Tag Archives: sewing

A Favorite Gown, at Last

08 Monday Jul 2013

Posted by in 1763 Project, Clothing, Living History

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First wearing at the Martin House in Swansea, MA

Most of what I’ve made I’ve hated. It hasn’t been perfect enough. This is pretty much how it works when you are learning something new: your eyes outrun your abilities, and you have to keep working away to build the skills to match your dreams. I’m still building skills, but I have at least managed to get to a place where I can just about trust my ability to make something I can stand to wear.

I’ve also learned that you are likely, in the process of making a gown or what-have-you, to hate the garment in question. My friend hated her Green Gown of Doom, but when it was done and on she liked it. Midway through the Cherry Seller Robe, I hated it, thought it a failure, and wanted to quit.

Persevere: the moment when you are most frustrated is often the moment right before you figure out the thing you have been trying to learn.

Paul Sandby, London Cries: Black Heart cherries... ca. 1759. YCBA, B1975.3.206

Paul Sandby, London Cries: Black Heart cherries… ca. 1759. YCBA, B1975.3.206

The story behind the Cherry Seller Robe is that I plan to wear it in Boston on August 10, so it is very old fashioned. Based on Paul Sandby’s Black Heart Cherries watercolor, it is open with robings, and made of Burnley & Trowbridge’s wool-cotton “Virginia cloth.” The gown fits in a “v” on the front, and to my eye, has a 1750s look. (I have not finished the cuffs, attached lacing strips, or finished the stomacher; once lacing and stomacher are done, it will fit more like How Now Brown Gown.)

It was windy. Catastrophic hat failure resulted.

For August, I’ll make a white linen petticoat and a tan “Virginia cloth” petticoat, a blue linen apron and, I hope, a new lappet cap. (I had one cut out around here somewhere…) The yellow and blue or yellow-blue-white striped petticoat may have to wait; I have a lead on some in a stash, but no sightings yet.  Making new, lighter-weight petticoats is in anticipation of August weather in downtown Boston. I’m still debating about the kerchief, which seems to be a solid color with a striped border; I may just wear the one I have.

Yesterday was hot and windy, with a chance of hat failure. All in all, a fine day to sew and wear wool.

5 Days till Monmouth

10 Monday Jun 2013

Posted by in Clothing, Events, Living History, Making Things

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This is not Cassandra's idea of a nice frock.

This is not Cassandra’s idea of a nice frock.

Cassandra doesn’t like wearing uniforms and bayonets. She wants to wear a dress. She will have to be patient. (Actually, she is wearing a chintz jacket in need of a hem, and if I revolt against buttonholes, I might finish that tonight. More fringe must be made this evening for the hunting frock.)

I switched to Mr S’s overalls for awhile, and we’ve done the first fitting, which gets us to buttonholes and then re-basting the inseam and outseam. In the process, I discovered that he does, in fact, have a twisty leg. I do not think it is statistically probable that the two pairs of overalls I have cut for him and the pair cut by Mr Cooke would all include the same slightly on the bias leg. So I reversed my plans to get those done, and will stick with getting them to fitting number two. They will need a master’s hand and eye for fitting.

Sunday: One last strip o' fringe required.

Sunday: One last strip o’ fringe required.

But I think I have a plan for food for Monmouth, have confessed to Mr S that, based on the Monmouth sutler list, we must leave room in the car for possible additions to the Strategic Fabric Reserve, and have convinced the child to try learning a new song on the drum. I also started a new pocket, but I’m not sure if my hands can take the backstitching. Slipstitching and whipstitching aren’t too painful, but backstitching proved quite painful last night. It’s totally annoying, because it’s pointless to post a photo until it’s done and right-side out!

You can see the binding, but not the stripes. Silly!

You can see the binding, but not the stripes. Silly!

But this will be a panicky, intense week of samplers, reference, grant applications, and event prep. I suppose that’s not too different from many other weeks…though the last time I had this combination, we were only going to Sturbridge. I took comfort in the idea of how close we were to home, the way the cat knows how long it takes to dash to the basement when the doorbell rings. From Monmouth, it’s a long way back to my own basement.

Frivolity

29 Wednesday May 2013

Posted by in Clothing, Making Things

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chintz jacket

Detail, back neck and neckhandkerchief

Well, not all that frivolous, but pretty frivolous for someone who has been doubled down on a uniform production and class prep.

The remnant of chintz has turned into a nearly finished jacket, which is good. All that remains to do is the hem, and once the lining has been trimmed that shouldn’t be too hard. The pattern is an adaptation of the JP Ryan jacket pattern, with sleeve and length adjustments. It’s plain enough to pass, and with a striped “lincey” petticoat, will answer for New York-New Jersey servant wear. I have my eye on Monmouth.

checked linen bagAlso for Monmouth, the first of two checked linen bags. Small enough for toothbrush, comb, and other toiletries necessary in this century but out of place in 1778, these bags should help make camp packing lighter weight and more authentic. Hope so anyway, or what’s that backstitching and overcasting for, fun?

