SIL journal

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I've decided to make up Simplicity's new pattern for an Elizabethan costume, #0679, making changes as needed to make it more authentic. My plan is to keep an online journal of the process, with pictures. If any of you decide to join me, pleae email me to tell me all about it, and send me pictures!

August 22: Decided to make the costume in size 14, mostly because I have a corsetable dress form in that size.

Looked through my stash of fabric. Found some beige upoulstery velvet, a gift from a friend who was moving, to use for the overskirt and bodice. The pattern shows the bodice matching the underskirt, but they didn't do that: the overskirt and bodice should match, as if they were a one piece garment, which they often were.

I'm considering a piece of emerald green brushed cotton with a velvety texture, for the sleeves and forepart of the underskirt.

August 23: Pre washed the fabric for the bodice and overskirt. Every big costume project seems to entail at least one Horrible Disaster, and this one started off with...er..a splash. As the washing cycle started draining, the plumbing backed up, spewing raw sewage out of the kitchen sink, the toilet, and the shower. Let's hope this is the only incident on this scale.

Made some preliminary sketches to try out trim patterns, varriations, etc. This is something I do almost constantly; every envelope and grocery store receipt in my purse has a sleeve or a trim pattern scribbled on it. The process of deciding can take anywhere from a few hours to years.

I'm trying to decide if the forepart trim should match the sleeve, or be something different. I like this style, with horizontal bands of trim spaced 3" apart, with diagonal slashes in the spaces between. Maybe.

August 25: The fabric is prewashed. I don't usually prewash three times, once with Lysol, but the plumbing disaster sort of forced it. Luckily the fabric came through fine. I was doubtful because it was rather stiff, but now it's soft and dense. Here are the swatches. The gold trims are not the ones I'll be using, they're too plastic looking, but I included them just to get a sense of what the colors will look like with gold.

August 26: Still trying to decide on trim patterns, I was leafing through Janet Arnold's "Queen Elizabeth's Wardrobe Unlocked", and found this

. If you scroll up to the 22, I said that the bodice and overskirt should match. It's been my opinion that they always did, but this shows a matching bodice and underskirt...just like the pattern. . Now, she's Italian, not English, but still...you'd think I'd learn not to say never.

I'm going to make the bodice and overskirt match, though, because it's more typical.

September 12: I took some time off to clean the studio, get the kids into school, and work on plans for a business I want to start. But I'm back now.

An important part of any project is establishing a deadline. As I plan to sell this gown on Ebay when it's done, and I think it would make a dandy Christmas present for someone, my deadline is officially December 1st. Let's see if I make it.

The first step was to determine the size. My dress form has a 40 inch bust and a 30 inch waist. According to the pattern, A 40" bust makes her a size 18, but a 30 waist is size 16. the usual advice is to go by the bust measurement and adjust the waist to fit, which would mean I should use size 18.

However, I'm justifiably suspicious of these things, so I checked the pattern. I measured all the bodice pieces at the bustline, excluding the seam allowances, and found that the actual measurement was 42 inches.

Why do the pattern companies do this? It's due to a concept known as "ease". Modern fashion is rarely skin tight. It needs to have some extra room for the garment to skim over the body rather than hugging it. Since most people are so used to wearing garments with ease, I believe the pattern companies are operating under the assumption that people won't think the garment fits properly if it's fitted tightly.

An Elizabethan bodice with 2" ease simply won't look right. At most, it needs 1/2" ease. Also, since I'm making this gown for resale and whoever buys it may not be the precise measurements of my dress form, I'm going to make it with laces, not hooks, at the back to give it some adjustment room. With laces, a bit too small is better than too big. Therefore, I'm going to cut a size 16, altering the waist to the 30" measurement.

September 13 Made the bum roll. No surprises here, it's very easy. I chose to space the rows of stitching on the hip yoke at 1/4" rather than 1/2", to give my fabric a bit more body. It also made the spacing easy, as I used the width of the sewing machine foot.