Google Is Acting Up: I Cannot Leave Comments on Many Posts

Something odd is happening on a number of Blogger-based blogs that I read regularly: the comment feature isn't working!

For example, Sabine of Kleidung um 1800 has a wonderful post on antique writing desks...and I wasn't able to tell her how much I loved hers and its purple writing surface, and that I have one too, which once belonged to a young woman of my hometown. She had signed in her name in several spots inside the box, testing her handwriting skills, and left her pen nibs inside. To that collection I've added childhood letters and cared, and I've carried that writing box with me most of my life and hope to pass it to my children to add their memories to.

Or Hallie of At the Sign of the Golden Scissors, with her post about muslin gowns embellished with silver plate embroidery and other "goldwork". Those gowns are so hard to find...the only picture I'd seen of one until she wrote was a drawing in Gail Marsh's 18th Century Embroidery Techniques. Good sleuthing as always! Again, I couldn't comment.

So, if I seem silent, or you do, please know that it might be Google kicking its heels a bit...

Very best,
Natalie

Cue the Solo Cello



Noah and Christopher on the beach, while Daddy, out front, has a swim.

Bye-bye, summertime.

It's fall.

From the Collection: An Utterly Fabulous Antique Edwardian Formal Skirt

Skirt front.

Do a train and a trumpet silhouette, sheer silk, peekaboo construction of laters of white and colored sheer silks and lace insets, and a shimmery satin fluff at the feet, encrustions  of beaded motifs, and four -- count them! -- four underlaying flounces, make your heart flutter-flutter?


Then I have the formal skirt of your dreams, an Edwardian confection, a tour de force bought some time ago in totally unwearable, and without major reconstruction, unmountable condition, from a dealer liquidating another dealer's estate. The bodice is missing. Most collectors would call this skirt a cutter; I call it a researcher's and pattern maker's dream.



This skirt is a monument to the Edwardian love of luxury, of layers and of the seen, the suggested, and the hidden, of plays of light and shimmer and soft color. It is also an interesting admixture of the classically curved with the linear and almost medieval, some of the patterns on the skirt seeming to herald the beginning of the very modern era.


Skirt Design

Skirt back.

The back of the skirt tells you much about the skirt design. This skirt is shaped like an enormous trumpet. There is so much on the floor that I think the lady who wore it was quite tall, somewhere over 5 feet, five inches, my height. The skirt would have puddled around her feet in any case in the fashionable manner, but not so much as is shown here.


The waistline is shirred all the way around, but most heavily at the back, and as we will learn, would bunch more at the back than is shown, for there are three tiers of interior ties that gather the back together rather like a Natural Form dress of the end of the 1870s.

Further puddle control is a series of long tacks connecting the various layers, holding them together with an inch or so of give, but sewn such that the top layer falls into folds. The entire experience is controlled to maintain the silhouette, but in a flowey manner. Amazingly complex.

The top of the skirt, except the belt, is sheer silk. It shows the a second skirt beneath, of a very pale green silk gauze. Underneath both? Another layer opaque white silk. The skirt from knee down is a light satin, embroidered with cut steel faceted fat bugle beads and glued-on, (yes, glued!) cut steel faceted nailhead beads sans holes, and cut through at sections with lace appliques made of a combination of tape lace with brides and tape lace on net.

Final control over the flow and swish and puddle? Four layers of flounces that help hold the skirt's trumpet shape, that thicken the folding and puddling, that offer swish and a peep of froth. But I hurry myself.

Trim
Here is the front waistline, below. The skirt band suggests a belt, and the hanging applied applique, which functions as a Medievalesque extension to the belt. Note the quatrefoil designs. All the beads and nailheads are cut steel, but in two tones; they vary in the light, too.

The front hem is a happy, or uneasy, depending on your taste, mix of the Medieval, the modern, and the Classical Beaux Arts. The lace joining the upper, sheer part of the skirt to the satin part? Classical. The appliques set at intervals all the way around the skirt? Ditto. The cut-steel patterning, and mix of Medieval quatrfoils and Classical acanthus-esque motifs (the pointed ones), and the very nineteen teens lines and the mirroring curve shapes, like wings or...I don't know what they are called...they have a name: you can seen one hanging from a quatrefoil at the lower right of the image below.