JoAnn Cotton fabric.

I watched it for six months.

And, finally, on a whimsical trip to Jo-Ann for plastic drawers, the remnant table was half off. The fabric I’ve been watching since it was $7/yard was $1.50 a yard. I got all 8 yards for $12. I see a dress of some kind in this fabric, though it will require caution to wear. 100% cotton, this will burn. Which century or decade? Not sure yet. But I like it, and that’s enough to start with, when you’re feeling frivolous. (And yes, I did read that article in the Times about hoarding, but this is Strategic Fabric Reserve purchasing, not hoarding.)

Sewing for the Adjutant

25 Thursday Apr 2013

Posted by in Clothing, Living History, Reenacting

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Falling In, OSV 2012

Falling In, OSV 2012

We were invited to join a Massachusetts regiment after the event at Old Sturbridge Village last summer, and we did. This has been a good thing, though it’s sometimes a little tricky to figure out which unit to “be” with. It is also a challenge because even though the Rhode Island unit has careful (if unwritten and slightly out-of-date) standards, the Massachusetts unit is another thing altogether.

Gathering the first sleeve head. Destination: Saturday afternoon

Gathering the sleeve heads. Saturday is soon!

The women last weekend kept asking what I was working on so assiduously. It was the hunting shirt (to become a frock) for the Young Mr for the new unit. Cut by the master, entirely hand-sewn by me. This is not something they would do.

“Sewing for The Adjutant, ” I said, “is another thing altogether.”

“Don’t even try. Who can sew like that? He’s a professional,” I was told.

What we're aiming for.

What we’re aiming for.

Well, yes.

So wouldn’t that be the very thing to reach for? It’s not like he’s not helpful. I have his shirt to copy, he answers my questions patiently, and I haven’t yet felt like an idiot.

The skill I have I owe in part to my mother and grandmother, and to the Dress U workshop with Sharon Burnston.  Stroke gathers, two-by-two stitching, using the tiniest needle possible are all things I learned or honed in Sharon’s workshop. And thanks to that workshop, this hunting shirt-(perhaps)-soon-to-be-frock is a great deal easier to tackle.

The other part of skill is practice. It’s as true for piano or soccer as it is for sewing. Just keep stitching, and it will come.

And after the fitting, the fringing. That's for someone else to do.

After fitting comes fringing. That’s for someone else to do.

What I find hardest is fit: not only is it hard for me to judge how much to take in a garment to achieve 18th century fit while maintaining enough ease for the wearer to swing an ax (or to accommodate teenage wriggling), alterations annoy me. I suspect that the key may well be not to fit at the end of a day, but at a beginning, or at least a middle. Fitting after a long day of sewing could make you think you were tossing away a whole day of work. It also feels, still, like taking a car to the mechanic or the cat to the vet. There’s something wrong, and I don’t quite understand it. Yet. But with Shoulders Roll Forward and Monkey Arms, I bet I’ll understand more soon.

How Now, Brown Gown?

11 Thursday Apr 2013

Posted by in Clothing, History, Living History, Making Things

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Finished. Hope it fits, right?

Finished, that’s how, with holes in my fingers and a split in my thumb.

Sure hope it fits…I have tried it on along the way, and it is an open robe, so chances are good it will fit. But after I dressed Cassandra, I did have that “What if…?” moment of dread. There’s a lot of this that’s like art school. Hours laboring alone, hours of studying precedent, craft/technique and theory, and then you have a presentation, i.e. you wear the thing in public. I try not to think about it too much.

I could take this apart for you (the sleeve is more ‘modern’ than the cuff; gowns are not known to have been bound at the hem, though petticoats were; didn’t finish the matching petticoat; did I use the fabric the wrong side out?) but Gentle Reader, I suspect you can supply your own quantity of anxiety, and need not borrow a cup or quart from me.

Let’s talk about the fun parts:

For a while, I hated this gown. Seriously. The closer I got to being done with it, the more I flat-out despised it and found it ugly. Why? Too nice. That’s a respectable gown, that is. It’s the gown your mother would tell you to wear, or the one she thought you ought to change into when she said, “You’re going out in that?” As if you were planning to run away in a red and black calico gown… And I hated the color. Then I thought the wool was too heavy.

Mrs Sylvanus Bourne, JS Copley, 1766. MMA, 24.79

I am not this old. My impression is not this wealthy. My dress is not silk. But when I look at what I’ve managed to make, and I look at this (my own white apron is coming; I almost finished it yesterday, but the alarm company called and I had to go deal with an early-morning bat) I feel better. I have white mitts, a white kerchief, and there will be a white apron, bats or no bats.

It’s a neat presentation, the brown and white will look well together, and with a black hat or black bonnet. And by the time I’ve sat on dirt and ground some soil into the skirt, and burned a hole into the hem, I’ll probably like this gown.

But it seems so…proper…and that just doesn’t seem like me.