Uh-Oh, the DREAM DRESS

I know from following the blogs of online acquaintances that many of us have at one time or another fallen, plump, in pit-deep infatuation with a particular dress, and have decided, come what may, to create their own version of it. Demode's Maja dress, Diary of a Mantua Maker's 1790s plum embroidered evening gown, and The Aristocat's block print polonaise ensemble -- with handmade shoes -- come to mind.

It happened to me not so long ago. Here she is; meet my dream dress from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, accession number 1995.5.5.

She dates from the late 1790s, is made of cotton, and is lightly embellished. I think she is not well mounted on the model, because, looking at the detailed shots, I believe the loose pieces falling to each site were meant to cross over on the front and hide the front lining and especially the rather rough waistband. Yes, the lining is embroidered, but the fabric being so light, it would have shown through the upper layer in an attractive manner. In back, she appears to have a falling collar.

Unlike the V&A, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has not published much about her other than the above and some excellent pictures. You can zoom in decently on the dress to see details, although the original resolution is not terribly high.

So, what makes her so desirable, a real dream? Her combination of simplicity and the elegance of the feathery, limited-palette embellishment. Let's have a closer look at the latter.

Above, a photo from the back of the dress. Two of the back seams are embellished with close backstitching in yellow and cream silk, which I find effective, if not entirely in keeping with the rest of the embellishment design.

The whorl pattern made of spangles and silk embroidery is actually a stylized floral design, with a flower or leaf at the top left and a leaf at the bottom. It is executed with flat, untwisted silk, probably reeled and not spun, given its brilliance. By reeled I mean that these are long silk filaments reeled up from the unwound silkworm's cocoon, several lengths being twisted together to form the thread. They are not short bits of silk spun together to make a thread.

Because so many of the satin stitches are so long, and perhaps due to storage problems, in places the embroidery has really begun to degrade. See below.

Here's a detail of the embroidery pattern at the dress hem. The stems get their density from the spangles being overlapped. I think there is gold detailing around the spangles dotting the arrow-headed leaves.

Gorgeous, isn't it?

So, can I do this, from a technical standpoint? Mmmm. The dress itself is not so different from the wrap-front dress I made last year. I've done spangling and that is more fiddly than difficult. Nor is the backstitching embellishment an issue. It's the flat satin stitch that will give even accomplished embroiderers pause. It's slow to do, because one needs to lay each thread with the laying tool. Thankfully, the design is so stylized that one need only plan the direction of the stitches once for each type of motif: this is not a wandering, naturalistic design in which stitches would have to follow individually designed flowers or leaves at any of 360 degrees 'round the compass. Still, that is many, many months of embroidery...

What Would I Change, if Anything?

This needs research, but I have several ideas.

1. Replace the cream satin stitch embroidery with ribbon embroidery. There is documentation for ribbon embroidery on Regency-era evening dresses. I just have to see if this was done in the 1790s. I am thinking not so likely...
2. Replace the satin stitch embroidery with silk chenille, couched down. Now, there's an obvious choice. Chenille embroidery was popular, in part, no doubt, because it was fast and flexible. The issue is that the effect will be far less shimmery. You cannot see the shimmer too well in these photos, but I assure you, it is there. That's one reason embroiderers used the more expensive, harder-to-work flat silk. It is just lovely to look at. So, I would end up with a slightly less elegant, high style effect. It's something to ponder.
3. Make the dress slightly less poofy, especially in front. This dress exhibits the extreme end of pouf of the fashion plates. If the Met has dated it correctly to the late 1790s, it would be no later than 1797 if worn in highest style circles, because poofiness, especially in front, was being slenderized. Now, 1796 was a poofy year, and there were all kinds of jokes abroad about the look of pregnancy that a portion of the bon ton sported. Certainly the front of this dress is just right for someone in maternity clothes :} Since I am no longer entirely a spring chicken, erm, well, it would be a case of mutton dressed as lamb. So some slimming is in order.

Will I Take the Plunge?

Again, mmmmnnn. It's a dream dress for now.

A Real, Extant 1790s Cloak

My cloak.

Remember that hugely long voile cloak I made for this past summer's Jane Austen Festival? The kind that's pictured over and over and over in 1790s fashion plates?

I've located an extant example. They seem incredibly rare, perhaps because they were so long that they were easily stepped on or otherwise damaged and also easily reused for other items once they went out of fashion.

Diane Thalmann, dealer in English and French antique textiles, http://www.antique-textiles.net, sold a netted one dated 1790-1795. It's looooooonnnnngggg: 120 inches by 21 inches. Heavens.