A view of the skirt towards the back shows more motifs, in the central motif -- peer closely now, please -- there is what appears to be an "M". Whether this is symbolic of the owner, the maker, something else, or nothing all, remains a mystery to me.

Back bottom of the skirt.

Furbelows Below

I had to say it: had to. Furbelows are frills, and heavens, there are frills aplenty under this skirt! In order, top to base:

• Pale green gauze gathered frill, with applied narrow self ruche.
• White gathered gauze frill, with applied narrow ruche of a gauze ribbon.
• Satin knife-pleated frill.
• Deep flounce of light crinoline or some sort of stiffened cotton or linen, tucked.

Each individual element is in itself not difficult, and while good care was taken in the construction, nothing is entirely spot-perfect. It's the sum total that renders it not only an amazing thing to look at, but a dressmaker's tour de force. If only we could see it in movement!


By the way, this is the only time I plan ever to mount the dress, and I had it up less than half an hour, unless I give it to an organization that can conserve it. The top layers are sound, but the underneath is a mess, and the skirt is so heavy that it would soon pull itself apart.

Heads Up: Blogger Has a New Way of Displaying Images

Edited on Thursday, September 29: It appears that the slideshow function was a test, for as of a day or two ago now, when I click images on Blogger blogs, Blogger displays them the regular old way. So much for all that :}

Dear readers,

This evening I discovered that when you click an image in a Blogger blog posting, instead of seeing the original image in larger format, you get a slideshow function in a black screen that lets you look at all the images in your post...in a rather small size.

Like many bloggers, I put smaller-scale images in the main text body, allowing text to flow around them so readers can keep the flow going, and only click on images when they want to look at bigger versions.

This slide show is convenient, but isn't so great for costumers who love to offer their readers really big image versions so they can look at fine details like seams and individual stitches. Terrible for people like me who love blogs that show fine details in giant images!

Don't despair: you can still get those mega images. Here's how.

Towards the bottom left of the slideshow screen the phrase "Image from" appears, followed by a Blogger web address, or part of one. Click that Web address. A new window opens, containing the original image, sized for the window. If you to see the original as big as originally designed, click the image itself and voila. View all the details!

Here's a screen capture of the lower left corner of the slideshow screen with the link I am talking about, below.

Happy viewing,

Natalie

From the Collection: An 1880s Wire Bustle Pad

Earlier this summer the boys, my mother, and I visited a nearby antique store and I came home with a wire bustle pad, a gift from a favorite dealer. He had a collection of long standing that he was slowing purging, and was pleased to find an appreciative home for something he admitted would find love only from a narrow niche of people.

What a treat, and I was delighted. Here it is, in detail and measured for you, so that together we can enjoy its fascinating construction and wonder who might have worn it. An adult garments for end of the 1880s to 1890s, when bustles were falling out of fashion and later, when a bare pad just added a little oomph? Or a young girl? If the latter, we might imagine how she felt to wear such padding, light though it might be. If children then are anything like they are today, I imagine some girls fancied the grownup experience of looking fashionable, if uncomfortable, while others felt it a silly and inconvenient impediment to their fun and movements. I would certainly fall in the latter camp!

Like I have, I think you'll find the construction ingenious. It's also a good example of economy of materials and labor. The materials are high quality and the construction sound and sturdy, but there is stitching and stapling only where absolutely needed. Manufacturing elegance, here, and awareness of labor time spent, but still a secure, quality result. Sure wish my microwave was as sturdy...our less than year-old machine broke, the manufacturer gave us money for replacement, but the first replacement was dented inside its multitude of undented wrappings, and the second has a defective face panel. Quality control went down the tubes there. Sigh.

Materials

The bustle itself is made of wire. It's probably steel wire, though it shows no signs of rust. The wires have some "memory" to them; that is, if you apply a little pressure to them, they resist the pressure rather than denting. The strength of the shape is assisted by the way the structure is made: the wires are woven almost like a very wide window screen (do you feel an idea coming on, bustle lovers?) However, the memory isn't that strong, for there are some small dents in the structure.

Of what the tapes are made, I do not know; they feel like cotton, but I've never felt linen tape and so cannot tell. The tapes themselves are pretty, if discolored. The central part of the width is herringboned, while the edges, to some 1/4 inch, are tabby-woven selvage. The effect is discreetly architectural.

