebay that I "antiqued" with black acrylic paint, glass pinkish pearls, black plastic beads, white plastic pearls, red czech glass beads, and little gold plastic sead beads.

My necklace is alternating pinkish glass pearls with smaller white plastic pearls, with two silver glass pearls and a huge plastic teardrop pearl as the charm (a former earring from goodwill). I also have a "gold" and "pearl" brooch (also a former earring), and a large string of plastic big and small pearls to drape around my neck and over the "brooch".

The flag fan is a sample swatch of home decorator's fabric that I embroidered in gold. It is stiffened with Timtex interfacing and cardboard, trimmed with lace and velvet ribbon, and attached to an antique gold painted dowel rod.

My purse is "whimsical". Which basically means I have not a smidge of research on venetians having purses. But I can only tuck so much in my bosoms, so purse it is. Its made with burgundy wool and strips of fabric swatches I had cuz I coveted them but couldn't afford them.

Lastly, I found a pair of pretty silver goblets at goodwill, and I think that completes my accesorizing.

Notes for Additions and Future Reference.
1) Adding an inch guard at the bottom wouldn't hurt, since i hemmed it a bit on the short side. This is especially true if i ever wanna wear shoes with a bit more sole or heel than my china flats.
2) Getting a partlet together would really make it more authentic. I'm not sure what style or when, though, so this is a big hazy in the future thing.
3) Learning a venetian hairdo would be nice.
4) Next time, work on getting the side back lacing more in the eleanora di toledo angles. And the bodice more conical.
5) I've got enough fabric left over for the eleanora di toledo strip sleeves, and the buttons for the pinch points. I will definitely make these some day, but for now, I am thrilled with my "candy stripe" sleeves.

Permission Granted

2005-06-19T23:24:00.000-04:00

Beth has kindly okayed my posting of her face and dress ALL OVER MY BLOG! ;-) As requested, I hereby promise not to include ones wherein she does not look stunning. Also, thank you to niter for letting me steal the photos from her far-superior-to-mine-camera.

I was so excited for this shot. It is my favorite of the whole day! Beth was very beautiful and intently listening to the talented harpist/vocalist. I think I snuck this picture. Either that, or she was very good at pretending not to notice. Doesn't she looks regal and serene? You can also see her pretty sleeves and bead clusters! Not to mention the spectacular horned hairdo.

Beth looking fetching in
a field. I tried to sneak
this picture, but she
caught me. Blasted
plastic trashcan. At
least her skirts cover
most of it.

coy--I like this picture cuz it looks like we're checking out/flirting with some off-screen fellow. And I'm pretty sure that fellow was Beth's husband. No worries, dear, I know he's taken.

lovely ladies

Actually paying attention to the photographer this time.

Elisabeta and I waiting for costume judgement. I'm making a sour face from the sun, but the dresses are worth posting. This was BEFORE drunk guy came. And, I just noticed that beth's hair compliments my dress quite well. ;-)

And, a series of "action photography" courtesy of Niter. Here, we are playing ragball. Which is like hot-potato and musical chairs all in one. Running in these dresses is warm, I tell you:

ragball--action beth!

ragball, action Julie!

Don't we look lovely while waiting for the ball? And the big plastic trash can. Again. Isnt it lovely?

Beth in her stunning-ness. And my butt. But also a decent shot of how niter cleverly braided and wove pearls into my hair. Huzzah! Thank you niter! Good servant girl. Oh, and hello, trashcan. sigh.

And lastly, the only of the two of us faking the whole musical thing that came out well (at least in my opinion). We are covering a very non-period green transformer box with our multitudes of skirts. Worked rather well. What didnt' work well was me fake playing the ren guitar. My E strings were grossly out of tune, and many of the pics are of at least one of the two of us making a hideous face. The hairspray loving nats didn't help, either....

guitar

Weekend Adventures

2005-06-19T21:05:00.000-04:00

Well, this weekend was the venetian dress debut at the Virginia Ren Faire in Roanoke. I FINALLY got to see Beth's dress in person--simply stunning. Internet pics (though lovely) just don't do it justice, and the costume contest judges agreed. More on this later in the post, as I'm already digressing.

First, a Disclaimer:
I forgot to ask Beth for permission to post pics of her, and I'm not comfy doing so without getting her go ahead. Since its sunday night, and I'm anxious to post SOMETHING, I will do the totally egocentric thing and post pics of myself only. Thus, I will gush over Beth's dress and show pics only of me... Just know that I'm not TRYING to be self-centered. I'm trying to be considerate. I also stink at photoshopping, and since my hubby's out of town blurring is not an option. Cropping's about as much as I can handle.

And now, a recap:
I started my trek to Niter's Friday morning, and made it in "excellent time", which is just a nice way of saying that I drive like a speed-demon when I'm excited to get somewhere...

Friday afternoon/evening we ran around her town collecting fun wines, dinner ingredients for a very tasty "paella"( which I now know how to make for myself), and the most sinfully delicious truffles from The Chocolate Spike. As strange as it sounds to combine flavors like curry, chipotle and lavendar with chocolate, it was amazingly exotic and wonderful. And I ate "too many" of them. Not that one can eat too much chocolate, as Beth correctly reminded me, but I do eat it at the expense of becoming more booty-licious. And my booty-licious-ness is quite enough already, honestly. ;-)

Saturday morning we woke up bright and early to don our garb. And ran late, as women are known to do... hehe. We met Beth at her house later than expected, with my hair undone, my brooch fallen off, my girdle yet-untacked-to-my-dress, and our flemish servant Niter barefoot with broken shoes. Beth was spectacularly (and punctually) attired, coifed, shoed and packed for the day. Bad Julie. Teehee.

After I finally got my stuff together, we took some photos in Beth's lovely wooded yard (thank you to aaron and niter, our photographers), and headed off to the faire in Niter's SUV. Um, I mean carriage. Yes, carriage....

We arrived at the ultra-small faire (they're only in roanoke for one weekend) being some of the few patrons to dress. "Elisabeta" got to be my sister for the day, which was great, as we often joke that we're clones. Niter got to be our insolent lady's servant. She was quite a brazen little thing, showing her ankles for a sixpence and drinking from my goblet when i bid her hold it. I showed mercy and refrained from a public beating. ;-)

We were mistaken for faire workers more than once, and had the opportunity to talk to many-an-interesting member of the court and towne about various things, mostly their lovely elizabethan costumes. We were even formally introduced to the queen, who offered to find us husbands. (Elisabeta and I promptly avoided her for the rest of the day--a courtesan does not need a husband, right? Besides that, we actually DO have husbands squirrelled away in the 21st century, who would probably not take so kindly to her majesty's offers).

Here is where I confess that while I love making the gowns, I am socially inept (and shy, and self conscious) when I have to play a character or talk with any sort of accent. Really, I should work on that....
I bring this up since I think that I offended a man with my courtesan banter--and I wasn't even being lude. I simply asked what the use of only ONE husband was when a girl can have MANY a rich suitor? Not all at the same (exact) time, of course. (innocently bat eyes). I couldnt' tell if he was playing to be offended, or honestly offended, but he really did walk away from us rather quickly. Anyway, sorry, dude. I was playing. In real life I'm monogamous and quite happily married to only one man! :-)

Highlights of the day were:
1) The weather---it didn't storm as threatened! It was in the 70's and mostly cloudy, so we didnt' overheat until the early evening when the clouds left and the sun appeared. We even got to comfortably wear our fun fancy sleeves for most of the day.

2) sitting at a harp concert where we got to provide percussion (myself, a-rhythmically--my drummer husband would be so ashamed). This inspired me to listen to both of my Lorena McKennit cd's on my way home, since the harpist was talking about her.

3)The alpacas that go "mmmmmmffff" and have freaky horizontal pupils. And are super cute.

4)Doing "women's work" and gossiping about husbands with the townfolk.

5) prancing about in our dresses playing ragball with various patrons/workers.

and, last but not least,
6) the costume contest we enrolled in as elisabeta and julieta. I got an honorable mention, and Beth received silver in the contest, with only a dashing and knowledgable Welsh woodsman ahead of her. I think we both enjoyed "strutting our stuff", so to speak. (Until the sun came out and we just fanned maniacally. People were impressed by the uniqueness of the venetian flag fan! Even the queen herself.) Oh, and the judge's subsequent use of us as examples of certain styles in the costume lecture. That was fun.

The downsides:
1) my boobies are sunburnt
2) I think i need to add about an inch to the hem of my dress
3) my boobies are sunburnt
4) I am jealous of beth's "horny hair", and must work at teasing my own locks. However, I must mention that Niter did a lovely job of braiding my hair and twisting pearls into it. I just long for horny head.
5) Did i meantion that my boobies are sunburnt?
6) Oh, yeah, that drunk guy.

After the faire, we rushed home to beth's to loosen all our corestry, and made plans for a fondue/wine/pasta/chocolate evening with the boys. Twas delicious, and much fun. Very nice to see niter and beth in comfy 21st century clothes after all day of prancing about in gowns. And also great to spend some time with their respective hubby's, since I get to see/talk to them less, and they're both very fun guys.

I'd like to thank niter, beth and hubbies for inviting me/helping me dress and do hair/feeding and eating with me/taking and sharing pics and generally giving me a very fun and happy weekend! Huzzah!

Oh, right, and some pics:

me alone

field

Okay, so in the first one I'm missing my brooch, and in the second one i've got computer nerd glasses (forgot my contacts, and I'm blind as a bat) and my pearls are crooked (and yes, I know it was against sumptary laws for courtesans to wear pearls. Guess I'm not exactly a law-abiding citizen,eh?). No one's perfect. ;-)

ren guitaring. I'm kinda faking, as I've only had one lesson, and don't know any songs yet--but I will! Still, its a nice pic.

ITS OVER!!!!

2005-06-15T23:14:00.000-04:00

Yes, I think I'm officially finished with this dress for some time. Okay, still wanna do a partlet. But that will wait. Especially after learning that Beth is not partletting this time around, either (despite making a beautiful one!). I will be like her and delude myself that i'm making one for october. Actually, I'm fairly certain that I will. Just in good time. This Saturday is the unplanned "early" weardate, and the "real" day is to be sometime in October at the MD Ren Festival.

I've neglected my blog for the past few days in the interest of finishing fiddly bits before posting.
I've hemmed the sleeve bottoms, added utility loops for attaching items to my waistline, hookneyed the slits under the lacings, trimmed all long threads. I've also hemmed the gown (a bit shorter than i intended), and attached one guard of the burgundy wool. I'm still considering a second guard for later, but for now, I'm thinking one is just dandy, especially with the time contraints AND my need to feel reasonably finished for saturday. These pics are all sans accessories, but i'll have my fill of pics in the whole getup come this weekend!

front

back

Oh, also, I got my cool (but way more huge than expected) ring off of ebay, it matches my dress very well, and is deliciously gaudy:

ring of power! NOtice my newly shorn fingernails--a sacrifice to the lute lesson gods!

And a trip to the little asian store yielded the stereotypical not-really-period-but-best-i-can-do $3.50 babydoll china flats:

shoes

The cool thing is that this store also sells these in white, and as i'm pretty sure they're cotton I could get white ones and dye to match future outfits. Huzzah!

There shall be a feast of photos early next week! I'm so excited!

Fickle-ness, Thy Name is Julie

2005-06-11T23:17:00.000-04:00

I've been going back and forth for the past couple of weeks about what types of sleeves my dress should have. My original plan was for strip sleeves a la eleanora di toledo. I absolutely love those sleeves. I bought the buttons for the decoration/closure all down the sleeves. I have 60 of them. They are gorgeous, and I've already spent $8 on them. So, I'm commited to making those strip sleeves, right? Right?

Well, technically, yes, they're still on my to-do list.

But somewhere my fantasies for a super non-period sexy Dangerous Beauty dress turned a complete 180 and I found myself trying to make an as-period-correct-as-possible venetian gown that I could still claim to be a courtesan. So be it--its certainly turned out to be much more of a challenge, and a much better learning experience.

So, why the fickleness with my eleanora strip sleeves, then? Well, she was florentine (at least, i think), not venetian. And though I searched Bella's very-well-researched site and a few others, I saw no examples of those types of sleeves in venetian art/portraiture. And while they are period, I just can't say as I'm sure that they're very venetian. So I went on a search for sleeves I thought had some flare and that I'd want to do. I came across these:

vecellio

How I never noticed the helical sleeve look in all my portrait/sketch research before escapes me. Now, these are sketches, so there's a little less to go on concerning materials/construction used, but I'd interpret this to be a sleeve made with the dress fabric with a guard (matching the dress guards) swirling around it. These sleeves fascinated me in their design and unique-ness, so I played with my fabric and found I had enough of the orange dress fabric left to do these sleeves AND the strip sleeves. The strip sleeves have been bumped to a future wear-date, and honestly, my dress is pretty generically venetian/florentine(with the exception of the butt point). So, i think the sleeves would be an "instant" decision as to where i wanted to be from on any particular day. Cool. I like variety.

Now, what I didn't count on was how difficult it would be to get the swirls to look correct. Aspirations to be period and making a curved elbow sleeve pattern caused me some interesting problems. To get at least the most visible part of the sleeve evenly spaced was my goal. I ended up with this:

Its weird, and not perfect, but it works.

And the sleeves all put together look passably like the sketch examples. I used some "extra" buttons from the strip sleeve down the front length, so I havecamica poofing holes. I love that look.

sleeves

vecellio

I fastened the sleeves to the dress via buttons and loops. And I was fresh out material for to make loops. I am proud of my solution: I made my own cord from leftover blackwork embroidery floss. I guess all the silly friendship bracelets I made in elementary and middle school gave me some skillz. ;-)

sleeve joint

Limp Dress, Limp Fan

2005-06-09T22:47:00.000-04:00

Chugging right along. 8 days till wear-time (assuming the rain gods smile on us). Tonight I hunkered down to do the girdle and the flagfan.