Example of cloaks: left one is white,
right one is black. From Gallery of Fashion

As she described it: "This rare hand netted long scarf or stole would have been worn round the neck, crossed over under the bust and tied at the back.... Alternatively, it would have simply been placed round the neck and allowed to hang down – nearly to the ground. I have never had such a stole/scarf, and because they were of fine muslin, lace or netting are almost impossible to find, even in fair condition." See http://www.antique-textiles.net/shawls/1790-1795-white_long_scarf.html.

Netted Cloak, Diane Thalmann

Do have a look at this item, and her other shawls and textiles. I guarantee you will learn a great deal and if you are in funds, you might find a bona fide treasure.

Inside a Story: The Eighteenth Century Market Fair at Locust Grove



Autumn playsThree Graces with a little girl
from The Kentucky History Club

"We're inside a story, Mama," Noah remarked, his hair outlined in copper and gold against a sun-warmed log-cabin wall. A good choice for a story, and an excellent choice for a day. Clearest sunshine, air cool in the lungs but not biting, Locust Grove's trees at full color.

All around us, a busy market. It was the smells that made it most real: sides of pork spitted and roasting, Carolina rice in a giant kettle, the charcoal from multiple braziers and the blacksmith's forge, the fires from the big kitchen and the woodworker's cabin, cheddar cheese, roasting pumpkins, apples, unfiltered cider, crushed grass, straw, horse dung, and sometimes the odd scent of slow match or black powder.

Then there were all the sights, and the people to talk with and the stories to fall into. And the music: from military bagpipes to penny whistles to the human voice.

Trying yoyos.

Not one of us wanted to leave, and we had been there nearly the entire day: three of us were four years old and three, Jenni, Laura, and myself, were adult, and all six were as blithe as blithe. I want to go back inside the story!

Our Day, Narrated by Christopher and Noah

The bread and cheese wagon arrives.

Miss Autumn joins in the country dance.

Playing the drum and fife for stray coins.

Excited to buy good bread and cheese. They came wrapped together
with a twist of paper.

Munching on the bread and cheese...a second lunch,
hee hee.

The country dance.

A Continental soldier.

A German woman on her way to her camp.

They said the horses were a little spooked today.

The Braunschweigers with their German Shepherd.

When the boys saw these girls race to explore the springhouse,
they raced there too.

The pair of girls try to explain that the door
lock beneath was unpickable :}

The boys find water at the springhouse. We think that you
could store milk pails here.

Noah looks at the water. Just feet from the springhouse,
the actual spring bubbled from the earth, guarded closelt by trees and underbrush .

Noah explains that he thinks that the stream goes under
the springhouse.

The boys watch the blacksmith make
a double hook to hang from a ridgepole,
as Christopher explained to me later.

Christopher says the blacksmith was pumping air
with his bellows into his forge.

Chukka-chukka-chukka, sings the spinning wheel.

Demonstrating drawing the yarn. The spinner then
explored how all yarn is twisted, using roving and
willing pairs of children's hands.

The juggler on his ladder. Noah and Christopher
say that he had to take little steps with his ladder
forward and backward to keep fom falling over.

The soldiers were getting ready for a battle, says Christopher. And there I
am looking, says Noah, but I wasn't really fond of the soldiers.
In fact, we did not watch the battle...but when we thought it was
over, and came to peek, it was not over! Oops, away we went again.

Leading the way to the big kitchen, where a very large fire
burned in the enormous fireplace. The room was full of
vegetables, fruits, and cooks. Then the rat catcher arrived,
and said, "I heard there were some rats here in the kitchen."
But Christopher says, I think he thought the potatoes were rats.
[Sadly, I did not catch a shot of the kitchen.]

A view of the Continental camp. Christopher says he wishes
I had a picture of the candy shop. They bought maple sugar candy and
licorice but not gobstoppers, because they were too big.

Where our first lunch was cooked: we had Carolina rice cooked
in a giant kettle, mixed with roasted pork from a spit. There
were pumpkins roasting, but those treats were not for us, sigh.

Late afternoon cider.

Fun with Noah.

Exploring underneath the table.

More exploration, throughs cracks in the table.

The soldiers' retreat. Right now they are letting their prisoners
go, says Noah.

The very last scene...the day ends for us, while the soldiers and
their families get ready for an evening of feasting, singing, and company.

The day is over, says Christopher, and now it's time to go home and have dinner.

Spenceration: The Hive Mind Speaks and We Have a Rough Plan

Start with lapels
and sleeves.

Thank you all for considering the spencer issue...with your help, we have a solution.