Total weight? An ounce or two.

There are no labels or other manufacturing marks on the bustle.

Construction, So Far as I Can Tell

The bustle appears to have been made as a wire tube, which was then bent into a crescent and a fold introduced into the wide side. Each end was then squashed into a nub perhaps 1/4 inch thick, and capped like this, so far as I can tell:

• A length of the same tape appears to have been wrapped about the nub. I cannot see it except where the outer covering, described below, has worn away.
• A length of the same tape was folded. At the end of one long side it was sewn into a seam the width of the bustle nub. The tape was then turned inside out to protect the seam.
• The nub was inserted into this little pocket.
• The covering was stapled twice at each end of the forward edge of the tape, where the bustle itself starts. 

The bustle was then attached to a tape belt, like this:

• A length of tape long enough to go around the waist was cut. 
• The bustle was laid alongside it, off center, so that the tape belt would buckle at the side! That is accounted for by the fact that one end of the tape is longer than the other, and the short end is cut raw, folded once, and stapled. The other end is raw. The buckle is missing.
• Another length of tape with a tiny seam allowance on each end was laid underneath the waist tape, so that it doesn't show when the bustle is worn. It's like a facing. It is as long as the distance across the interior edge of bustle where it would sit at the waist, but measured straight across from nub to nub. This means that when worn the bustle wire may not touch the wearer too much. Instead, the tape comes under stress and pulls each end of the bustle closer to the wearer.
• Both short ends were turned and sewn under.
• The long edge was sewn to the waist tape at the edge closest to the wearer.
• This made another, very long pocket. The end of the outer nub wrapping tape was stuck inside, and stapled with one staple close to the nub. I cannot tell for sure, but I don't think the side of that tape is caught in with the facing each seam, and there is no other stitching holding it to the waist tape.
• The other long edge of the facing was not sewn; you can see in the images that part of it has folded back.
• In the middle of the facing pocket is another nub of tape, stapled. The edge is broken off and it doesn't stick out of the facing pocket. What it was for I do not know. You can see it in the image where I am holding the waist tape, just below.

I do not believe the metal itself would touch the wearer's waist

The Bustle's Age

An example of this very model of bustle was sold by Augusta Auctions some time ago as part of Lot: 521, March/April 2005 Vintage Clothing & Textile Auction, New Hope, PA, labeled as bustle pads from 1880 to 1890. That bustle pad was in better condition than mine is. If you look at the other examples, you can see some of the variety of bustle pads out there. 

Was It Meant for an Adult or a Child?

I did a little experiment. I carefully wrapped the waist tape to the mannequin. The tapes wrapped with an inch or two to spare. However, the result is just eeeny-weeny, and although the skirt would puff out a little, the bustle horns don't wrap well around the waist; you can see this on the back view, especially. Very out of proportion, sitting so awkwardly that it feels tippy. The horns of the bustle pad don't stretch to wrap the waistline enough so that the tension on the belt helps hold it close, but not too close.

If worn by an adult, the tournure given to the skirt would be narrow and miniscule. just enough for the very end of the 1880s and the 1890s.

Look at the variety of bustles sold in that Augusta Auctions lot. "My" bustle pad is at the far right and is smaller than the others.

However, it might fit a young girl nicely, because the waist and hips would be narrower than an adult and the horns of the bustle wrap naturally and in proportion.

Not being a bustle expert, I just am not sure. I'd want to try it on a properly sized and fitted dress of the era to see. Can anyone illuminate this further?

How It Was Worn

Let's have a look at a few fashions.

Augusta Auctions sold this skating dress from the 1880s in lot 205, November 2009. One might expect smaller padding for this activity, but the tournure produced is still sizeable. The auction page has multiple pictures for you to peruse.

This September, 1890 Godey's fashion plate shows the very last gasp of the bustle era. Perhaps in this year my modest bustle pad might have worked?

Here's a girl's bustle dress from the 1880s, sold by Augusta Auctions, lot 326, April 2006, New Hope, PA. See that little bump on the back? Bustle...

Here is a fashion plate from Godey's, 1874, showing a girl in a bustle dress, with a similar bump-out on the back. Neither bump is extreme, it's just there. Were bustles similar to mine worn for the First Bustle era? I know that adult bustle pads of this sort existed. Whether this make and model was in circulation at that time, I don't know, but the effect in children's wear was very similar. Here below is a Godey's example from February of 1874.