The girdle is made from plastic pearls from the cheap trim store nearby, red czech glass beads, black and gold plastic beads salvaged from a $1 goodwill necklace, and ouches from ebay that I previously antiqued with black glaze. Its all strung on copper wire. Here it is on my limp dress:

girdle
I was especially proud of how I brought it together in the front. You probably can't tell, but the left side of the center is a necklace clasp for ease of dressing. Its ingeniously hidden. ;-) If by hidden you mean small....

girdle detail

I also finally finished my flag fan. The gold outlining embroidery provided me much entertainment on subway rides. It also got me some rather strange looks. Oh well. The fan is from a swatch I bought at a going out of business fabric store (sob), edged with some lace and then covered with red velvet ribbon. I painted the dowel rod brown then put gold over for an antiqued look, though really it just came out looking like muddy gold. I'm so-so on this fan, the embroidery is regretted now, since i'm not too fond of the gold. And I made the tabs to loop onto the rod just the right tension so it doesn't swing freely, but it doesn't stay still either. Kinda a flaccid fan thing going. Hrm. Regardless, its done, and it'll look nice in pics.

fan

Thoughts on Jewels

2005-06-09T09:51:00.000-04:00

Well, now that the dress is coming closer to finished, and definitely closer to its debut (9 days, but who's counting?), I have moved my eye to accessories (the dress is hanging out. Literally). Here is what I've got currently:

The big ole' clip on earring I bought looks good in its second life as a "brooch" ( i think i'll engineer a way to have it a bit lower on the guard than this pic--as in below the camica at least). I took the liberty of adding a bit of huge gold-link chain I had from an undergrad toga party (don't ask) in the loopy style of the time. Okay, its only SORTA the style of the time, as theirs would be a full necklace looped over (see portrait above), and mine mysteriously disappears into my bosoms. Hey, the chain was short.
Anyway, I wanted to know my public's (i think my public right now is about 3) opinion of this. Short chain, or should i string a long thing of pearls, like the lavinia portrait?

I still like my earrings (the ones on my ears), but now with the whole ensemble, the necklace I was originally so excited about seems to not match my other jewelry. Its copper colored metal (all my other stuff--sleeve buttons, ouches, brooch--is gold), and its got really stand-out-sparkly rhinestones (everything else is subdued gold and pearls). A shame, cuz I really love this necklace. But it just doesn't match.

I set to making new one. A very simple new one. Cuz I'm lazy. ;-) Its creamy pinkish pearls interspersed with ivory whitish smaller pearls. With some silver ones and a leftover teardrop from a goodwill earring. The clasp is something I picked up to use in my girdle but then didn't. So i guess it was leftover too.

new necklace

necklace clasp

Baby Got Back

2005-06-08T19:55:00.000-04:00

I've been a busy bee. Realization set in that my dress's debut was a mere 10 days away!!!! Then, realization set in that I'd like to let my dress hang/settle with the skirts attached for about a week before I do the hemming. Thus, a-cartridge-pleating and a-skirt-attaching I went. I've got the multiple punctures to prove it. And yes, I own a thimble. But it pinches my chubby little fingers so....

Now my dress has 7 days to hang so that i can hem it a week from now and go to the faire two days later. Cutting it close? Maybe. But i can work on the sleeves/flagfan in the meantime.

I used semptress's felting-the-pleats method. I think it may have worked a little too well! This is a pic (form the side) of me trying to get a sense of the poofiness before I was finished attaching the skirts. That butt is shelfy, yes? I was worried, honestly. But I stuck it out and finished. Once I had the whole dress on and laced, it wasn't quite this bad. But this is a funny picture:

And, drumroll......Ta-DAH! Here is my dress with skirts:

front

back

I am undecided. I can go back and cut off about an inch of felt pretty easily and I assume that would lessen the butt-shelf by about an inch, too. But, it may settle and be unnecesary. And honestly, i'm a bad judge of whether my butt looks too big or not. I personally think it ALWAYS looks too big.

I'm asking for a vote. Big Butt, or smaller but still big butt?

OOOOH! and please note that the lengthof the skirt is not too short as I anticipated. This is cuz i folded over as little as i could get away with before cartridge pleating it. Its actually almost exactly the right length when i wear my brown leather cloggy shoes, which are the best renfest shoes i currently own. Hehe, I love when things are easy. As long as the settling doesn't change this too terribly much, i'll be able to just slap a guard on the bottom and go my merry little way...

In other news, the jewelry bits I ordered from ebay came today. I plan to use them as ouches on my girdle. THey were a might bit brassy when they arrived, so i took to antiquing them with some black acyrlic glaze I had on hand from painting christmas ornaments. It actually stuck to them, which amazed me. In this pic, the one on the left is antiqued, and the right is not. Its a little hard to tell a huge diff in the pic, but in person i promise it makes a world of difference. The difference between cheap looking and pretty cool. hehe.

ouches

If Niter Insists

2005-06-07T10:29:00.000-04:00

This is to prove to the insistent little niter that my evening of cartridge pleating was less than picture worthy. So how do I prove this? I take a picture. Ha. Not very exciting, is it?

cartridging--padded out with yellow felt a la Semptress. Oooh, I would like to point out my ingenious use of the tape guide. It keeps all my running stitches relatively straight and uniform, and you just move it down for the third row of stitches.

In other news, my buttons came yesterday! This means I am officially sticking with my strip sleeve plan, despite having some fickleness last week. I can't waste the buttons, now can I? I bought them after getting a hot ebay tip from Lydia, as well as some excellent detail shots of the gold and black eleanora di toledo portrait. I was originally going to look for buttons with pearls in the center, but then I got an actual look at eleanora's buttons:

eleanora button (pic courtesy of lydia--thank you!). Thus, I decided a pretty design on a little gold button is more than acceptable (and probably more correct), especially at 8 dollars for all the buttons I needed (plus some extras). I got these:

Sorry for the sorta crappy photo quality. My computer ate the good one, and I was too lazy to reload, so my diary sports choice #2. I got two sizes. The smaller are 1/2 inch diameter and will be the ones joining the strips of the sleeve down the length, and the larger ones are 3/4 and will be the buttons that I use to attach the tops of the sleeves to the dress straps. I'm actually thrilled that these buttons are reasonably close to the ones on the portrait. Um, except for the being acrylic part. But they do look convincingly like metal, even in person. So we won't mention their acrylic-ness ever again. ;-)

Distractions Galore

2005-06-06T00:14:00.000-04:00

This was quite the insanely busy weekend. We had afghani dinner plans friday(yum), a very long bbq party saturday--I got to meet one of my best friends' new niece. Absolutely adorable. The fattest cheeks I've ever seen on a baby. Cartoonish cuteness! Oh, and baby puke on my knee. Of course...
And today (sunday) we had dinner and a show with my family. The musical the lion king is just abosluletly breathtaking in its costumes/staging. Wow. I had tears. I'm not kidding. Perhaps it was cuz I was pmsing and therefore emotional. Still, it was beauteous.

The point? Well, there was very little time for sewing. A bad thing, considering I now have less than two weeks til the first wear date. Eeeek. I work well under pressure, though, so I should be okay. I did manage to finish covering all my eyelets, so that looks pretty sharp. And I'm still making headway on the flagfan embroidery. Inching every closer to finished. TOmorrow I hope to at least figure out the proportions I'll need to do my cartridge pleating, and hopefully get a few lines of running stitch in.

The other big reason that I didnt' sew much? Well, I was distracted by another project. My hubby will have the benefit of wearing my next project. Now that I feel his new attyre has been sufficiently planned I guess I can go back to finishing up my courtesan. I think I have costumers ADD.

I promised....

2005-05-31T23:21:00.000-04:00

Today, I promised Beth a new post. Who am I to disappoint?

Contrary to what my blog may seem to tell the public, I have been diligently sewing. Mostly on the bodice. The bodice is two layers of denim into which boning channels are sewn. I used zipties for boning, and some poly from joann's for the long pieces that go over the shoulder straps. The front is faced with the orange "cut velvet", and the back is lined with a burgundy silky something or other purely cuz I'm vain, and its pretty.

I started putting the eyelets in for lacing. I was soooo tempted by the lacing ring suggestion, but one test run and it didnt' quite lay like I wanted. And since the di Toledo bodice has the eyelets, seems the thing to do. I am a cheater, though. I use metal eyelets and cover them in thread. The first one is covered, albeit poorly. Now just imagine this down the whole bodice. OH, and this is my first attempt at spiral lacing (thank you, Jen T!), so wish me luck, so far its a bit, well, curvy. But its on my side back, so hopefully it won't be too noticeable.

The eylets aren't done (not all put into the fabric yet), and so I couldn't try it on properly, but I thought my blog deserved some attention. Here is me holding it on just to get the effect, those wrinkles will hopefully disappear when properly laced:

The guard around the neckline is burgundy wool that I was forced to sew on by hand, which is why this has taken me so long to post. I'm the slowest hand sewer ever. ;-) ANd hubby stopped my insanity by banning me to sew pearls along the neckline. He said it would be too busy. Now that I bought my brooch (okay, its an earring), I'm inclined to agree. Thank you hubby for saving me from me!

Oh, and I jsut noticed the appearance of my SECOND pair of leopard print pj pants on this little blog. Chuckle. I'm a jungle princess. Roar.

Goodwill

2005-05-30T14:20:00.001-04:00

I've recently been in contact with the very friendly and talented Lydia, and she has inspired me to look for findings/jewelry/buttons to accent my costumery. You'll notice in her gorgeous tudor that she found an absolutely perfect pendant/brooch, and this had me ebay searching for quite some time today. ;-)
Being the queen of instant gratification that I am, I tired of ebay and decided to give goodwill a shot before shelling out shipping. I picked up these 2 pair of earrings for $3 (the big gold ones are clip-ons, and the teardrops are post earrings). So yes, some instant love for me, but I'm still watching quite a few stunning things on ebay...

I think I will be able to alter these to my preferences. I especially like the look of the teardrop hooked to the bottom of one of the big gold ones. I'm thinking one of these would make a nice brooch for the center of the bodice like i've seen in some portraiture.

I was also quite happy to find several cups that interest me greatly for faire days. For hubby, a rustic pewter mug to match his scottish attyre, for me a pair of fancy silver goblets. The goblets had me ecstatic. They look hand etched, are from india, and are heavy and cleaned up very well with my anti-silver-tarnish cloth. A mere 3 dollars. YAY for goodwill!

cups

The Point of No Return

2005-05-27T09:38:00.000-04:00

My fabric pattern repeats itself in the absolute most inconvenient way for skirtage. Oh, sure, the sides meet up nice, but the length of the repeat is such that I cannot achieve the proper skirt for my height--either i use 3 repeats down the skirt to yield a (hopefully only) slightly too short skirt, or if I try to do 4 repeats down the length, which means I have not enough fabric for sleeves. What's upsetting is that another 1/4 yard would have been all I needed. But I bought everything in the store, so its not like I can regret being cheap or something. I really want matching sleeves. Thus, short skirt it will be. I will add a guard of my maroon wool to the bottom, I guess. That is what I bought it for, though I was hoping not to have to resort to such measures. The wide bottom guard is something I haven't really seen in portraiture, but a few of the online costume community have done this, and it looks nice. Its an acceptable fix, and I don't think the guard will have to be too wide, actually. At least its workable.

Okay, I knew I'd be scared of cutting my orange fabric, but I really didn't think I'd be this nervous when the time came. AHHHH! ;-) It literally took me hours to pin everything so i could be sure I would get mirror images. Symmetrically anal, yes? This is me trying to figure out my layout to conserve as much fabric as possible and get some nice motifs. I was so tense hubby had to give me a well-deserved backrub...

patternlayout

I think it came out well--mostly symmetrical, and I'm happy with the positions of the motifs. And most of all, I'm glad that hurtle is over:

Now I just need to work up the nerves to sew it.

And Now for Something Completely Different...

2005-05-26T23:23:00.002-04:00

I took wednesday night off from costume sewing to attend a project class at the store where hubby bought my sewing machine. Its a very cute little quilting-focused store run by a husband-wife team up. Very nice people. And very good sales-people...I always leave poorer.

Anyway, I attended a class teaching how to make fabric boxes. We learned the basic box from this book. Mine turned out to be pink and green, since I've been on a green kick lately. I had a lot of fun doing this, and I can't wait to make some of the other designs from the book. Very cool.

Box with lid on.
Oh, and I put my box to use right away holding various little threads:

And just to remotely relate this post to my dress project: the really stiff interfacing we used to make the box rigid was called timtex, and its very thick and very sturdy. I think I will use this to make my fabric flag fan hold its shape. How's that for applying new knowledge? hehe.

Strip sleeves

2005-05-24T20:41:00.000-04:00

Wow, pattern drafting with julie is a lenghty business. I wanted to recreate the eleanora de toledo sleeves in this portrait:

eleanora

I found a great dress diary wherein Jessamyn does a splendid job of recreating them (on an absolutely gorgeous dress, I must say). I love the way her pattern has the elbow curve accounted for, and something tells me this is more period than some of my other options. I found a great sketch for a similar style sleeve on Emmachia's free pattern page, and I used that to base my pattern off of. I figured if I could recreate a decent pattern from her sketch and then cut into fourths, I'd get close to what I wanted.

Many many drafts later, I ended up with what i hope is a suitable straight sleeve pattern, and I cut it into fourths and even remembered to add seam allowances!

I figured I should give it a test whirl before cutting the precious orange fabric:

In the real draft I will add more "pinch points", and most likely some sort of poof at the top. My concern is that they're too wide/roomy. I don't know if I should try to make them more fitted to my arm or not. Thoughts?

There's No Place Like Home

2005-05-23T21:01:00.000-04:00

Or like homosexual Africa*. This picture is a patterned-fabric-atrocity. I included it to entertain Beth. But this one is better than when you pinned me, cuz i'm wearing PINK LEOPARD PANTS!!! Ready to follow the yellow brick road towards jungle fever...

The point of this picture is...the point. Notice the more gradual buttpoint than on the green dress. And that the lacings have been moved significantly out to the side. This is my new bodice pattern for orange.

please ignore the icky fat bulges. Sigh...must work on that.

Anyway, the most interesting bit of sewing I've done was to sew the linings together and make boning channels. Which is none too interesting, actually, so I'm not bothering with a pic. Looks a lot like the pic that I took of that whole little process last time. I'm doing an interlining to hold the boning made from two layers of cotton denim, and the inner most layer I *may* line with some silky stuff, but as its been a bitch to sew thus far, I might jsut forgo that bit. Hell, 2 layers of denim and a layer of orange upholstery fabric is more than enough to keep me sweaty...

Tonight's plan is to work up the strip sleeve pattern so I can have all the pieces I need to VERY CAREFULLY layout my pattern and cut my dress from the limited yardage of orange fabric. To that end, I decided I should go get some tape for cutting and rehashing old patterns. Julie went shopping. Julie stopped at joanns. Julie forgot tape all together....