Here it is:

• lapels, from the blue wool spencer, because they look so good, but a little smaller than the 1794 example, so they won't look silly for evening wear
• sleeveless base, to take care of Kentucky summertime ridiculous heat
• optional add-in sleeves, from the blue wool spencer, to take care of the cooler seasons
• optional add-in epaulettes in gold braid to hold up the sleeves
• trimmed at the cuffs and around the collar with chenille embroidery in a Neoclassic design, to complement the add-in epaulettes, in a faintly military style -- a takeoff on your Museum of London pelisse trimming, Mrs. C :}
• made of my existing 1.5 yards of periwinkle silk, so that I don't have to spend for fabric



Add the "body".

• sewn with yellow silk sewing thread to add some pop to the seams (see Nineteenth Century Fashion in Detail for an example)

All I have to spend any money on is for chenille embroidery "thread", and some braid, and yellow silk sewing thread, to add some pop to the seams.

Next, Planning the Project Execution

Let's do this right, and have a proper plan:

1. Examine extant garments, and check written sources in diaries and magazines. This refines understanding of how the garment is worn, constructed, and trimmed.
2. Search for extant chenille trimmings. I already have a pretty decent idea but want to show you pictures.
3. Get chenille in soft yellow from Hand Dyed Fibers. Get yellow silk thread (check Mary Corbett's Needle 'n Thread for best source: it could be Hedgehog Handworks.



Design a Neoclassic embroidery pattern.

4. Find braid or use chenille to make it.
5. Work up toile in muslin and refine fitting over the dress, especially the sleeves.
6. Take the toile pieces, and draw them on the silk.
7. Draw the trim design in pencil on the silk. Do not cut the pieces. This is how I understand 18th century embroiderers would have worked.
8. Stretch the silk in a hoop, and work the embroidery*. I do not have a proper "slate" stretcher such as would be best for such a project, but embroidery hoops galore, so there you are.
9. Cut the linen lining, cut the pieces.
10. Construct the body and sleeves.

*Eighteenth Century Embroidery Techniques has a chapter of how-to that can help teach you, and see also Maureen's Vintage Acquisitions blog article titled Using Silk Chenille for an illustrated tip on handling the chenille thread.

So there is my wintertime project: small, portable, but rife with social history research opportunities, and incorporating the chance to bone up again on an old favorite skill, embroidery.  Plus, pretty summery silk, but warm fluffy chenille.

Apply it to collar, fronts, sleeves, as here.

Now that was a pleasant effort as a lunch break during an especially busy work day. So nice to think of something entirely different from work-work, housework, house projects, and children.

Spenceration

I need a spencer. Okay, I don't "need" a spencer, but as I develop at 1790s-early 1800s set of garments, a spencer, or a garment with some spencer-like features, would be a next likely project candidate.

Done well, it could be convertible, used in multiple situations:

• if a lapelled spencer, with my little white wrap-front dress as morning dress; then with a matching skirt, and a high linen stock, and a hat, as a habit; with the informal cotton cream print dress as a walking-in-the fields ensemble;
• with the wrap-front dress again as morning dress, then retrimmed for afternoon or evening.

A spencer has the advantage of using little fabric and being a small, portable project just right for doing a seam or two as I feel like it. Here at home we have so many important house projects going on that I while I'd like to be working on something as a change of pace in the evening from reading, and as a brain-freshener, the project needs to be one that requires little in the way of especial energy, and next to nothing in the way of expense.

Herewith, a few ideas, all from the full span of Gallery of Fashion.

Option 1: a blue wool spencer.

March 1794, Gallery of Fashion. Morning dress
Figure XLVI (on the right). ...Petticoat of worked muslin...Spencer of dark blue cloth, edged with scarlet. Ruff of white lace round the neck. Plain muslin handkerchief. York tan gloves.

This spencer will have been of wool. A pattern for such a spencer is available from Sense and Sensibility. It would be straightforward to work one up and then later make a matching skirt. I would have to purchase wool, however, and could not wear it in summertime. Mmm, no. A project for another year...

Option 2, a green cross-over front spencer.

April 1798, Gallery of Fashion, morning dress
...Petticoat of white muslin, with an embroidered border. Spencer-corset of green satin, with plaitings in the front, and plaitings with a gold trimming at the wrists. Yellow sash, with gold tassels, tied on the left side. Triangular gold earrings. Four small gold chains round the neck. Yellow shoes, trimmed with blue fringe.