What Can You Do with This Information?

As I examined this little bustle bad, methought, one could take an old window screen or other wire, and do something similar with it, for either a child or an adult. The result would be a modest bustle effect, but light and less uncomfortable than a full tail would be.

Sure hope someone takes this idea and runs with it!

In Other News...

I am rethinking the Madame Cobweb 1869 dress project. For some reason, despite initial enthusiasm, I became sated with the style after researching it during vacation. Since 2008 I have aged some, and what seemed handsome then, now, after years of Regency wear and looking at robust 18th century originals on which the early 1870s inspired themselves, feels prettified, rather child-like, and out of my current mood.

Further, there are some house projects burning to be done: a cushion for the big early 19th century Empire settee in the upstairs hallway, curtains. While I am at Mom's, I could  make at least one of those projects.

Hard to say.We shall see.

Entering the Silly Season: An 1869 Madame Cobweb Dress

The silly season is upon us: time to design for Halloween! Having looked at so many sacques and polonaises these last weeks on Hallie Larkin's blog, I've conceived a sudden desire for floof and pouf, and bethought me of the First Bustle era, and my unfinished Dolly Varden project.

Since Christopher wants to be a cowboy again this year, I think I will accompany him as his mama, Madame Cobweb. Noah will be my black kitty cat -- he wants to be a kitty again this year, at least for the moment. They've grown so that I will need to make new outfits for them again, but those are easy and lots of fun. Madame Cobweb will actually make two appearances, since our tea society is having a Ghost Tea here at the end of October, too.

This dress will not be a Dolly Varden per se*, since those dresses were made up in eye-popping floral prints and date to 1872-1873. No, this will be a charcoal gray dress trimmed with black ruching. The design? The dress on the right in the image at the page top. You can read all about the pattern on page 77 of the January, 1869 issue of Peterson's, but I'll make some bodice changes, to be discussed in another post.

* Curious about the Dolly Varden phenomenon? See some research I did on it in the post A Brief History of the Dolly Varden Dress Craze.

Materials: All from the Stash, and Some Found Time

I have the bustle all ready, and a chemise, and a half-finished petticoat. I have the Truly Victorian patterns for the bodice and underskirt, and the pattern for the overskirt from Peterson's, and the fabric, a length of black cotton bought ages ago, and grey fabric, content unsure, purchased for a song long before the boys were even born. I even have black lace from my friend Curtis Grace and antique steel boning found in a grab bag I've been holding on to for some six years. It will be nice to thin the stash.

Better yet, the gift of time. The tots are getting their chickenpox booster shots in a few weeks, and since I have a chronic condition, have been told to be away from them for a week. Therefore, I'll be over at my mother's and make the costumes up in the evenings (the days are devoted to work, and if I am lucky and can get the fabric, to a curtain project).

Very little handsewing on this one, either...time to pull out the period handcrank to speed the construction, and time to use the pinking sheers to avoid having to finish interior seams. Plus, I've learned a great deal about seams and trims since 2009, and have a couple of damaged garments from the mid to late nineteenth century to refer to when -- it's not a matter of "should", but when :} -- I get stuck.

Anyhow, this will be the last project for this year, and a fun, quick one that results in a dress I can pull out annually for Halloween parties.

Stay tuned :}

From the Collection: Antique Morally Minded Buttons, and Pins and Laces, Moral or Not

Thought to change gears a little. Over the summer I have been collecting quarters and with this little mad money stash, I've found a few little tidbits of material culture which give us glimpses into women's lives.

As always, please click on the images to see larger versions.

So, what have we here?

Buttons Most Morally Minded
At the top of the collection shown here, are seven small brass buttons. They are studded with cut steel, faceted for a brilliant effect. This is true cut steel, for on the reverse of one of the buttons you can see the rivets, and you can also see the shanks. The quality of the workmanship is very high: consider all the detailing and those minute steel rivets, all packed into a button less than three-quarters of an inch in diameter! I think the design is an illustration of Aesop's fable called The Fox and the Crow, for a fox is up on his hind legs and appears to be reaching towards a bird on a branch.

Here is the tale in full, courtesy of Aesop's Fables.org.