But I came back with dowel rods and cappers and trims, and a reasonably pretty mix for a flag fan:

I plan on doing some embroidery around the leaves with the gold floss, then edging the fan in the burgundy velvet with a lace edge. This will be my only homage to the venetian laces, as I have no plans on incorporating them into my dresses. And I guess I'll paint the dowel rod. Or i could stain it. But I have paint in my possession, and I'd have to BUY stain. That was an easy decision.

*not that there is anything wrong with homosexuals, Africa, or any combination thereof.

Bead-dazzling. And FINISHED!!

2005-05-21T21:21:00.000-04:00

I went to the bead store in the city yesterday. Yes, the one that our trio didn't make it to last time round. And just to redeem myself, my concerns were correct--all parallel parking. None too fun on a hill and in a stick shift with no power steering. Still, I braved it and ventured forth. It was an entertaining store, and they had quite the selection, but it was pricey and my heart wasn't in to it at that particular time. I left with 2 strands of pewter colored glass pearls and some matte czech glass beads in the darkest red I could find. Then I went to the famed "trim" store and got some cheap plastic pearls in ivory along with the gold cording that's currently functioning as the drawstring on my purse.

Stringing my pearls yielded this girdle. I didnt' put much design thought into it actually, and I didn't have the peach pearls I was so keen on (they were too $$ in the store, but now I kinda wish i'd just splurged). Still, I think its nice enough, and I will try to make a fancier one for my orange dress. Its strung on copper beading wire, and I'm not really sure what happend with that front claspy bit, but its functional. Kinda religious looking, too, I guess. I attached the girdle to the dress at some key locations so that it would conform to the points (beth's idea). The pic has them pinned down, rather than sewn. I got impatient.

girdle

Oh, and since I was fiddling with the waist of my dress, I attached the utility loops to carry my accessories. Here's a pic of them in action with my purse and cup. I'll likely add a flag fan to that group, and I'll still have one extra loop in case I think of anything else. Oh, and in this pic you can see the way the hem turned out, and the beginning of how the sleeves look with pearls on the intersection.

I'm calling this done. Sure, there are pearls left for sleeves, but that is a carride chore for when hubby drives, which is fairly often. I have NOT one single fiddly bit left. This dress is FINITO!!
Tomorrow I start working up the orange. Huzzah!

Liberal Interpretations

2005-05-20T19:39:00.000-04:00

Since I was trying to pull and all-nighter last night, I thought I'd keep myself awake by sewing. I decided to tackle the aforementioned fiddly bits and also start on the bag/purse for me to carry my goodies around the fest like a lady.

Now, I don't really know, well, anything, about venetian purses. I vaguely remember the topic coming up at some odd time or another, and there is evidence of purses, but I have no idea regarding styles thereof. This is where I get to be liberal and artistic. In period, seamstresses would no doubt have tiny little remnants of the lush venetian fabrics, yes? Well, I had some scraps and large swatches of various fabrics I am fond of, and rather than just keeping them to look at, I decided to incorporate them into a sort of strip-quilted bag. The bag is simple: strips sewn together to make a big rectangle, circle with interface stiffening for the bottom of the bag, light pink tafetta lining (light so i can see whats in there when i take a peek). So basically a glorified pouch with drawstring action. The bonus is that I can use it with both dresses.

bag
The only fiddly bit I've got left on the green dress is to add some utility loops in the folds of the skirt around the waist so I can carry goodies (like bag, cup, fan) sans hands. Oh, and I might add pearls to the sleeves, but that is most definitely NOT a requirement.

I decided to just do one 2 inch strip of red guard a bit up from the bottom hem of the dress instead of my previously planned wide bottom guard.. Why? Becuase when I hemmed it I was too lazy to cut out excess fabric (and also afraid of cutting in case i screwed up the hem. I ended up with a wide pillowcase hem, which i conveniently covered with the guard. Brilliant. It also adds a nice weight to the skirt bottom.

pillowhem incognito

Fiddly Bits

2005-05-19T09:51:00.000-04:00

Ah, how I hate the "fiddly bits." I've got a running list of little, but not-as-inconsequential-as-I'd-like things to do before the green is officially done. Foremost on that list is the hem and bottom guard. Then I've got some loose guard on the bodice to sew down, need to serge the inside of the skirt where I sliced off the lining, so it doesn't fray. Need to cut a bunch of loose threads--particularly the leftover threads of cartridge pleating. Need to sew a couple more hook n eyes on the skirt front slit to keep it from opening. Need to make some sort of pouchy/purse. Need to make pearly girdle to accessorize, and a flag fan. I did, at least, finally finish that dreaded roped petticoat. Man, am I tired of pink. After all my little list is done, I can go onto greener, or oranger, rather, pastures....

Last night, after complaining to Niter that I hadn't sewn all day and being bummed about it, I decided to get off my tushy and fix that problem. So at 12am I started sewing. I finished my sleeves. They are now hemmed on the bottom and trimmed with the thin black grossgrain ribbon around the wrist, and hopefully the right length that the ruffle from my camica sleeve sticks out just so. I might fiddle with putting pearls on the intersections of the ribbon. but i counted, and I don't currently have enough pearls. So that'll wait til i've got a long car trip and someone else is driving. ;-)

Oh, and a shout out to Em! My wonderous sister came over yesterday morning, helped me lace into the whole getup, and pinned up my sleeves and skirt--a very long process. So, that is ready to hem. And on my to-do list for this evening.

No pics, boring post. Poor readers. Sorry.

Horrors of Pre-Washing

2005-05-16T09:42:00.000-04:00

So Friggin scary. This weekend I did precious little sewing. But I thought it would be extra smart of me to prewash my orange dress fabric and linings so that I could get a jumpstart on them as soon as mistress green is hemmed. Now, I'm aware that my fabric is some sort of synthetic. And I'm also aware that the manufacturer's instructions would most likely read "dry clean only." But I am a brave soul apparently, and threw my 5.75 yds into the washer on cold-cold permanent press cycle (I guess that actually qualifies as sorta brave, and sorta wimpy). Imagine my horror when nervous me peeked into the washer to find the water and frothy suds PINK.

pinksuds. ACK!

"Its okay," I tell myself as I have visions of my $13/yd fabric coming out mottled and ruined, or at the very least not the color I originally intended. "We wash because we EXPECT some dye leaching, and need to get rid of it so it doesn't ruin our pretty underthings..." Right. Um, but a very stressful time, nonetheless. Still, I figured the primary damage was already done, and that I should just wash it until the water ran clear so as to keep my camica (which i quite love, actually) from turning pink should i sweat at our 90+ degree MD renfests. Not that I sweat. An old highschool friend once told me that women don't sweat. They GLOW...

TWELVE!!!! washes later (some with and some without soap, some with massive amounts of salt cuz I read that helps set the dye), and the water was ALMOST clear. I figured I should stop tapping our nation's limited water resources for something as "trivial" as preserving my camica and corset in their white and beige-ness, respectively. Here is my not-so-fun science experiment. The last cup is still tinged, but hell, its good enough.

water samples--I took one at the rinse cycle of most of my washes, except for the ones where i missed it or left if unattended (hey, a girl's got to get out on the weekends). SIGH, the stress (and dress) was oozing. Poor hubby.

However, I'm glad to report that my fabric came out looking close to normal--a tad faded, and a tad less fuzzy int he velvet parts, and the lint all over it to explain why. Its 5 3/4 yardage is currently spread over my ironing board, clothes drying rack and a chair hang drying. I was DEFINITELY not risking dryer-related stress. I'm so tempted to dub this a dry-clean only dress once finished. It will need some major lint removal when its dry. Luckily I am well-prepared for lint removal as a result of the fru-fru-fluffy girly-man doggie.

And, for a non-stressful story: the only sewing I did this weekend, despite best intentions. Rings on my straps for to tie on my sleeves. Huzzah.

sleeve rings

I actually was motivated enough to mark all over my petticoat for additionaly cording, but i was a dolt and used the "disappearing" side of my fabric pen. So by the next morning when my sewing time came round, my work had abandoned me. Doh!

WristyCuffs

2005-05-13T00:30:00.001-04:00

Finished the camica today. Finally. I've been letting it languish, cuz i had a secret fear that the neckline band i embroidered for hours and hours was too small. However, I think it turned out to be a decent size. I coulda made it a little bit wider, but its more than functional as is. I love the way my curly edging turned out, even though manipulating it around the sewing machine was an asspain. But it looks just like that portrait from waaaaay back in my blog. Finally.

And how did I end up working the wristycuffs? They had to be expandable so i could get my chubby little hands through. And i wasn't in the mood for eyelets. I ended up with ribbon loops on one side and loose ribbons on the other. Works for me, and I think its kinda cute.

I was planning on doing a straight stitch in the rust color around the edge of the cuffs to make a border and cover the machine stitiching. But I'm also kinda liking it sans border. Thoughts, anyone?

Also, I managed to attach the ribbons to my sleeves for attachment. They won't be this long, and they won't remain loops, but I need to make the points of attachment on the dress, and i'll do all necessary trimming then. Each ribbon will also get a cutesty little pearl at the bottom.

Here are both sleeves completed (except for bottom hem) on the dress. Notice how i gracefully lift one arm to show off the camica poof ( great idea, beth). Also note the curly edge of my camica sleeve peeking out from the bottom of the green sleeve. I'm gonna hem the sleeves to the ideal length for this. I think its cute, like a ruff, and I didnt' even have to make a real ruff. Mwaaaah-ha-ha-ha-haaaa.

And what happens when i wear my dress sans sleeves with the new super fabricy camica? Well, the extra sleeve fabric is so much that it covers my hands. I fix that by pulling said sleeves through the straps and looking a little Dangerous-Beauty-esque. Functional. And I really did see this in a portrait on Realm of Venus on the camica page. Notice my loyal hound:

All that's left are the sleeve attachments and hem. Before I hem I need to complete the roped petticoat. So, petticoat is my plan for tomorrow. I've also got accessories to do: fan, veil?, partlet, girdle, purse, but i can do those a bit more slowly, and they're not ABSOLUTELY necessary to wear the dress. ;-) SOOO close to done. sorta.

Well on my Way to Spider(WO)man

2005-05-12T00:33:00.000-04:00

Finished the second sleeve tonight. It went much faster than the first. I only buggered up one part of the ribbon, right in the center, and was unwilling to rip in from all the edges to fix it. Clear nail polish did the trick. and you can't tell. Its in the pic. You'll never find where! Anyway, I attempted to mirror image the sleeves as precisely as I could (niter should love this), and I'm sorta proud of the (near) symmetry. hehe. And doesn't this look like part of a green spiderman costume?

I finally started sewing the neckline blackwork band onto my camica. Finishing my sleeves inspired me, as I need the REAL camica to do the poofing through the pearly slits. Huzzah!

One Down. Mostly.

2005-05-11T01:01:00.002-04:00

Tonight I worked on the lattice for my left sleeve. Honestly, once I got into it, the process wasn't that hard, and it only took a couple of hours. One nights work/sleeve is bearable, i think. And I'm very pleased with the result:

I will have to attach ribbons and whatnot to tie the sleeves on (right now its merely pinned). And i need to hem the wrist part, but that also will wait until i've got it tied on so i know the length better.
Note below, that my grids do not line up perfectly along the inside of my arm seam. I am far to lazy to do THAT much math. Just be happy the lines are straight, niter!
I also stole the sleeve opening idea from Beth, and tacked the sleeves together along this seam with pearls down the length. This is for my camica to poof through. This is my old camica, so there's not nearly as much fabric to pull through. I expect this look to get better when I finally finish gathering and butting cuffs/neckline on my camica.

And for buttpucker giggles. A better quality pic of what my buttpucker is doing now. Still there, still annoying, but no longer poking my arse, and I'm at a loss to fix it. I honestly believe its a design flaw. My point is so sudden in the back that I think it makes too much stress. On my next dress, i will make the point slope much more gradual (a la Beth's dress), and I really do think that will fix the problem. This was supposed to be a learning experience, afterall....

buttpucker

Lose Pounds In Seconds!

2005-05-09T18:47:00.000-04:00

Sounds like an infomercial. However, its exactly what I did to my dear green "practice" dress today. I've been concerned with the excessive weight of the dress for spring/summer use. It was formerly checking in as a heavyweight at 7.2 pounds. Today I cut out the flirty, red skirt lining, and the dress was magically slimmed by 2.4 pounds. Thats a full 1/3 decrease for those of you up to doing the fractions....

The dress is wonderfully light in my hands now, and much easier to maneuver around the sewing machine. It also means i've got oodles of red fabric just in case I need it for any other projects--sleeves, pouch/purse, flagfan? The only catch is that now I have to be careful about lifting my skirts when I wear the dress, unless I want to expose my picnic like checkers on the inside of the green fabric. Still, I think that trade is worth the heat regulation. Now the dress is a slim 4.8 lbs. Not counting extensive undergarments, of course.... For a 10 second scissor-induced-diet, that's not bad at all!

In other news, I've been working on ironing out some of my fit issues. Primary on the list is that annoying butt-pucker. Today I removed that part of the cartridge pleated skirt (goodbye hard-won handstitching, I shall be doing more soon, i suppose), and have removed about an inch of the boning to relieve some of the pressures and strain in that area (not to mention keeping said boning from poking me immediately above my, um, crevice). I also found what I think is the source of my problem--the lining and outer fabric were not the same width, so it was making "weirdness." I was hoping all that would fix it. Unfortunately, mr. pucker didn't go away completely, though it is undeniably better than it was. Sorry for the horrid picture quality, but hubby wasn't home tonight, and I'm not so good at the yoga mistress thing (as I think we've already covered). I especially like how it looks like there's a toothbrush stuck to my bum.

buttpucker. ooh, it sounds so dirty..... I really am at a loss as to how to fix this now. But its no longer uncomfy, so I may just suck it up and deal. Unless my accomplices can help me the next time i see them. chuckle. Up for night-before-event-sewing, anyone?
The next issue is getting the front "slit" to come together nicely at the point of the V, and to hide that skirt slit in the front. Hook N Eye closures are wonderfee for both issues.

hooks and eyes help hold the skirt closed, even when the dress isn't laced. I'd say that's effective, wouldn't you?