Here's a handsome spencer, of a color that can be worn year round. I cannot admire the "Minerva bonnet", but the "spencer-corset"! (Interesting terminology.) The effect is handsome and understated, and that Regency green just sings, doesn't it? To make it, it is nothing but the top from a wrap-front dress with some pleatings on it, and tight sleeves. The sash, a nice length of my silk, painted or dyed, with silk floss tassels.

Another look:

Still, with long sleeves, this one doesn't really work for very hot summertime wear -- which is when I tend to dress, anyhow, and it cannot convert to a habit style, for a more rugged look. Hmmm. Must think. Is this the one anyway, despite the limitations? Or does that wait, too?

The "Body" Option

What about another option, the "body", a sleeveless bodice? Even less fabric is needed, and but a bare few seams, and it is easy to wear in the summer to give a blast of color to the ubiquitous white dress.

Why yes, I think I can see that easily. I would need less than a yard of fabric, and gee, I have some lovely periwinkle silk, just waiting in the stash, left over from a shift dress I made to wear to a wedding some years ago.

July, 1795, Gallery of Fashion, morning dress
...Round gown of embroidered muslin, flounced at the bottom. Short full sleeves, drawn in the middle of the arm. Body of lilac taffeta. Yellow handkerchief, crossed in the front, and tied behind.
The yellow handkerchief adds yet more color. Let's borrow her friend's hat though, shall we? Her own reminds me of a corona of straw.

To make it, the pattern from my cotton dress for the back, and a wrap front, which will look the best with the underlying dress.

As for convertability, as you will see in the example below, the "body" can be worn for evening dress as well, when it is trimmed a little more.


February 1796, Gallery of Fashion, afternoon dress
...Muslin petticoat, trimmed at the bottom with blue satin in vandyke scallops; short full sleeves of muslin, trimmed with blonde. Body of blue satin, trimmed round the neck with a double plaiting of blonde, and on the back with a chain; epaulettes of the same, looped with a spring chain and tassels of gold.

This one is funky. Perhaps originally the bodice and sleeves were sewn attached to one another, but it could be easily treated as a separate body, with lace tacked on. The full sleeves of my dress could be pulled up with braided braid and tassels, and the ends tacked with lace as well. The chain in back, more braided braid, set with small buttons at each end, and again, tacked on as needed.

For right now, this tiny garment of four seams might just be the thing.  Mmm, I see too that I could do plaitings to the front of the periwinkle body, then make removable sleeves that tack in, as was so often done, and voila, have a periwinkle spencer. The ultimate in convertibility, for it would go from sleeveless undress to sleeveless evening wear to sleeved daywear. Wow. Really, how can you beat that? The next question, will that fabric eke out?

Yet...

The Half-Jacket Option

Here is a handsome summertime option. Jackets never fully went away; in a few issues previous to the plate below, there is a Hungarian fur-trimmed jacket, for example.

In this case, the jacket...a jacket because it has skirts -- or what we might call a peplum today -- is sleeveless. I like this one especially because it's in black gauze, and so it let's the dress show through, and is as light as light. Don't you enjoy the seaside view, as well? I think it's an effective picture.

October 1800, Gallery of Fashion, morning dress
...Round gown of white muslin, short full sleeves, tied in the middle with a coquelicot riband. Half jacket of black gauze, trimmed with broad black lace...yellow gloves.

To make this one, I would use the pattern from the bodice from my cream robe, which has the same back. We cannot see the front, but I would do a wrap front, using the pattern from my little white dress. The peplum? I'd drape that to see what would work best. I already have some sheer black cotton, rescued from a cutter garment, a gift from a friend, and black lace, ditto.

Because of the lace, the jacket could work as well for afternoon or evening as morning, especially if dressed up with jewelry. It is a fussier design, but sweet.

Mmmm. What to do? Which would you choose?

Croup

Two weeks of it, and counting. First the boys, with seal-like coughs, flushed faces, fevers, then colds, and throughout, lethargy and pain in the chest. Now both parents, ditto, excepting a trade for the terrifying cough with a sort of laryngitis.

Are we blessed to live in the days of modern medicine. This year 2011 may be spilling with every kind of sadness, tragedy, carnage, and venom, but we understand what germs are, do not bleed our already weakened patients, or apply blisters or other heroic treatments. Some of us, anyhow, can nurse each other with plentiful steam baths, plenty of clean air, good food, carefully controlled temperatures, real rest, isolation from further germs.

Thank God.

If you wish to know what croup used to portend, read William Buchan's notes on croup in his 1790 book, Domestic Medicine, pages 557-559.

In other news, lately this blog has received two very lovely awards; more on them anon, when I have time and energy to write.