A Fox once saw a Crow fly off with a piece of cheese in its beak and settle on a branch of a tree. "That's for me, as I am a Fox," said Master Reynard, and he walked up to the foot of the tree. "Good-day, Mistress Crow," he cried. "How well you are looking to-day: how glossy your feathers; how bright your eye. I feel sure your voice must surpass that of other birds, just as your figure does; let me hear but one song from you that I may greet you as the Queen of Birds." The Crow lifted up her head and began to caw her best, but the moment she opened her mouth the piece of cheese fell to the ground, only to be snapped up by Master Fox. "That will do," said he. "That was all I wanted. In exchange for your cheese I will give you a piece of advice for the future. Moral of Aesop's Fable: Do not trust flatterers.

From their size and style, I put them in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. They would have looked marvelous on one of the front-buttoning dresses then so fashionable. Was the button maker toying with irony, as he studded a fable about flattery with flashy facets? Or was he clueless? How about the dressmaker? Was she teasing her client or attempting to teach her? Or was mama offering a continual reminder to her daughter through her dress buttons? Or did nobody even bother to look and wonder?

Pins
This was an exciting find: hairpins still in their original brown paper wrapper. The paper is still quite strong, although I am trying not to handle it much. It is crisp and fine-grained, if that makes any sense, but there is no true gloss on the paper.

Kirby, Beard & Co. was a British company of long standing that made pins and needles, razors and much more. See Grace's Guide for the basic facts, and this PDF article, "Gloucestershire Folk Museum and the Mechanisation of the Pin Industry", by Nigel Cox, from the Gloucestershire Society for Industrial Archaeology Journal, 2005.

The pins are the ordinary pins used for eons and still available today. I have pulled out the wrapper gently so that you can read the labeling; like so many pins and needles, they were made in England.

Let's peek inside. I have shown the how the wrapper closes; the hairpins are grouped tightly inside, so tightly that they are almost interlocked. For those of you interested in selling hairpins at a living history event, knowing how things are folded is most helpful.

I am not quite certain and need to ask my friend Curtis Grace, from whom I purchased the pins and laces, but think these are from the attic of a former milliner and her sister. More on them in a moment: it's a tasty tale.

Laces
These laces are still tied and wrapped just as they were found. Like many of the reels of ribbons in that same milliner's attic, some of the laces are tied with cotton thread, of a thickness that reminds me of buttonhole twist.

I am not sure what type of laces these are. The leftmost are flat tapes, loosely braided. The right laces are tubular, and also braided. At their ends both sets of laces are crimped with black-painted metal.

Haven't estimated their length, but they do not seem long enough for corset laces. Boots, more likely.

The Milliner Sisters
Curtis goes to estate sales and has done so for many years. At one of these sales he visited the attic of a lady who, with her sister, had been a milliner. She was a hoarder, oh, was she a hoarder, he laughed. She had stuffed purses with all of her bills, and he found her grocery lists. Then there were the stocks of millinery supplies: rolls of silk ribbon on specially made cardboard tubes. The wide ribbons were wound on the rolls between very thin sheets of paper; I shall show you an example some other time. The narrow ribbons didn't always get this treatment. Some of the larger rolls of ribbon were tied closed with that same thread you see above, and shorter lengths ditto. There were rolls of ribbon from a quarter inch to three and more inches wide, moire, edged, picoted, or printed. Many were stained from their years in the attic, and a few were shredding, being made of weighted silk, but many are still strong.

Now for the fun part. The sisters shared their business, but split at some point, and every little item they owned, Curtis explained, split too, in exact halves. Even ribbons were divided right in half! Whether the split was amicable and the division the decision of two very precise ladies, or a tragic and angry separation, I cannot suppress a smile, these years later. Certainly the items don't retain any sadness, like some items do, preventing me from even handling them. Instead they seem to be happy, sunny things, telling their story to us afresh.

Material Culture and Social History Blogs
Are you interested in reading about material culture and social history? Then I have several more blogs for you that I follow regularly. They are all quite different, but I think you will dip into each one with joy.

At the Sign of the Golden Scissors
Specifically eighteenth century dress. A really wonderful journey into textiles, stays, portraits, and more. American.

Picking for Pleasure: Understanding Antiquing Acquisitions
Examining a wide range of American items through the lens of material culture studies.