I also worked on pinning the ribbon lattice to my sleeves. I decided to go with a larger grid than in my original pictures. For sanity as well as for ribbon-conservation. I've only got one sleeve so far, and its only pinned, not sewn, but I'm liking this look a lot. Hopefully will be able to sew this soon. Unfortunately, tomorrow night is out of commission for me, as I have to attend my little sister's concert. Note that this little lattice scares me. I just know its gonna move all around and be an asspain to sew. Simple. Hah.

sleeve

Sleeve Experiment

2005-05-05T00:16:00.000-04:00

My green fabric has a black checkered pattern on one side. I've decided to see what happens if i take advantage of this on my sleeves. Note that I'm planning on just doing straight sleeves that tie on, and will pull the camica out between sleeve and dress. I will most likely try a dressier style sleeve on my orange dress, but this is my "dress down" venetian, so I'm going simpler.

I went to the fabric store and bought ribbon. My original plan was to buy red/pinky ribbon to match the guards on my dress, but pitiful fabric store did not have that color. So I went safe and bought black. I decided to sew a lattice of the ribbon onto the green fabric following the existing checked lines. This is what the lattice is looking like so far:

I dunno. The effect is cool, but its kinda busy, as the existing grid is kinda small. I will think on it some more. I suppose i could do the same thing in a larger grid (more green space) on the nonpatterned side of the fabric.

Of course, I don't even know how period the crisscross pattern is. The only evidence I can find is this, from 1540's:

Huzzah!

2005-05-04T14:05:00.003-04:00

Okay, so that's some premature celebration, since I still have to finish the camica, petticoat, sleeves, partlet, girdle, hemming....But at least I have a pretty dress that all can look at. Okay, I suppose the pretty part is a tad subjective, but if you disagree, you're wrong. ;-)

Anyway, I've been thinking about how to wear my split front dress, as the layering options can be difficult if one wishes to wear a corset and a camica. I know that typically the camica is worn immediately under the dress so the fabric shows on the front split. But I've also seen evidence that there were sometimes more intricate things under the ladder lacing. Like this one:

Sort of like a stomacher?

Since my corset is of a decorative fabric, I'm thinking it could work in the above fashion, and it might solve some of my layering issues. What do you think?:

Front view. I folded up the bottom hem for shits and giggles so I could get a better idea of what it'll look like after hemming. So really, this is pretty much what it'll look like finished (plus sleeves). I might add a second guard to the bottom a bit above the wide bottom one. Depends on fabric availability and motivation. I think I've decided not to add the second guard to the bodice for now. This is based mostly on laziness, but technically there were more votes to not add it anyway! ;-)

Here's the back. I thought about adding guards down the side back seams but then thought better of it. Note that my collar guards aren't as symmetrical i like, but i'm dealing for now. I figure I can't see it, and if it really bothers me later I'll fix it. ;-)

And now for the super nitpicky stuff. This bottom bothers me right now. The skirt slit does not come together right. I'll play with the slit (chuckle) and try to loosen the gathering strings so it comes together more attractively. If not, hook and eye will be the answer...

Here is the butt. It is giving me issues. The strange pucker on the point gets to me. I think its an artifact of the weight of the skirt and the way one must attach the cartridge pleating. even the strong boning down the middle of my back can't keep this from puckering in. The outcome is that its poking me right above my buttcrack. Yes, I know that is graphic. Sorry. But I welcome advice on how I might go about fixing this?

stupid butt

And my other nitpicking. Because I attached the lacing strips behind the egdge of boning on the bodice, I'm finding that the very edge has a tendency to bend out, so if you look form the side you can see in. I don't like this. I may have to sew on some ribbon to lace through secondarily just to hold down this edge. Something that can wait and isn't a huge issue, but I will get around to it eventually.

nitpick

Mismatched Guards Are Period. I Hope.

2005-05-04T00:20:00.001-04:00

Well, as promised, I worked on attaching the skirt to the bodice. That is now finished, though I'm unhappy with some aspects of it. I'll have to talk about that on a later post where i have a pic of me in it....

For now, here is the mighty....interesting...handsewing of the skirt to the bodice bottom, and also a good shot of how i cheated for the lacing inside. Ribbon strip that was pre-eyeleted. I had intended this only for practice lacings, but I'm feeling lazy, and no one can see this when I wear the dress. Its inside, afterall....

lacing/cartridge

I was too lazy to lace it on this evening, but below's a pic of my progress thus far. The bodice, as you can see, is attached. And I cut guards from my red floral fabric. They were 2.5 inches wide before hemming, so I figure they're around 2 now. In retrospect, I figure i could've matched the floral patterns, but its probably more period not to, since they would've been scraps anyway.

I sewed as much on with the machine as was possible (around the boning) and then made sorry attempts at handsewing the rest. The handsewn bits amuse me. Especially when seen next to the machine stitches. hehe.

And here is my conundrum open to popular vote. I now have one guard. Shall i leave it as is, or add a second thinner guard a la this photo? I'm waiting to tally answers!

hmmm?

Venetian Neglect

2005-05-02T21:37:00.000-04:00

Yes, I've been blatantly neglecting my dress diary for sometime. I apologize to any "regular" readers that I may have disappointed during my time off. I was sick of handsewing the skirt onto the bodice, and had to put away for quite sometime. I did use the time to alter some cute clothes I picked up on shopping trips--"tall" pants were on sale (i usually buy "short"), and rather than miss out, i figured i'd buy em and hem to my short legs. I also finished the blackworking for my camica, but still need to attach the bands to the camica.

This weekend I had my wisdome teeth removed, and I figured that the painkillers could take the edge off of jaw pain AND handsewing....

With this in mind, I decided that the original way that I was attaching the skirt was more work than I cared to do and was overly complicated. I ripped it all out and decided to attach the cartridge pleated skirt the old fashioned way (like this). I think I might have made more work in the end, when you account for all the seam ripping. Oh well, I never said pain killers made me LOGICAL....

I also started cutting and attaching guards from the red floral fabric to put on the bodice. Tonight I'm working to attach the skirt to bodice and to attach the guards to bodice. No pics yet, but as soon at its reasonably together, I will post some.

I Couldn't Resist

2005-04-07T21:48:00.000-04:00

Yup, only kinda getting close to finished attaching the skirt, but I couldn't resist lacing myself in to see what it looks like. Thus far, I'm pleased. I attached the inner lining of the bodice (with finished edge) to the inner most side of the cartridge pleats:

attaching

I plan on attaching the other edge of the cartridge pleating further up the inner bodice. This will keep that folded edge flush on the bodice, and I think will provide skirt lift. If not, it will just mean lots of extra hand stitching, but that's okay--it'll be sturdier. Its all about the learning.... Once the skirt is fully attached , I will sew the outer bodice edge down for a clean finish--no doubt this will be hand sewn too, as my sewing machine is not super enough for the cartridge pleated bulk. So yes, there is actually a lot more work before the skirt is officially attached. Then hemming and putting guards on. So--kinda close to finished, and kinda not. ;-) Still nice to have a pic of what is starting be be a whole dress!

Here's the dress so far:

Still obviously needs hemming...I don't like the way the boning tabs stick up on the lacing edges--its actually straigt, but the boning bends out from my body and makes it look funny in pics. Don't know how to deal with that, so I'm just leaving it as is for the moment...
As for the skirt split under the bodice: had to split it to get it on, but I don't like the gap. I will have to add some hook and eyes to close it once I'm in. And maybe a green panel behind so as to not indecently show my underwear!

Also, this dress is HEAVY! Not exactly a hot weather dress, by the feel of it. Linen, here I come....

Weekend On My Butt...

2005-04-03T17:02:00.000-04:00

doing blackwork and watching movies, of course. This weekend I've used the free on demand movies for all they're worth. Hidalgo (okay), You Got Served (horrible--worst dialogue ever), A Guy Thing (amusing enough, and I really like julie stiles), .com for Murder (horrid), Little Women (a classic), Daddy Day Care (very cute), The Big Bounce (classic Owen Wilson--he plays the same character in every movie), Boat Trip, which I'm positive is NOT one of Cuba's sparkliest gems-- it was hilarious for the wrong reasons. I just finished Jersey girl which was a heart felt movie about dad and daughter despite it being hideously ben and j-lo. So, yes, I obviously watched a LOT of movies and so had time for much blackworking. I also ate more than my fair share of chocolate. Good for the soul.

Anyway, I've finished both wrist cuffs, and am respectably into the neckline band. The neckline has proven more challenging than expected due to its small size and the bleeding nature of my fabric marker. Its rather imperfect, but still just fine with me. ;-) These will all get straight borders in the rust after they're sewn onto my camica. Hopefully a project I'll delve into this week.

blackwork

Hubby was away, and I had high hopes for finishing a bunch of loose ends this weekend, like finishing some extra cording on the petticoat and perhaps the camica. So I figured I should finish the neckline blackwork before I could do the camica, and the whole weekend has been that. Hehe. Its nice to just sit and watch movies. Those other loose ends will wait.

I did manage to get out for a while yesterday and do some fabric shopping (yes, again), and FINALLY got the rotary cutter i've been slated for (even gave it its maiden voyage cutting the camica neckline above). I left the fabric store with underskirt material (3 yd remnant for $2/yd) which is blatently shiny and synthetic, and kinda looks like grandma curtains. But the backside has that slubby dull sheen silk look, so I'm going with it. I like the color--its the peach on the right. I also picked up a yard of orange texturey velvet (top) in case I get desperate for extra material for the sleeves--as we know my main dress fabric is limited. If I don't end up needing it, it can live its life as a large tote bag or something.

fabrics

Wish I Were a Yoga Master

2005-03-30T12:25:00.000-05:00

Or mistress, I suppose.
Why?
Cuz last night I finished tacking my cartridge pleated skirt onto my makeshift waistband, and i can't get into it. Here is an amusing pic of me trying:

yoga
Since I can't yet model the skirt on my waist, hubby and I decided if I modeled like this i could be Van Helsing or Amadeus. Incidentally, this also gives a good idea of how much too long I made the skirt...Some major hem is required:

crazy skirt

Of course, I knew I was gonna have to split the skirt to get into it for real wear. But I was hoping to be able to wriggle in and out for the practice dress so I wouldn't have to split the back sides and then repair them later and split the front when I alter the dress to front lacing.

Beth has suggested a leap of faith where i assume the bodice fits. well, it certianly seems too.... and start the ladder laced alteration now to only have to split the skirt once. I'm quite tempted...

Here's a pic of my tacking the cartridge pleated skirt to the waistband. I did three tacking stitches per pleat. Right sides together...

cartridge tacking

Final matter:

Beth, here are my latest blackwork designs. I did the design alteration I was thinking of on the flaming onions--this way you can pick between two. This pic also has a background grid--look at the zoomed pic for more detail. Please note, though, that the grid we drew it on was 20 square/inch, and the grid in this pic is 10. But it will still give you a good idea of scale. The 20 square/inch was too pixelated to see in pics.

blackwork designs. Includes neckline idea, lemme know what you think.

Luting

2005-03-28T11:30:00.000-05:00

A small tangent from costuming. But its Ren-related, so I think appropriate to post here. I have become enamoured with the idea of getting a lute and learning to play upon it. My dad and I started researching this weekend, and he's going to try to find out more from one of his friends that owns one. We're not sure if he plays yet, but if he does, all the better, as I'd have someone to ask questions. Teaching myself is fine, but knowing there is someone to go to when i'm stuck is better. ;-) Anyway, I shall not bore others with too much of my research, but it looks as if a 6-7 course lute is the way to go for the period (meaning 6-7 pairs of strings), and last night I started searching for lute/vocal music for purchasing.

I know, I know. A bit early to buy the music before the lute, right? Well....I actually found out how to tune myclassical guitar to lute tunings, and so could get a jump start if I want. Which I do. Now I just need to find my pesky guitar capo. I think it has resurfaced a few times since the move, but I've no idea where to look for it. I may be visiting the music store today.

If I get my way, this will be me: (maybe)

Detail of fresco from Realm of Venus

Oh, and if anyone reading this diary ( I know there are a few besides niter and beth) know anything about lutes, I would greatly appreciate helpful hints!

Blackwork By Design

2005-03-28T00:09:00.000-05:00

This weekend was spent both working on my own blackwork and trying to design some for Beth. Graphic design hubby was of great help on the adobe graphy program he had, since its much easier to erase on that than it is on graph paper with a crappy pencil eraser (pencils can be hard to come by in this house). It also makes for a much nicer picture on my blog. teehee.

The following designs are all Beth possibilities. I took the idea of the pomegranates that she seemed to favor, then did one pomegranate design and then totally disregarded pomegranites to persue what I'm calling the flaming onion. Actually, it was supposed to be some sort of artichoke pomegranite hybrid, so it can also be called the artigranite, the pomechoke, and hubby calls it a flaming pineapple. Its clearly got identity issues... Speaking of which,Beth-- please lemme know if you'd rather purity in your pomegranates, rather than mutants thereof. I'm a radiation biologist and have a little thing for mutation.

Anyway, Beth, please look these over, decide if you like any of them, or elements thereof, would like me to tweak, or like me to try again ;-) I will not tell you which one I like best, but I can tell you that I am not 100% happy with any yet. Therefore, if you are not super fond of any, believe me, I understand and will go back the drawing board, or graph paper, or adobe or whatnot. Also, when we do come up with a wristy cuff you like I can work up a neckline deal using similar themes. I figure that'll save designing necklines for all these possibilities until we actually find one you'd like to work with.

These are all right around 2 inches. I'm sorry, I couldn't bring myself to do 3 inches cuz 2 inches looked huge to me. But if you want bigger, just tell me to supersize it. ;-)

hrm...I suppose I'll tell my inspirations. The twisty bit/frame on the two outer designs are from Dragonbear's Italian sampler, though it appeared there with acorns, and we modified it a bit. The pomegranite in the left most design is a not quite as stylish version of one found on Kateryn de Develyn's spanish sampler (its black on the sampler). I tried to do the super stylish one in this design, but it didn't fit well in the twisty background. Actually, I wouldn't mind using this pomegranite design plugged into something else, as I think its loverly. If you move your eyes to the right of that spanish sampler by kateryn, you find my inspiration for flaming onions in green.
The middle design combines flaming onions and an alternative pomegranite as seen on Blackwork archives. The left is obviously same background as first, but uses flaming onions instead of pomegranites. The thing I like about the flaming onion is the shape kinda mimics some of the Italian fabric prints.