Zho Zho's Textile Adventures
Textiles, history of costume, historic houses, fashion, from New Zealand.

Today I leave you with...
...Muffin and Ladybug snoring, apropos to the Cat Days of Summer. Why should the dogs get all the press?

First Day of Nursery School

Yesterday morning was iomportant. The boys sang a made-up song about a coffee house after we helped them dress for their first morning at nursery school. Then they picked up their backpacks, and off we went with grandmother to Immanuel Baptist.

All four of us were excited, but only two were nervous, and those two didn't include the boys. They had worked out their worries by clinging to Mama and Daddy the night before, a night culminating in a nice early morning thunderstorm. Parents out there, do you feel a giggle rising, suspecting who slept well, after lots of cuddling, and who didn't?

Once in their Pond, the suite of rooms they and their other boys and girls will call their own two mornings a week, Miss Donna showed them their cubbies, and they began to follow their noses, inspecting everything else and glancing at their classmates. Grandmother and I tagged along, and I watched the wet morning sunshine peep into the windows and spotlight a pretend grill.

"A gree-ill"!

"Two kepuchs [ketchup bottles]! And this is an ice ceem, Mama! It needs to go into the freezer." Noah tested the pretend freezer door. My plan for long hugs evaporated and I backed away gently. They are growing up and I won't smother them, but boy, did I want to reach down, nab whoever was closest, and squeeze him tightly, and then squash the second one equally tightly and leave his nose damp with kiss marks.

"Goodbye, Noah! Goodbye, Christopher!"

Waited.

"Goodbye, boys!"

"'Bye-'bye, Mama!" with some waves and smiles from both of them.

"Thank you so much, Miss Donna; I can see they're pretty happy, and oh, Curte will be here to pick them up...". Miss Donna smiled and I knew she knew what was going on; Curte was not the only Daddy who would arrive early upstairs and sip coffee, a floor away from his children, waiting.

Out the door we went, and a new stage of their lives began. I suppose for us, too.



By the way, yes, I did hug them lots later. When yesterday evening they rode their bicycles back to grandmother's from the ice cream shop, they were taller. I am positive of it. Sigh.

Volunteering in 1790s Costume for the Costuming Society of America at Ashland: A Success!

Dramatis personae: Jenni (middle), Polly (right),
me (left). Also, look! My plumes are standing forward,
the way they are meant to be. They soon swung backward,
the bums.

This evening the Jane Austen Sewing Society/Bluegrass Regency Society volunteered at the kickoff of the Costume Society of America's Summer Symposium, at Ashland, the Henry Clay Estate.

Polly, Jenni, and I demonstrated trapunto (wadded quilting), goldwork embroidery, working with plumes, and rolled hemming for symposium participants, while they nibbled on hors d'oeuvres and when they weren't touring the Ashland estate house or looking at its costume collection. Jeannie took all the pictures; thank you, Jeannie, you were so sweet to do it, especially as you were not feeling well.

It was such a delight to listen to, learn from, and talk with kindred spirits, people who have made costumes, fashion history, and textiles their life's profession or passionate hobby. They were all such kind, interesting people, so willing to share information about themselves and their work. It was a treat to meet students and their professors, docents and researchers, professional theater costumers, and conservators, to learn about fabric conservation, and oh, so much more, all set in such golden-green beauty. There is nothing like Ashland's grounds on a handsome summer evening.

Thank you, CSA and Ashland, for having us. We so enjoyed helping out and spending time with you, and we hope that the rest of the symposium is a grand success, and that your dinner cruise goes off like a happy dream.

After having a chance to think about it all more, I'll write more, but here are some of the pictures.

The only costume notes for the moment: yes, that's a new hairstyle, one closer to the real deal for 1795, and it features innumerable curls made with a combination of rollers and a good curling iron, and the addition of a massive looped chignon in back, of artificial hair. I still haven't figured out how to get curls to stay on top of my head. Have tried pinning my curls up, etc., etc. and may resort ro adding tiny rows of artificial rouleaux. Still, this style is close to some fashion plates and some prints and portraits, so I am happier with this evening effect than I was with the effect last round.

The bandeau is a strip of buckram wrapped with silk, which is then manipulated with stitches to introduce some pleats and folds,  and then tied in front and pinned with a vintage brooch set with brilliants. The necklace is a double strand of potato-strung freshwater pearls, with ribbon closure.

Finally, no, the plumes did not stay right way round on my head for long. This iteration I just plunged the end of the plume behind the bandeau and into my curls. Last time, if you recall, it had been wired to a thin structured under-bandeau that was hidden behind a soft, wrapped bandeau. Round three experimentation ahead. I am busy reading in magazines of the era trying to glean bits of evidence.

Finally, aftermath :} There's that massive chignon, now let down, and all the curls coming undone after being let out of the bandeau.

The next morning: Jenni of Living with Jane wrote about the event too; please do have a read!

Volunteering for the Costume Society of America...and a Hiatus

Happy News! Our little Jane Austen Sewing Society will be volunteering for the Summer Symposium of the Costume Society of America, Southeastern Region. At their kickoff reception at the Ashland Estate, we will demonstrate fine handsewing along with fan games, while we wear Full Dress suitable for outdoors, a la Ranelagh. We're all really looking forward to the opportunity to volunteer, and if I get the opportunity, I will post about it.

Meanwhile, the serious news. This blog is going on semi to full hiatus for another period. The boys start nursery school in a month or so, and our house renovation needs more of my attention. Therefore, the hobby must step aside once again.

I've enjoyed this last six months or so of fun with getting ready for the Jane Austen festival, and down the road hope to return with more translations from Journal des Luxus und der Moden, more costume research, and more experiments in period sewing.

Meanwhile, happy summertime to everyone, and I will see you again, on and off, later this year.

Accessories: 1795 Full Dress Ensemble in Cream Silk, Part 3

Some of the accessories used in the ensemble,

More 1795 Full Dress ensemble details, this time the all-important accessories, from hair to fan.

Headdress

Let's take it from the top, shall we?

Ugh, I almost deleted that, but, let it go...I am talking about hairstyles, with or without toupees.

By the way, the Gallery of Fashion uses the term toupee all the time, and doesn't necessarily mean a rat-sized piece of obviously fake hair glued to a man's head, but the hairstyling at the top of the head.

In case you've forgotten the look of the entire ensemble already, here it is from the side:

A little play in blue and white and sepia.

The inspiration was this 1795 'do, as you may recall, made with a satin chiffonet (wrap), spangled, and with a diamond brooch and two ostrich plumes.

Gallery of Fashion, 1795, detail.

Well, I had a vintage freshwater pearl and steel brooch instead, and not all the spangles are yet applied to the chiffonet, and the fabric is dupioni not satin, but the ends are pinked, as in the figure, and the affair is tied as in the figure as well as Polly and I were able to get it.

I had one issue with the headdress. Underneath is a bandeau made according to Lynn McMaster's tutorial (see previous post). Well, the feathers refused to hold that well. One really needs to have LONG wires to stick the plumes in.

Yet are wires necessary? Nicole of Diary of a Mantua Maker located a fascinating print in the Yale Lewis Walpole Library Digital Collection, titled "Beauty and Fashion", from 1797. First, the full print, and then let's look at a detail.

The mezzotint shows two women at work in what may be a home, given the mirror and pretty wallpaper and patterned fitted carpet and nice table, but also might be a shop. I am not versed enough in prints to know.

You see that they are wearing their headdresses and hats indoors. One sees this all the time. It may have been practical, given cold weather, and it may have been fashionable, and it may have been an artist's caprice, although even amateurs drew women wearing their headwear, not just caps, indoors.

Here's the detail, above, that has me all excited. The lady on the left is sewing a plume to the chiffonet, which is at least partly constructed of ribbons. See how stiff the chiffonet is? See how it holds its shape in her hands? It's constructed (!), not wrapped on the head. There must be a substructure, a stiff bandeau, to which that plume is being sewn. Otherwise the chiffonet would be floppy.

Some wraps were just that, wrapped...there are prints satirizing the process...but this one is premade, and it means I can construct mine, get it just so, sew the plumes to it tightly, and never worry my head again about trying to wrap the thing again or about falling feathers. O happy day that this nugget of historical experience revealed itself.

A second detail showing the tools of the trade. Scissors, of course, small ones, and lace, which I think is the spotted stuff hanging off the table, and a roll of striped ribbin, and what may be a pattern or cut-out piece of fabric. Pins everywhere. They are mid-length and they have small heads.