Anyway, enough for now. Its bed time. Easter chocolate has kept me up past normal sleepiness, but if i don't sleep, work tomorrow will be torture. Of course, it'll probably be torture regardless...

Blackwork

2005-03-27T01:40:00.000-05:00

Pre-Easter at the in-laws provided much time for blackworking. Mostly cuz hubby and his brother were engrossed in video games. This was fine by me, however, as I got to listen to the game narrative and background music, which was conveniently somewhat period luting. The game was Bard's Tale, and I found it fitting to work on dress details during. ;-) I also got to stitch while my MIL knitted and we watched home decorating shows and ate chocolate. Oh, the decadence....

I am almost finished one of my wrist cuffs. I ended up picking a rusty brown embroidery? thread (I used 3 strands of the 6-strand stuff you usually use for cross-stitch). I cut a strip of iron-on interfacing for the cuff stability ( my camica fabric is really flimsy, and I think I needed more structure). The wrist bands are 1.5 inches wide. I drew the blackwork design on them with wash off fabric marker. Luckily, 1 layer of camica fabric and 1 of interfacing were fairly transparent, so this was simply a matter of tracing. Here's my progress so far. Its most certainly got that hand done look. But thats the point, right?

blackwork

As you can see, I decided to get "fancy". I filled in the diamonds with some yellow thread I had in my bag which happens to be the same yellow thread I used to do the edging on my camica neckline and sleeve bottoms. Why? Mostly cuz I only brought one wrist cuff for the weekend and I finished it more quickly than expected and wanted more busy work. I also thought the yellow would tie in with the edging and look nice. Period? I dunno. But I like it.

Then I finished the yellow and still had time to kill, so I decided to go back and add the middle lines in the x/flower bits. Luckily, we're back from in-laws and I've prepared my next cuff, so I won't be tempted to add more embellishment on it. I think its borderline "busy" already. hehe. The only thing they will get besides what you see above will be two straight lines on either side for a border. This will be conveniently placed over the sewing machine lines I'll get when I attach the cuffs to the sleeves...

Whew!

2005-03-24T00:36:00.000-05:00

Cartridge'd!!!

All three lines of stitching in, and I pulled them up to cinch it--couldn't resist seeing the effect. What neat little pleats they be!!!

Now I just need to figure out how to attach this massively heavy skirt to my bodice. According to most informative site I've read (Ren Tailor) you have to attach right sides of skirt and FINISHED bodice together. So I guess I have to finish the bodice boning/bottom first... I wonder if its possible to attach the skirt to lining and interlining only and then try to do a cleaner finish between the outer layer of bodice fabric and skirt? I may have to play around a bit. Also, I wanted to steal beth's ideal and do some utility loops around the bodice/skirt seam for attaching useful items--may i ask if there are any tips/tricks to this, dear?

I'm also seriously tempted to throw in a pocket or two. ;-)

Chuckle. I love this!

Progress...

2005-03-23T12:00:00.000-05:00

...is slow. Still, I'm brushing up on my stand up comics today while I work on my 3 lines of running stitch for the cartidge pleated skirt. And it is rather relaxing to just sit on the couch and stitch.

I decided to line the skirt with the first fabric I bought for my courtesan gown (yes, i'm on my third choice now). Its a mauvey-red with purple floral crap. I figured I'd never find another use for it, and it actualy does make a decent lining. It adds a lot of weight, which hopefully means nice drape and making the practice more similar in weight to my real dress, so my practice is more applicable... Here's the fabric, gurgi loves to get in my way when i'm trying to lay massive amounts of fabric flat on my very limited floor space:

fabric--this is where gurgi plopped himself right on the bit of fabric I was trying to measure and mark for pleat stitches. Silly pup--his evil eyes are showing his true colors.

Detail (for me to remember) of the skirt:
1) 3 panels, 58" wide at 53 inches long (plenty of lengh since I dont know how much extra I need for cartridge pleating "poof" and foldover.) I figure based on how much I have to hem this skirt I will know how long to make my real one to conserve as much fabric as possible...
2) lining and dress fabric are sewn together right sides together at the top/waistband with a 2 1/4" hem. When turned right sides out, this will mean the skirt will be 4 layers thick in the area getting cartridge pleated, and thus should make for a fuller gather and more body.

hem--sorry, crappy pic
3) I cut dips out of the top of the waistline that (hopefully) are in rough proportion to where my dips fall naturally in the bodice. The total skirt is 170" circumfrence, and the waist is 38". I worked the dips like this:

skirt dips--hopefully this math works for me, or there will be an ungodly amount of seam ripping. Love my sketch, dont' you? ;-) Its here so I can't lose it.

In other news, I have drafted some blackwork patterns I think I will use on my camicas. I was just gonna use other people's stuff, but then i decided to be creative. ;-) Hell, I've got time....
The skinny swirly one is for the neckline, and the more ornate one is for the wrists. The wrist one is loosely based on an example of Italian blackwork I found on DragonBear.
I may tweak a bit more, but I'm sorta fond of these:

blackwork

No survivor? No CSI? I'll sew, then.

2005-03-17T23:45:00.000-05:00

Yes, all my fave tv shows were moved or ignored for NCAA craziness. Thus my evening was unobstructed sewing. What's funny is how little I actually got done considering how long I had...I was retardedly slow when it came to pinning (and sewing, too, actually) this evening.

Anyway, I cut the outerdress bodice fabric, and finally figured out how to sew the blasted thing together with right sides together and turning inside out without getting hopelessly twisted on itself. Long story. There was a lot of seam ripping involved....

Regardless, here is the bodice as it stands now:

front

I like the shape a lot. This pic is sans fancy corset, so I'd say the boning in the bodice alone is pretty sturdy if i wanna cut back on some layers. I used the cable ties for boning in all my channels except for the boning that goes over the shoulder. For that I used regular old poly boning from Joanns, since I could get that in longer lengths than cable ties. My concern with the bodice "as-is" is that you can see the boning through the outer layer, so I may need to add a little padding layer. Sigh, I was hoping to avoid additional layers. This could be avoided with creative trim, though, as Beth suggested. I will think on it more. Oh yes, and I'm hoping those side wrinkles go away with skirt weight. If not, I will have ot be creative with ridding myself of them.

Here is the back as is:

back

You can see the butt point. its more pronounced than in pics from yesterday, but I still think it could be a bit more so. For the practice dress, I'm happy with this and won't change it. But on the real deal, my plan is to take the side seams further to the sides as they approach the bottom so that the triangle won't be so pinched, and to perhaps lengthen the triangle if the widening doesn't make me happy enough. The two sides on the waist are a bit uneven, but I think that will correct itself when I actually measure as to where I'm sewing the eyelets. This placement was rather cursory.

Also note: These are still my impermanent lacing strips, as I'm not ready to actually put in eyelets. I am still thinking of changing this practice dress to be a ladder laced front, so that would mean I just sew the back seams. So it is likely I will never put real eyelets in this particular model...

Oh, and just cuz i'm tickled with this idea:

straps

This is the result of taking boning up the front sides, through the shoulder straps and down the back. This is just wondeful, and I will definitely be doing this for the real dress. These straps are sturdy, and you can see that they hold their shape very well. They will NOT be slipping of my shoulders, which is great. And added bonus: they push the bosoms in from the sides to (hopefully) eliminate side cleavage while enhancing the sexy little bit in the middle. Italian Rennaissance cleavage enhancement.

Bodice Bruhaha

2005-03-16T23:10:00.000-05:00

Tonight I thought it'd be good to work up my bodice for my practice dress.

I had my lining cut out from yesterday, so I figured I'd do a "final" fitting with it before proceeding. To this end, I sewed the shoulder seams together, basted some eyelet ribbon on (an ingenious find from our fabric store weekend ) and roughly laced it to make sure it fit. It seems workable to me:

back--the wrinkles will go away when there is boning on the lacing edges--ick--pardon the underarm back fat. Hope that doesn't keep happening. The lining is not actually crooked either, that is simply an artifact of the way i crookedly sewed on the lacing strips--hey, I said it was rough..... Contrary to what it looks like, there is a back point, but its kinda lost in the wrinkling--hope that gets better. If the point is still too small (despite lengthing it from my original pattern), I will just make it more pronounced on the "real" dress.

front --good view of the general shape. The shape will no doubt be smoother with boning in and corset under--also more conical(less boob bump). This is a great start, I think. Don't worry, the neckline will be lower once the whole dress is together--I've got some seam allowance still on top there. I like cleavage. ;-) The waistline will come up to a more flattering level when the seams go in, too.

Since the lining was workable, I took to cutting out the interlayer so I could make the boning channels. The interlayer is white denim (leftover from my corset), and was cut with the same bodice pattern. I clean finished the edges to prevent fraying, and pinned my lining and interlayer together. Then I took my ruler to draw my boning lines. These are where I decided to put them--notice, I am gonna try taking the boning up over the shoulders for wide-set strap stability:

boning placement

I went out tonight and bought zipties for cheaper boning. I got some mighty 24 inch long ones, and I think they will work quite nicely (thank you Beth!). Now I just need to find a tool I'm willing to dull cutting them to the right sizes.

Overall, I'm happy with tonight progress. Tomorrow, perhaps I will get as far as cutting out the outer layer of bodice and starting the assembly process. How exciting.

Practice Dress

2005-03-15T11:23:00.000-05:00

Wow. I have just now realized that my blog up to this point has basically been a whole lotta build up and research but not much dress making. Yes, I've sewn some underoos. But now, faced with the prospect of an actual *gasp* dress, I'm quite excited. ;-)

I am starting on my practice dress. The plan is to have the pattern in good working order before I cut up my more expensive fabric. The practice dress will be an army green type color (the plain backside of a lightly patterned cotton/rayon? type fabric I have just sitting around). If I decide to keep it around to use on dress down renfest days, I will be trimming it with some brown scrap fabric I have (using this for the lining, too). Also, once I'm confident that my closed front pattern is in good working order, I may alter the green practice dress (no doubt at a later date) to be a front ladder lacing style, since I think that would be fun to have in my collection.

practice fabric colors. very neutral/natural

Professionally fitted (compliments of beth) pattern in hand, I started cutting out the bodice lining:

lining
Then I realized that it has been since highschool (just about 9 years ago) since I have made any sort of bodice. And when I made that one I had a pattern with directions for dummies, and for all the directions I was too dumb for, my grandma helped. Thus I am not exactly sure how to proceed (how embarrassing). So, I started doing some dress diary research and heavy thinking (takes me a while). I think I am now getting an idea of how I'll actually work the sewing, since I wanna include some boning I will have a lining, then an interlayer, so the boning will go between lining and interlayer. Then I'll sew the actually dress outer fabric on top of all that hubbub. What I'm hoping is that you will not clearly see the boning through the outer layer. If I can, then I'll most likely have to add another layer. But I really would like to keep the layers to a minimum for hot days.

Also, I was struck by an idea I saw on the Semptress's site. In her construction of a pair of bodies, she takes boning all the way up the straps and over the shoulder straight down the back. I realize this may be unorthodox for a dress bodice (rather than an underdress corset deal like she was making), but I really kinda think that doing this will minimize strap slippage. I've read a few dress diary's where strap slippage was an issue, especially since the Venetians were fond of wide-set straps, and I really do wanna presesrve this style but not have to worry about my dress falling off. ;-) I think a cheap poly boning, rigilene, or even zipties (which I am eager to try after seeing beth's corset) are all flexible enough to work for this and still provide a decent structure. I also think having straps with just a little struture will help push my...ahem...assets in, and minimize side-cleavage, which is not exactly the look i'm going for.

Oooh, and brilliant Niter suggested quite a fun litle project to entertain me. After I cut out the bodice lining, she told me to take the negative and put it on my real fabric to get a sense of pattern placement. Of course, it took her a few moments to explain to retarded little me what the "negative pattern" meant--I was stupid and flustered last night. Regardless, it was a wonderous idea, and here is what I came up with-pardon the not exactly straight laying brown, but at least it gives an idea. Loving it.

front-- i think this layout is perfect.

back--still considering this layout, but I kinda like the way the pattern is here, i think i may move the two meeting lines on the design a bit further up the back, though.

FunFilled Weekend

2005-03-13T19:20:00.000-05:00

Greetings to my accomplices--I hope your drive home has been a smooth and enjoyable one--glad you're willing to drive so far for a visit! Oh, and sorry I forgot to give you your return trip chocolates (though that was suspiciously convenient, eh?). I think that means that the next time I come to visit you, I will have to make up for it by bringing you copious chocolates. Thank you again for all the wonderful gifts! I felt like it was Christmas. ;-) And Niter, glad I could unload my velvet upon you. hehe

For those of you not my accomplices, the three of us spent a very relaxing and yet fabric/trim- filled weekend together. We decided (rather at the last minute) to have a weekend of girliness, fabric sales, good food and just a *little* wine and karaoke thrown in for giggles. It was wonderful to finally be able to talk about design concepts in person (and with fabric swatches on hand, I might add). Sipping some great gourmet teas (from adagio.com--see button on left to get a coupon--shameless plug), and munching on strawberries and fancy pants chocolates seemed to complete the decadence of a weekend already dominated by decadent fabrics from various local vendors. The weekend got me psyched to sew again, which I'd been kinda putting off recently. Now I'm definitely feeling more motivated.

I was also extremely happy that the fabric store sales I promised did not leave my dear accomplices empty handed...that would have been not quite as fun, though I think we would've enjoyed ourselves with or without fabric purchases. After all, just looking and getting ideas is entertaining... But purchases are damn satisfying. Chuckle.

My personal "big" find was the fabric that I will slice up to make guard/trim for my dress. It is a dark maroony red wool--very soft and seems pretty fine (or so I think, don't know much about wool, actually). I got just under 2 yards of it (remnant), and I'm certain I will make that amount work for my purposes. Now that I have the main dress fabric and the trim, I will start considering the fabric to make my underskirt--currently I'm leaning towards trying a peachy golden hue, but I've not actually seen the three together, so that could change. Below is a pic of my orange dress fabric and red guard material. Notice how dear, long-haired Gurgi had to sit on the fur-attracting wool ASAP. I also bought two little fabric swatches that I'm considering for use in making flag fans or pursey-pouches. I don't really know their fate yet, but I liked em, and now they're mine. ;-)

dark red wool trim

A big bonus of our time together(for me at least) was that I had my bodice roughdraft pattern pinned up to fit me properly, and now I'm drafting the "final" pattern--thank you so much for your patience in helping me out with that, girls--especially Beth!! Hopefully, this means that in the next few days I will get a move on cutting out some bodice bits for my practice dress, and perhaps even *gasp* do some sewing!
Here is my pattern. I altered my corset pattern to get the general shape size, and experimented with adding the straps/back side lacing until I came up with something reasonable. Then dear friends helped me make it actually fit. Also, I love leftover christmas wrapping paper for pattern drafting. hehe

Trim Color Clarification

2005-03-06T13:35:00.000-05:00

Ah, for my accomplices. I know its hard to visualize my color choices from my drawings, especially on internet/wacky computer colors. This should give a better idea.

Here is what it would be like in the first sketch--my fabric with bold redhuedpurple trim. I think this looks very rich and sumptuous:

This is what I had in mind for the second sketch--orange velvet trim, but with a band of the purple:

And just for shits and giggles: what it would be like if the purple weren't there at all (less rich in color palette, i think). I am fairly certain i wouldn't go for this:

Me, the Ex-Commitment Phobe

2005-03-05T13:57:00.000-05:00

Yes, I admit it. I have been fabric commitment-phobic for the past few nights. Sad to admit, but fabric anxiety has caused mild insomnia and much anxiety during the wakeful hours. Hell, I even dreamed of fabric...

But today I did it. I bought it. And there is no turning back, cuz this store doesn't accept returns under 10 yards. And seeing as there were only 5.5 yrds to be had, I'm well under their return policy limit. I am stuck with it. And I love it. I have looked at, oh, 8 diferent fabric stores (but who's counting) in the last 4 days. And not a single fabric I saw that could hold a candle to this one was less than 30 bucks a yard (often much higher). So, despite spending more than I wanted (I still refuse to admit my splurge--believe me that it was nowhere near 30 bucks a yard), I got the best fabric for the cheapest I could find while still being thrilled with my fabric. Best compromise I could make really.

So, here it is:

Above, in sunlight, or natural light, I suppose...

With the camera flash on. Brings out the bronzy/cinnamon/browness.

I am somewhat concerned with the amout of yardage I have--5.5 yards (nice man only charged me for 5). I would rather have 6-7 to account for pattern matching and give a fuller skirt (hell, I had 8 of the velvet). But I know that if I'm careful, I can make this work. I also have a few tricks up my sleeve for fabric conservation--large swath of complimentary fabric along the bottom to lessen the yardage towards lenght for the skirts, and similar large swaths up the sides of the split skirt. I am also considering sleeves in predominantly or all complimentary fabric instead of the pricey stuff, if necesary. Or, I figure strip sleeves can easily be done using scraps from cutting if i'm careful.

Now for the fun part! Since I have new fabric, I get to come up with new design concepts. This means I get to break out the expensive colored pencils from my college artclass, which I always find fun.

I made up these two sketches:
I think I am more fond of the left one, as the deep reddishpurple seems more sultry and courtesan like to me (for more correct colors see 4th pic in previous post--middle purply red on my orange swatch). If I used this combo, I'd try to find a peachy underskirt fabic similar in color to the background of the dress fabric.

The one on the right I made with the peach/orange velvet in mind (4th pic previous post, top peachy velvet) for the bands on the bottom and sides of the skirt. While I like the idea it seems less impactful than the deep red-purple (at least in the sketches).

And just because it was cute that he helped: here is what adam would do (I'm considering it)--make the bottom/side skirt swaths match the dark detail of the dress fabric and do a gold underskirt. I'm clearly a better quality color-er, dont you think? (Not true really, as he was an art major, but he just didn't spend much time on this.) my concner with this is that it'd be harder to match the dress color than to just intentionally buy something different (like the purple). I'm afraid if I try to match and fail it will look as such.

adamsketch

Fabric Craziness

2005-03-03T17:44:00.000-05:00

Its official. I've gone fabric nutters! Let me bring you all up to speed. I have recently been not up to sewing my dress. Why? Well, I think its partly because I'm not sufficiently excited about my fabric (also cuz I've been busy, but you know...). So I've arranged a mutually beneficial fabric swap with an accomplice, and I've been questing for the "perfect" fabric...

Though the red velvet is lush I have never quite gotten over the fact that its not the color I wanted (the one it was in the store vs the one it is in sunlight and in normal houselighting). But I've also noticed courtesan-accomplice-friend looking up fabrics suspiciously similar to my velvet. Yes, slightly different shades of red but similar. Why? Because she has secretly coveted my fabric and I've known it all along... ;-) So I've decided, why have two similar dresses in a closeknit group of three when we could have 3 spectacularly different ones? You see, this situation gives me the perfect "out" from my fabric. I sell velvet to accomplice, and she is happy. I buy fabic I like better, and I am happier. Plus we get the benefit of all looking unique in our courtesan threesome.

So today I went shopping. I didn't buy anything. But I had fun badgering sales people for swatches. There is one store left to explore for Saturday, but here are my current contenders:

Front sides of all. that orangy one is really not that bright orange, but the flash reflected off it funny. Love the orange, its my fave--but also the priciest (and i am worried that the store doesn't have enough yardage--they informed me its the last of the stock). I put the orange on hold and will call them tomorrow to have 'em measure exactly how much they have--guy at the counter estimated 5-6. I think I can eek out a dress with 6 yards, less if i must, but really I don't wanna go much lower than 5.5. Cartidge pleating takes a bit, afterall... (the soup can is for online color assessment--stole the idea off ebay).

In the sunlight--this is more the "true" color of the orange fabric, except that the burgundy on it is lost in this pic, and in person its more like the first pic. So, combine the orange from this pic and the red on it in the first and you've got the fabric I'm currently lusting after...

Above are the backsides of all the fabrics (just as a point of interest) and some trim options--I'm liking the purple and orange idea right now. Sounds weird, but I really think it could work if done correctly. Niter--Don't you DARE say its hokie colors. You'll ruin my whole dress for me. I'll cry. I swear I'll cry.

frontsides and trim

orange and burgundy close--again, its not really that orange. I love the orange cuz its like a cut velvet. Very period. The background is like a dupioni silk look in terra cotta, and the burgundy is raised fuzzy velvet.

Here's the multicolored one up close. I love this color combo, and it would make the purple/orange trim options work quite well. The problem is that there are only 5 yards. Which makes it kinda last resort--its on hold just in case. I'd also like to mention that this one's woven design seems the least authentically period of the three.

Here's the burgundy/gold one up close. I am quite fond of it. They had 41 yards at the store, so yardage certainly won't be an issue. This is my surefire backup if the orange is too little yardage and I don't find anything better come my last fabric store foray on saturday. The slashy design in the burgundy background seems a little unperiod, but its subtle, and I still think this fabric could work spectacularly. The full print on it is gorgeously period--you can't assess its splendor from a small swatch.

Wish me luck on Saturday. To Rockville to visit the TWO STORY fabric store. I'm excited. Its supposedly huge. I've never been.

Roped Petticoat

2005-02-24T21:21:00.000-05:00

With my pink petticoat shell assembled, I trekked out during the beginning of today's snowstorm in search of cotton cord. My previous choice, a sisal rope, was a bit too thick after washing, plus I was worried it was the wrong material and besides, it kinda smelled funny. Cotton cord sounded like a good choice. The problem is that my deficient Jo-anns carries nothing of the sort (at least that I could find). Neither did Home Depot. So I decided to check out the camping section of Walmart for ropes. No luck. But as I happened by the hampers and clotheshangers, I thought....clotheslines...And behold, 100 ft of 3/16 inch cotton clothesline for under 3 bucks. Yay! So I got home and got to washing it for the preshrink, and unlike my previous rope it stayed just the right size....

Cord washed and dried, I decided to incorporate some rope right into the hem of the skirt (hemming and cording all in one? sounds like less work, and I'm a fan of that!). I decided to go with a wide hem, and I sewed 4 lines of the cord right into the hemline. I think it looks kinda space age-y, but cute, and it does add that extra stiffness that I think the bottom should have.

After the hem was complete, I started in on making the ribbon channels of cording to spiral up the skirt. I made the front of the skirt have evenly spaced ribbons going straight across, and did the spiraling-up-to-a-new-level on the back half of the skirt. This is so that the crookedness is not visible from the front. Why you ask? Well, I figured the skirt is pink, the ribbon is mauve, and the whole combo is kinda cute. So if its a nasty hot day I can cut out the decorative underskirt and just expose my underwear. Petticoat=less formal underskirt for hot days (if it comes out nice enough). Aren't I just clever? ;-)
In the ribbon channels, I decided to do two cords instead of just one cuz it fit nice and snug and the single cord was a bit roomy. Also, extra stiffness with 2.

assembly--bottom 4 channels in hem and double rope in the ribbon channels.

Here's the "finished" product. I may go further up with the channels, but for now I'm outta rope. I can't decide whether to add more or not. Thoughts?

complete? ( still need to make the waistband, even if i don't add more channels)

And I wanted to test its effectiveness, so here's a sidebyside of with and without the petticoat for one of my old skirts. Its somewhat subtle, But it does make a discernable difference:

without

with petticoat

I'm A Good Girl, I Am

2005-02-21T15:32:00.000-05:00

Its been just over a week since my last post. tsktsk. And I started out so strongly....

This week's project is the corded petticoat. Today I have been ironing and cutting my fabric. For the skirt itself, I am using pink cotton shirting material, and have decided to go with a gored skirt that's waist is slightly bigger than me so I can have it on a drawstring (for the unexpected weight gains/losses--hopefully losses).

As for measurements: I decided to make the waist 40 inches around (mine is 32, but my hips are 44, so i figured that was a good compromise and would allow drawstring action). My skirt will be two rectangles for front and back (so 21 inches each--2x20 is the 40, and 1/2 inch seam allowance on each side) and 2 traingles on the sides to create the gored skirt effect. I decided to go with 100 inch circumfrence at the bottom of the petticoat based purely on a piece of ribbon i put on the floor and stood inside til I thought it was a good sized "halo" around my feet. Since the waist will be 40 inches, i need to add 60 by the bottom, so my gored triangles will have a 30 inch bottom each. I folded my fabric on itself selvage to selvage, and cut 2 rectangles of 21 inches and two rectangles of 16 inches wide. The 16 inch ones I cut in half diagonally to make 4 right angle triangles, which i will sew together.

Here are the pieces all cut--there are two layers, so 2 rectangles, and 4 triangles:

I sewed the trangles together into 2 larger gores, with the right angle sides together:

And, all assembled it looks like this:

I am actually worried that the 100 inch circumfrence isn't enough, but i'm gonna keep trucking and see how it comes out. If I don't like it I won't use it. ;-) or I can add in some extra panels, if it comes to that... It will be easier to tell once I have some cording in it to see how much it actually flares out

Tomorrow I will hopefully get out to find new rope/cording to provide the "body" of the skirt.
That's all for now.

Languishing Diaries

2005-02-13T12:20:00.000-05:00

I am still alive, I swear. My dress making has been languishing, taking a back burner to my obsessive gyming and weight loss regimen. And reading. I've been a literary crazy for the past week and a half--finished 4 books.

Anyway, I wanted to let everyone know that I attempted to start my roped petticoat, but when I washed the rope it swelled and would no longer have fit in the channels the size of the ribbon I bought. I will either have to purchase new rope or new ribbon. Rope is probably cheaper.

In the meantime, I think that my dress making will pick up again quite soon, as I spend part of this weekend perusing venetian portraiture in the National Gallery of Art. Seeing some of my researched paintings close up was certainly inspirational. The detail you can see in the real paintings is phenomenal. I am very much looking forward to starting up again. ;-) It was also amusing to my hostess (and myself) that I could identify different methods of lacing and blackwork and partlets on the portraits, while she was obviously looking more at the artistic value of them. hehe

Boring Eyelet Update

2005-02-02T13:26:00.000-05:00

My eyelets are finished. It took me god-knows-how-many-movies to get them all done. But they are adorable. I shall not bore with pics, as all the eyelets look much like the ones shown 2 posts ago. So, just picture that with thread covered eyelets on both sides... ;-) For reference, I used button thread at the wondrous suggestion of an accomplice--it is thicker and takes less stitching to completely cover the metal eyelet.

Also, if anyone endeavors to cover eyelets with thread like I just have, remember that if you watch movies during, you SHOULD NOT rent foreign subtitled flicks. Even if they are set in the period of the Italian Renaissance. I thought the costumes would inspire me. The major problem with my thought process is that its extremely difficult to sew around eyelets AND read subtitles at the same time. Unless you can manage to have your two eyes looking two different directions. Then it just might work....

This weekend I promise to start, if not finish, my roped petticoat. I'm gonna use some pink cotton shirting I already have, some sisal rope (hope this works) and a grossgrain ribbon in mauve for the rope channels. My plan is a gored skirt, and I need to sit down to figure out the circumfrence that I'm interested in. Don't want it too poofed/tudorish, as that's not really the style, but I do want some skirt support and not have the skirts constantly wrapping round my legs....

Necklace Spree!

2005-01-30T19:14:00.001-05:00

Today, I went out for lunch with my whole family for my youngest sister's birthday. She's 17! Its so weird--she still feels 8 to me...and she'll love that I put that on the intraweb!
Anywho, after the lunch, my other two sisters and I decided to peruse the mall (my sister had to do an inventory in a store there at 6, and we decided to help her kill the time). We stopped in the Icing store (conveniently the one sis had to do inventory in...), and I found some kick-ass-awesome jewelry!

I think this might be courtesan usable--especially the first--the pearl one. But I'm putting them both online to show off cuz they're awesome. They were from the Icing's vintage collection that is now going extinct. So I got each necklace for $3, and the matching earrings for $2.50 each. I thought that was pretty good considering the normal prices ($12/necklace, $5/earring). Score!

I think the above is so much like some portraits I've seen. And the green jewels should accent the red dress nicely.

And this was just too cute not to buy.

Eyelets are Forever

2005-01-30T11:38:00.000-05:00

I know, tis been a while since my last update. I've been busy...but not on costumery! But I have managed to start the final phase of my neverending corset--covering the eyelets with a nice little buttonhole stitch. I have 24 eyelets to cover in totale. I have finished 12. These 12 took me 3 movies (King Arthur, Without a Paddle and Never Say Never Again) and one episode of the Venture Bros. cartoon on adult swim...

Its not much, but at least i'm posting something...

In other news, I bought ribbon to make the channels for my roped/corded petticoat. So I hope to start that soon.