This is what I love about this hobby: the chance to discover the material culture and the experiences behind it.

Hair

What I still do not have the way I want it is the hair.

The hairstyles of the day were so full that to look like a fashion plate, even with very long thick hair one still would have had to employ hair switches or a wig. Portrait miniatures, full portraits, and prints show a variety of looks, some full, some obviously just natural hair, thick, thin, curly, or straight. See the 1790s Fashion: A Transition from The Enlightenment to Regency posts and browse the images to get a clearer idea.

I was aiming for a Miss Frankland's hair in "The Frankland Sisters" portrait by John Hoppner (1795).

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

My own hair is quite thick and curly, but not quite shoulder length.

To make the hairstyle, I pulled most of my back hair into a loose ponytail, secured it with an elastic band, then pulled the tail up the back of my head and pushed that giant curved haircomb you see in the topmost image down on it. The front and side hair were left hanging, and the remainder of the back hair ditto. I had no hair to hang down, much less enough to create the looped chignons of the fashion plate as well as the mezzotint about, so opted for this simpler, slightly later style.

When wound with that silk, the hairstyle flattened, and didn't have the length to work. The curls were too snakey thin, too. Solution? I will have to puff the natural curls more, lie the chiffonet on top more lightly, and hide some imitation locks underneath, in an effort to get the 1794-5 look.

Oh, about that comb. The base is a gift from Polly. I took an old pearl necklace I had that had broken, trimmed it to fit, and wrapped it to the comb with thin jewelry wire. Voila. It'll do, and can be taken apart and the base reused.
A final note about that mezzotint print above. Do you see the shorter hair the women are sporting? Plus that both women have hair that lies in soft waves rather than all-out curls?  By 1797 big hair was bye-bye, that's one message, and second, that not everyone strove to sport little curly tops. I see this in other Lewis Walpole prints, bye the bye. If you use the link above and browse the library's holdings, you can see for yourself.

The Belt


Yes, the belt. The one item for which I do not have a proper reference. It just felt right. Belts were used, no doubt about that, and the design on the belt fits right in, but its size and shape? I am not certain. Further research needed.

The fabric part's construction is simple, and I made no attempt, other than sticking to handsewing to make it perfectly period. A length of silk is just folded over a core of stiff cotton duck, and overcast down. Then one end is threaded through the buckle, then end turned over, and stitched closed, just as in any belt. The other end is whipped closed.

The belt buckle, front. If you click the image, you will see the cut steel details. The color varies, showing a bit of damage. I am thinking it very late Victorian or Edwardian based on its large size and the curve it makes, perfect for going around a waist. I have another, definitely Victorian/Edwardian one in faux jet of a similar design, bought at the same time and from the same source...both were in a grab bag, I think, for pennies. Those years, the 1890s through the 1910s, were a Golden Age for belts with sashes.

The belt buckle from its back. Note the rivets. This is a true cut steel piece, interestingly with a gold color on the main frame, which is not terribly usual.

On the back, three roundels composed of vintage glass circles shaped and colored to imitate cut steel (from Bumbershoot Supplies, again), sewn down, and then surrounded by purl frieze, and a star of frieze sewn inside.

The Fan

All I did here was to paint, in gold acrylics, an Adamesque design with swags and bellflowers and plain bands, both ubiquitous motifs from the 1760s onward, on a pretty sea-blue fan. Here the blue is stronger; the lower photo has truer color.

The stick ends are gold-painted, too, and a row of small dots spots the sticks just below the paper.

No particular model was followed, here. Rather, over the past year I reviewed lots of images of fan leaves from the Victoria and Albert, the British Museum, and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and absorbed the things I liked. Then, having  having drawn Adamesque designs for cards and whatnot for fun over the years, just came up with a design out of the head and painted it, on the spot and with a small brush, loosely and without particular worry.

I am very happy with the results. It is airy, subdued, and warm, the gold and blue reminding me of sky and sunlight.

Its only issue: meant to sparkle in dim lighting, it -- doesn't. The gold paint is best for daytime. No wonder some fans were glued with spangles! Next time, I spot some spangles on.

A detail, below.

That ends the series. I hope you've enjoyed it. You'll see this ensemble again, tweaked. More about the occasion soon. It's a very exciting opportunity that our little sewing group is honored to be a part of.