Corset Conclusion, I Hope

2005-01-23T14:50:00.000-05:00

Wow. I don't think I should've wished for the boning to come in quite so much. Cuz sometimes you get what you wish for. It came Friday night. I have been working on finishing the corset since then. The boning is perfect in it--no channel fit issues (kudos to me and my knowledgable ruler use), and it looks very nice. Note to self and others: the spiral steel boning is MUCH more flexible than I had envisioned. This makes it much more comfortable than I envisioned. But in the future, if I want to go for rigid, I would go with the spring steel. That is what i used to approximate a "busk" in my corset, and it really does the job.
This pic shows the flexibility of the spiral steel--top is side to side, middle is straight, and bottom is front/back flexibility. I found that the spring steel (its jsut a strip of plastic coated metal with rounded ends) is only flexible front to back (not side to side), and even only marginally flexible--so it makes a great busk substitute. The poly boning acts like a weak spring steel.

Once I had all the boning in and had attached my lacing strips once more to assess fit (and removed them once again--yay jack the seam ripper), I decided I was ready to put the ribbon edging on.

The ribbon I found at the local fabric store, and thought it perfect. It has a slight shell design in cream and tan. It complements my corset fabric nicely. It is thick, heavy duty ribbon, so I thought would work well for the load bearing corset. And to make it stronger, I folded it in half (it is 2.5 inches wide, and the pattern calls for 1-1.5", so this seemed a good solution).

ribbon trim on corset fabric--love the way it looks together.
The thing I didn't love was how FRIGGIN DIFFICULT it was to sew onto my corset. With each pull of my needle (handsewing mind you), I was going through 2 layers of denim, one of thick curtain fabric and two of heavy duty ribbon--and sometimes more. Ouch. The needle stuck so many times I can't even describe it. And the thread kept insisting on knotting itself. Friday night I sewed on it for about 4 hours. On Saturday, I worked on it almost all day, and thought I would go mad. My sister, who was stuck in our apartment due to Maryland snow, took mercy on me and helped me--we were stitching from opposite sides of the corset to get it done faster. But Saturday bedtime came and it still wasn't finished. Sunday morning breakfast and then back to stitching--I just want the thing to be done! About 17 hours, 3 puncture wounds, 1 pinky blister,2 bent needles, 10 numb fingers and 4 callouses later, I was finished. Ouch. Remind me not to do this again. This corset better last for a long long time! It weighs 1 lb, 10 oz. My sister and I both bled on it.

As as if it wasn't torturous enough to do the ribbon, when it was done I had about a 1 minute feeling of accomplishment before I realized I needed to put the eyelets in for lacing. I used Dritz 1/8" eyelets in gold--this took me an additional 2ish hours--Ack! While I like the way they look (daintier than grommets), they were not deep enough for my 3-fabric-layer corset, so the innermost denim layer did not all get caught into the eyelets. To fix this, I think I may have to sew a buttonhole stitch around each eyelet. It'll hold all the layers, but a side effect is that it will look more period. Quite honestly, I could care less about period on the corset that goes under the dress, but looks like I'll be going that way anyway. I'd much rather just know that I am done, but looks like the corset has it in for me and I will have to work on it a bit more...

Here are some pics, though. I think its AWESOME. Now that its *almost* done (minus the sewing over the eyelets), I think all the crazy work was worth it!

Here is a close up of the finished product. I'm loving it, personally..

This is with a skirt I already had made from the same fabric for a past ren fest. Convenient little ensemble, should I ever need it...

And here is the back view. I intentionally made it a bit small in hopes of losing my 15 thanksgiving and christmas pounds. And if i don't lose them, oh well, its still serviceable. ;-)
Damn, baby got back.

Corset In Waiting and Partlet Brainstorms

2005-01-21T17:56:00.000-05:00

Sigh....I wait for boning. What an interminable thing. Okay, so yes, I only ordered it 2 days ago. But I want it now! Pout. And no, I didn't pay for fast shipping. So wait I shall. My frugality often defeats my impatience. So full of vices....

So, despite inactivity due to waiting, I have sewn the decorative outer fabric to my corset. It looks quite sharp, I think. I hope that I kept well enough to the stitch lines that I did not significantly shrink my boning channels. I ordered 1/2 inch boning, and made 5/8 inch channels in my design. So they better fit when it gets here. Great, now I'm worrying myself....
Anyway, I am not going to bore you all with pics of the still unfinished corset, even if I do think the outer fabric looks sharp. I will wait until I have the finished product in all its splendor. At least, I hope its slendor-ful when I finish...hehe

I am planning a trip to the store tonight to get more ribbon for the corset edging. It seems I'm rather stupid and didn't buy enough the first time round. What's worrisome is that I got it on clearance, so if they're out, I must find a new ribbon option. And I did so like the one I picked the first time round. I suppose I should also buy grommets or eyelets to enable the lacing of the corset. If I get a few other things I can keep myself busy while I'm snowed in this weekend. Apparently Maryland is getting a snow dumping. If only I had my boning I could finish my corset for snowy day diversion. Ah well....

As for partlet brainstorming:
It struck me the other day that an interesting way to do the partlet would be to bead it. I do not think it is strictly period, but it should have the right look (i am thinking gold beads with either pearls or a garnety color bead at the junctions). And, I think I can figure out how to bead a net faster than I could teach myself to weave one. Now I need to find a cheap place to buy beads so I can experiment with it--don't wanna drop too much, cuz I could be wrong about it looking right or my ability to figure it out. hehe. I am excited to try it, as I haven't seen anyone else do this yet, and so it'd be unique. So secretly proud of myself for thinking of it....

Corset Plan of Attack

2005-01-18T10:53:00.000-05:00

Ah, so I have received some great suggestions on how to fix my strangely fitting corset. First, I can make lacing strips to temporarily attach to the thing and see how it actually looks when laced. Awesome. Mission accomplished:

My temporary corset lacings (made of white denim and Dritz grommets)--I simply baste these on to whatever corsets/bodices I experiment with now and in the future to see what they look like laced without having to poke possibly-wrong holes into my garment before I'm ready. Yay!

Next is the whole fit and bodyline thing. It was suggested that the corset is too long around my waist/hips. So I will try to shorten the tabs just a bit, and cut the tabs up into the corset a little higher so they find my natural waist better. I'm also told this will make it more comfy. ;-)

I think that it is imperative for me to bone the whole thing (at least temporarily) with poly boning to see the true effect. This will allow me to make any adjustments before I order the more expensive steel spiral stuff in the pre-set lengths...

Tonight Jack, the seamripper, and I got to be great friends. I have never seam ripped so much. First the boning channels that I had to half cut off, then the temporary corset lacings (twice, cuz I tried it on twice). I also discovered the awesomeness of FrayCheck...Did wonders for cutting those tabs up higher when I didn't have the energy to sew a cleanfinish on the razzling demin.

Here are my results. I think I could cut the side tab even a little higher, and I will do so. Overall, I am much happier with my corset now, and though I don't think its perfectly shaped, it'll do:

My corset frontview. Notice the side tabs sticking out. I will remedy this by cutting the tabs a little higher. They will also be more sturdy when I get my real boning (steel instead of poly).

Sideview of my reworked corset. I like this line, and I think its period appropriate. And let me just tell you how weird it is for me to put such a buxom picture of myself online....Don't stare too much.

My outer corset fabric is in the wash preshrinking--shoulda done that earlier, cuz I would be able to attach it tonight if I'd planned better. Oh well, I will add it to the design tomorrow, I'm sure. I feel so productive!

And in other news....I've ordered the boning. I think I'm confident enough in the size of the corset that I can do it. Anyway, the prices really were not bad. The best prices I found were at Hedgehog Handworks. They also give discounts when you order in quanties of 4 or more, and everywhere else I looked only gave quantity discounts for 12 or more. I ordered some extras too, just in case--I probably will want ot throw a few into my gown, too, so why not?
For the boning, I decided to do a mix of styles:
1) The front 4 channels with 1/2 inch spring steel, which I read can bend forward and back but not really side to side (which means sturdier "busk" effect). I'm also doing the 2 back center bones with spring steel (but 1/4 inch), as I read somewhere that it was "must" for corset integrity.
2) The channels around the tabs will have 1/2 inch spiral steel, as this can bend side to side (important to have on your...ahem...sides). But also they are sturdier than poly, and I don't want my tabs flipping up. Hopefully that works.
3) A few non-important channels will have poly boning for some support. Mainly, these are the ones that are sandwiched safely between channels of steel--A way to save a little money.

Corset Woes

2005-01-17T23:41:00.000-05:00

I am pretty sure I stole this post's title from one of my accomplices. I worked on a corset today for quite a long time (granted, I had a lot of distractions). I used the corset pattern generator from the Elizabethan Costuming page. I opted for the boned tab style, since the site said that it was the most comfortable. And in all my fun layers of courtesan clothes, comfort will definitely be an issue. ;-)

While I think it looks okay in pics, I am not sure its gonna fit me properly. I kinda tried to play with it (I haven't put grommets in yet) to test the fit. I think it is TOO straight, if that is possible for the venetian silohuette. It does not make a conical shape, but kinda a straight up and down. I am hoping that once I get all the boning into it (it needs to be ordered first) it will fit better. Maybe I'm just being pessimistic. Sigh.

I've also found that its exceedingly hard to fit a corset to yourself when you have no one to help and no dummy...Here are my attempts so far. I apologize for the poor picture quality. Usually hubby is there to take good pics, but not tonight.

corset layout/boning--all the boning is straight up and down (except for the ones on the back) . Maybe this is the source of my "too straight" problem?

Corset "fitting" . Keep in mind its not laced (no eyelets or grommets yet), and there are only a couple pieces of poly boning in there--i'm waiting to get my spiral steel boning, but I need to know what sizes to order first.

As for the corset, I still am not sure what I think of it. I do hope I will like it more after "sleeping on it" and getting the boning/laces worked out. (I apologize for the weird picture angle. I was contorted trying to hold the camera far enough out to get the whole thing in the pic.)

So far I have only used the white denim for the corset. If I can get the pattern working okay I will cut out my outer brocady fabric, but as my supply of that is limited I am waiting until the corset pattern works to use up my decorative stuff.

I guess my corset will be on hiatus until I get the boning into it and figure out what's going wrong...

Fabric Store Fun and Curly Camicas

2005-01-16T23:23:00.000-05:00

Well, over the weekend I hit the fabric store sale as promised. I cleaned up on thread. I bought all sorts of colors. Just in case....

I also got a liner for the inside of my dress bodice, a hideous 50 cent/yard fabric with teal checkers to use while drafting patterns (so i don't waste my good fabric), and some pink lightweight cotton shirting for any random use I come up with.

My other big find was 8 yards of a dark olive fabric to make a "practice dress." It was $1/yd. I have decided (and it has been pointed out) that I have almost zero experience drafting patterns. So, I am planning on doing a practice "courtesan" dress. This will be with the olive fabric. Its a poly/rayon blend, so kinda eh (not authentic), but it'll be good for practice and feels similar to my velvet weight/texture wise for good practice. The olive is plain olive on the back side, and diamond striped olive on the front side. I think I will use the plan side for most of the dress, and perhaps a bit of the diamonds for accent (maybe on the front of the bodice and around the bottom of the dress). Anywho, here are my new fabric finds:

fabricfinds--silky burgundy is for lining my velvet dress bodice, hideous teal checks is for pattern drafting, olive is for my practice Italian gown, and pale pink is cuz it was 50cents a yard and it might be good for something....

Other than that, I found that Simplicity patterns were on sale for a dollar each, so I bought two of them. #8881 is the Elizabethan dress pattern. I may try to use this pattern to loosely base my own bodice pattern on. the necline is basically correct, and I'll just have to tweak it toadd back side lacing, and fix the waistline so it is more Venetian (change the point in the front and add one in the back). The other pattern is #5794. It is a cloak. I will make it if I'm feeling luxurious. Particulary since my existing cloak may be sacrificed and recycled to be part of my red velvet courtesan dress. It is a dark mauvy pink, and may find itselft cut into strips of trim for the dress...

So, the cloak I currently have is the pink on the top with the black finishing stitches. While I love the cape's fit and style, I often complain that I do not want the pink cape (I made it in highschool). I am faced with a dilemma. It matches pretty well. Do I kill my pink cape to make fabric strips for guard trims on my red velvet dress? Or do I keep the pink cloak intact because, hey, it does match my dress....?

Also, since I got new thread I was able to work on my camica more. I hemmed all the edges (top, sleeve and bottom). One of my thread purchases was a silky rayon thread in a golden tone. With this I bound the edges of the sleeves and neckline to produce the "frill" effect I have previously referred to:

Palma Vecchio: La Violante

I think my edges turned out very well. I've got a closeup of the curling edge in gold, and a whole pic of the camica as it is now.

I think this is as far as I will go on the camica until the dress is finished. I have quickly gathered the neckline for this pic just to see how the effect worked. But i do not want to permanently gather the neckline until I know what the shape and size of the dress's neckline will be. Basically, I want my camica top to *just* peek over the dress. So, finishing the camica will be put on hold until much later. I also plan on gathering my camica sleeves. This will be done at the same time as the neckline so I don't screw up and end up doing them somehow differently....

Gown Construction "Blueprint"

2005-01-14T10:16:00.000-05:00

Besides the gown itself and camica, which I think I pretty much covered in my previous posts, the rest of my ideas are as follows:

Corset:
I plan on making a corset to go under the gown. For this I will most likely use the Corset Generator and Sewing Instructions on the Elizabethan Costuming page. I have purchased a heavy white denim for this purpose. It seems quite sturdy, was on ridiculous sale, and is white so it won’t bleed onto anything in the wash. I am considering doing steel spiral boning in the corset for extra support (I lie a bit on the busty side) and “cinch”--I lie on the mushy side, too ;-). There are some boning retailers suggested on the aforementioned pattern site, and I will have to peruse those to find the best deals. I am still deciding if I want to do the outer layer of my corset in decorative fabric. But most likely, I will decide “yes.” If so, the decorative fabric will be some tan curtains I picked up in goodwill at the insistence of an accomplice. You can see it here, in the underskirt. Its leafy.

corset fabric is the underskirt

I also saw another corset idea I quite liked. On Festive Attyre, there was a picture of a corset that was laced in the back ,b ut had hook and eye closures in the front to make dressing (and undressing) yourself easier. I might experiment with this….

Underskirt:
We’ve already touched on this, it will be the red brocade from my previous post. The major thing I wanted to add to this info was that I am thinking about making it a “corded” underskirt. Which to my understanding means I sew channels containing rope around the bottom and up the inside of the skirt to provide a loose support for skirt poofiness. My thought is it would allow air circulation “down there” on warm days, as well as add to the aesthetics. I will experiment with this, as well… The references I have found thus far in on the Semptress page, and on the Festive Attyre site in the diary for the Bergamesque Noblewoman's Gown.

Depending on the cording used, this could be fairly rigid or much less so. I still am not sure if I’m doing this, but its at least fun to consider…

Partlet:
Oh, how I love the braided/woven Venetian partlets. A great example is from a Veronese fresco:

Veronese: Detail from a fresco (off of Realm of Venus)

And a delish detail shot (though Florentine, not Venetian) is found in an Eleanora de Toledo portrait:

See Partlet, above . Also for anyone interested, there are even better detail shots of this painting on the Raveness dress diary. She was able to see the painting in person, and got some excellent photos...

I have found various people who made these types of partlets and explained it on their websites. Some actually weaving them, like Briana on Realm of Venus, and others assembling crisscrossing trims on sheer fabric, like Alyxx. Both methods are very effective, and I will do the weaving if I’ve got time (and if I can manage to figure it out), but the sheer fabric option is also spectacular if I save my partlet til last minute!

Girdle:
I want to do a beaded girdle as seen in many Venetian portriats. One good example of a courtesan and her girdle is this:

Unknown Artist: Courtesan

Keeping in mind that the above example has a larger bottom piece for accent, I looked around WalMart to see what I could find to approximate it. I came up with a beaded tassle sold for window dressings. It was $2.50, so I figured it was worth the expense to save me from trying to make the thing…I also checked the beading section to make sure matching beads to this tassle are fairly common, and they are. So, my girdle will look like an extended version of this:

beadies for girdle (middlish left)

FlagFan:
I absolutely NEED a flag fan to complete the ensemble. First, they were in Dangerous Beauty,
and they appear in Venetian/Italian portraiture:

Titian: Portrait Of A Lady In White

I think the only details left after all the above are jewelry, hair and perhaps a veil. I will definitely hit thrift stores/goodwill/antique stores for the jewelry. I love that kinda stuff!

Hair, eh, i'll have to experiment. And if my hair sucks (its currently a bit short for braiding), that's what the veil is for! ;-)

Until next time (most likely after I go buy camica thread...)

Design Concepts Part Deux

2005-01-13T20:23:00.000-05:00

Hrmm…what else can I bore you with? Some of my inspirations, I guess….
Well, besides the Dangerous Beauty movie (which was the greatest impetus for this project), my second most important influence has been reading through the creation of the Seresina gown by Jwlhyferdewinter . It was the first venetian courtesan link I found, and had a great effect on what I saw in my future. Mainly my future being “yes, I could try this….” ANd her dress is so lovely, it is definitely inspiration to try my own!

I wanted to show some portraits of elements I’d like to include in my ensemble. This also serves as notes for me to remind myself of things later! So bear with me….

I want my dress to have the general Venetian silohuette seen in numerous paintings from 1550-1600. A perfect and simple example is this:

Veronese: Portrait of a Woman

Note: Besides the excellent silohuette, I chose this because I interpret the dress to be made from reddish velvet. Sound familiar? However, remember that I do not want the front ladder lacing in my dress, just this general shape. I may shorten the waist, as I am shortwaisted, and I want it to be comfortable and flattering to my figure. Afterall, what girl doesn’t?

Below, we have proof that the Venetians did, indeed, have non-front-closure dresses and also featured split skirts with fun underskirts. This is part of my design concept as well. Again, a portrait of a velvet dress. Excellent. I am also interested in the method of trim on this dress, particularly the sleeves. I could entertain the idea of something like this….

Titian: Portrait of Titian's daughter Lavinia

New topic:
I would love to have my gown puddling on the floor. Or have a nice little train. I do not know how reasonable this is, as I plan to be walking around the Faire in it. Many of the historical portraits and sketches do show the dresses to be longer than floor length, or featuring a train.

Vecellio Sketch

One thought I'm toying with is that I could do JUST the train, but have the dress be to the floor (and no longer) in front. Then, for walking around the Faire, I could bustle it in the back. I have not found historical reference that this was done, but it does seem very practical, and I could imagine them doing it back then. I’m also inspired to do this by (you guessed it!) Dangerous Beauty! She has several dresses that she bustles (more excessively than I would, but you get an idea). I apologize for the crappy picture, but I took it of my TV, and those never turn out well.

DB ScreenCapture

Additionally, referring back to the Vecellio Sketch above, I want the back of my dress to have the “V” back at the waist and the low square neckline in the back, as seen on so many gowns of the time.

Last Item on my list for today. Trims. I love this portrait. It is part of the reason I bought the pink taffeta. ;-) Though I am not making this dress (perhaps I could later), I am a big fan of the guard trims used, and hope to incoportate something like this in my design (like my mulberry ribbons--see sketch, previous post). I just love this pink and green combo. But I'll just have to remember that for next time...

Moretto da Brescia: Portrait Of A Lady

Design Concepts

2005-01-12T18:14:00.000-05:00

Okay, so we know I’m making a courtesan dress. We know I’ve already started the camica. But what of the dress? What will it look like? What is this red cotton velveteen I’ve spoken of? Here we go:

Courtesan in Venice.
I’m thinking red. Okay, I’m "slightly" biased by the costumes in Dangerous Beauty, but they do wear an awful lot of red and I like it. The DB character also has an orange dress I love, but the orange in my local fabric stores are limited, and I can’t bear to buy fabric sight unseen from online. Besides, one of my courtesan-to-be accomplices is doing an amber/orangey dress. So I’ll stick to red. Anyway, based on Oonagh's Own website, red was a pretty dominant color. Sounds good.

Flashback to months ago. I visit the fabric store. I buy a red brocade-y cotton/poly fabric. $25 for 6-7 yards. Not too bad. In the store it looks red with purple-y red details. I’m excited. I can do all my accents in some deep purple reds. Sounds regal. Nope—at home the purple is lost. This is my first clash with in-store-lighting. Oh, then I find on Oonagh's site that there’s not evidence of purple being used in Venice during that period. So perhaps the evil store lighting saved me from myself…. End flashback. I have a costuming hiatus to decide if I like this fabric or not. Maybe I’ll use it for curtains if I don’t use it for a dress….

On to the recent past (a few days ago):
I find info online for a local fabric store “selling way below cost” “too low to put online”. I go. OH MY GOD! Delicious fabrics. Scrumptious. Exactly what I’d like to have as a courtesan. I get some swatches (the store was closing when I got there) to think about it. My choices range from $25/yd-$40/yd.

LUSH SWATCHES
I love them. (mental note to make a dress with that blue and gold...someday). I think if I do the diamond burgundy fabric as an accent and a cheaper fabric for the rest I can afford it. That night I go back to the local fabric store and find THE red cotton velveteen. It matches my diamond swatch almost perfectly. I get 6 yards of the red velvet. I take it home. I pull it out to admire it. STUPID STORE LIGHTING! Sigh…velvet no longer matches my pretty little diamond swatch.
Another accomplice counsels me on my non-matching fabric dilemma. Okay, so my red velvet doesn’t match the diamonds. But I haven’t bought the diamonds. And they’re expensive. So, the velvet (and yes, the evil in-store-lighting) saves me from the insanity of dropping possibly hundreds on fancy fabric that is best reserved for when I’m a more accomplished seamstress. I admit defeat. And yet, I’m very excited about the red velvet potential…

Serendipity:
I put the red velvet on top of the red brocade from several months back. The “red” brocade now looks deliciously mauve, and wonderful next the velvet. I think we have a winning combination…

My *final* fabric selection. The bottom is the red cotton/poly brocade. The middle is the red cotton velveteen, and the top is my fru fru pink acetate taffeta. Isn't is a sexy combo?

The pink is something I picked up at the local store for $1/yd. It’s pink taffeta (acetate, not silk). Totally not a “me” purchase. But courtesan demons in my head started talking about how cute it’d be to line the skirt in pink taffeta. I’ll get a rustle and a flirty pink flash whenever I lift my skirts…. Oh, the rapture.

This is my concept sketch thus far:

concept design

I decided not to do front ladder lacing, despite what most of the portraiture of the time tells me. Why you ask? Because I’m obstinate. And because I think my two accomplices are both doing ladder lacing, and I like variety. Probably I’ll end up with side back lacing, since I’ve seen that in an Arnold sketch of the burial gown of Eleanora of Toledo (c. 1562 ).

The trim in my colored sketch is not necessarily my final choice, but its good in the drawing for now…

I’m not sure which sleeve style on the concept sketch I like best. I’ve seen ones sorta like the one on the left. But basically, that one is from Dangerous Beauty, and I think not period accurate. But it is awful cute. We’ll see. I have a few other sleeve ideas I might sketch out before making my final decision…As the sleeves are removable I won't feel so bad if I don't go completely historically accurate on them. I can always add an accurate sleeve later on....

More Camica Fun

2005-01-11T18:58:00.000-05:00

Well, I was "sick" again today. I just couldn’t bear to get outta bed. And what do you think happened?! Well, I sewed, of course. This dress is gonna get me fired. ;-)

I finished sewing the bulk of the camica together. Then I played with possible neckline treatments on some scrap fabric I had. I think I will end up doing a tight clean finish (think appliqué look) on the very edge. Besides looking nice, I think it’ll cause a curly frill, and should look much like the painting below. Next to it is my swatch of experimentation. When I really do this, i'll most likely use a gold thread for the edging, instead of garish purple-pink.

Palma Vecchio: La Violante

Besides the frill, I’d like to include a solid band over the gathering stitches, perhaps a band with some decorative stitching like this portrait:

Jacopo Robusti - Il Tintoretto: Flora

Whether I’ll do the decorative stitching by hand or cheat and use one of my fast and easy machine stitches is yet to be seen. I do have 9 months, so I could afford the handwork. We’ll see…

Other than that, I decided to go back to my chemise to hem all appropriate edges. But before that I decided to REALLY finish the seams off good. That meant ironing the seams open and then folding over and ironing again to hide the clean-finished edges. I’m still paranoid about gauze fray, so I decided to stitch on the edges. What a difference this made! (see below, left seam super-seamed, right seam unfinished).

Unfortunately, my extra credit seam sewing meant I ran out of white thread and didn’t get to do any hemming. Oh well. I hate hemming anyway. I’ll do it later. Here’s a picture of my camica so far. Its not gathered anywhere, or hemmed. But you can get an idea, and you can see how fun and transparent it is.

More later. As I’ll be taking a hiatus on sewing until I have more thread, maybe I’ll post some concept/design posts for the next few days…
I know, "thread is cheap." But if I wait til Friday its 50% CHEAPER! ;-)

Camica Adventures

2005-01-10T18:31:00.000-05:00

Last night I decided to work on something. ANYTHING! I am just SO excited that I’m busting to start, even though I know I’m not ready for the real dress yet (besides needing some sewing practice, I also need to lose the 10 lbs I gained over Thanksgiving/Christmas). So, I decided to start the camica.

I will confess that I skipped work today because I am "sick", and (even though this wasn’t my plan) I ended up fabric shopping. I scoured the fabric store for a suitable camica fabric. Their linen was far too coarse for my liking, and the straight up cotton muslin was boring (i.e. a lot like my pre-existing chemise). I also had a preconceived notion that I’d get something translucent for my camica. That seems deliciously naughty and courtesan-like. Unfortunately, most translucent materials I found were some sort of polyester or poly blend. Which means Hot. And since my dress is gonna be velvet (its red cotton velveteen --more on this later), I want to keep other things to natural fibers and lighter weights to make it more bearable to wear if its warmish. And the Maryland RenFest (where I get the most use out of my costumes) can be unbearably warm. This will most likely end up being my autumn dress. ;-)

I was losing hope on my natural fiber translucent fabric dream (couldn’t afford silk). But then, in the home decorating section, I happened upon 100% cotton decorator’s gauze. Yes, it’s gauzy. It’s pretty friggin' see-through. And I love it. It’s like very thin linen, since you can see all the weave details. 4 1/8 yards came home with me for camica goodness. $2/yard.

So, Monday night I started cutting camica bits out. I used the pattern on The Realm of Venus website, altered a bit for my preferences and cut out in a different order. I made the body 38 inches long (falls somewhere between my knees and ankles--i'm short) and the sleeves an excessive 40 long inches from the shoulder. I wanted sleeve length for poof. And to approximate a cool “tuck-chemise-under-the-shoulder-strap” effect I saw in a painting for when I don’t wear my detachable dress sleeves. See below:

Marietta Robusti (La Tintoretta):
Venetian Woman

I clean finished all the edges of my cuts with my awesome new sewing machine (Christmas present from hubby Janome 3500), using techniques I learned in my beginners’ sewing class. Very proud of myself. I felt the clean finishing was necessary, as it is gauze. And gauze is, afterall, prone to fraying.

fraying gauze vs. clean finish

I started sewing bits together, but really only managed to attach sleeves to gussets before it was bed time. More later.

*since originally posting this, I've found a painting that supports the translucent camica idea. Go me! See below:

Giovanni Antonio Fasolo: Fresco:
Detail from "Games" (from The Realm of Venus)
translucent camica sleeves

In the Beginning

2005-01-09T16:49:00.000-05:00

Here goes....

I have been in love with the Renaissance Festival since high school. I have very fond memories of making my first costume with two dear highschool friends in my grandmother's chaotic sewing room. Looking back on it I remember how fun it was to be making uber-girly clothing that we normally can't wear in the 21st century (at least not without getting some very strange looks). I also think about my poor grandmother putting up with the three of us. She should be sainted.

In college, I had the pleasure of watching Dangerous Beauty for the first time. Besides educating me on how empowering it is to be a respectable whore whom occasionally deepthroats bananas, it piqued my interest in the clothing of the Italian Renaissance. Basically, I wanted one of those dresses. Really really badly....

And I still do. As I do not have funds to pay for a fancy seamstress, and I do have a bit of sewing experience, I've decided to try to make one. We will see how this turns out. Or if its any cheaper than just getting the friggin seamstress. My initial forays to the fabric store have cast doubt on the affordability of this project. Apparently I have expensive tastes...

First project will be the camica...Second, corset, I guess.