1580s Doublet

This doublet is based on the pattern for a 1585 woman’s doublet on page 107 in Patterns of Fashion 3. I based the rest of the outfit in the illustration on a picture of a woman in a doublet in the introduction to the book.

In my stash I had a remnant of gold brocade that I had bought at a curtain shop that was closing down. I decided to use the wrong side for the doublet because the right side is quite bright and shiny and I didn’t want my doublet to look so rich. There are two layers of linen as interlining which holds some light boning (linen isn’t so expensive when it’s fluoro orange!). On wearing I didn’t think the boning was enough so I now wear the doublet over my effigy stays.

The fabric I used for lining is completely synthetic but was quite nice to work with. I made this doublet when I was still in school and as I hadn’t made a properly lined garment before I took it to school for help. I wasn’t studying textiles at the time but the textiles teacher was my home group teacher and she very kindly gave me a few lunchtime lessons. 

When I finished the doublet I found that the peplum overlapped in a way I hadn’t expected and I wasn’t completely happy with the collar but I was reassured when I saw an extant doublet at Warwick Castle (when I went to England) that had the same issues.

The camica (or undershirt) is made from muslin and constructed entirely from rectangles. It has a very loose weave. Camicas are usually white and I suspect I made up the idea of having a coloured camica – I certainly can’t find that I have any evidence of coloured camicas being historical. The camica and skirt are both hemmed by machine, which horrified me last time I wore it because I wouldn’t make it that way nowadays. I would guess the skirt fabric is a very fine stretch corduroy but from a distance of more than a foot away it just looks like a heavy velvet. The skirt consists of rectangles cartridge pleated to a waistband.

When I do my hair for this costume I don’t use bobbypins to hold the braid in place, but instead ‘sew’ my plait to my head with a ribbon to form a bun.

 I made a flat cap to go with the outfit from this tutorial.

Corset tutorial

Last year I made a corset and pair of cuffs to be part of my everyday wardrobe.

The corset is a cut down version of TV110; the cuffs are a pattern my mother draped on my wrist. (It’s difficult to drape a pattern on your own wrist.)

Because the fabric I used didn’t repair pin holes I used clips instead. I sewed the cuffs by hand – getting a sewing machine into the tiny spaces is a lot of effort for a messy result.

Below the cut is a tutorial for how I make 3-layer corsets.  The pattern has boning channels through all layers of fabric and openings in front and back. I adapted the method provided with the pattern because I didn’t want the boning channels to go through the fashion fabric and I wanted a front opening only. There may be better ways of doing this, but when I was trying to solve this problem I couldn’t find any guides. I have since used this method for several corsets and have found it to work quite well. It is an unforgiving method: any adjustments would require taking apart all of the corset sewn after the place needing adjustment.

2013 Review

Costumes:
2013 began with making a replica of Lady Denman’s dress to celebrate the Centenary of Canberra.

I finished work on the costumes for my friend’s film. I learnt some very basic leatherwork and made a pair of boots and two pairs of boot covers. The boots work, but I think I would need to improve my leatherworking ability a lot to make anything else.

My aunt asked me to make a gypsy costume as a gift for her granddaughter. It consists of a blouse, veil and skirt.

I want to record here that I currently have the patterns for two of the three Assassin’s Creed outfits nearly finished. I was productive in the last quarter of the year; I just didn't finish anything. 

Real Clothes:
I made a corset and cuffs.

I started the design for my big project for the year in January and finished the garment in October. Getting the design from theoretical concept to completion involved a lot of problem solving which caused delays throughout the process but I am very happy that I spent the time to get it right.

During the process I designed and made a crossover tunic as a bit of light relief.

I am making slow but enjoyable progress on the Bayeux tapestry dress.

I also made a slip for myself and a halfslip for someone else, neither of which were worth pictures.

In 2013 I made fewer pieces than in any year since I stated costuming. This bothered me a bit (because I have a bad habit of judging myself on quantifiable results) but on reflection I think there were several good reasons for this. One was getting a permanent job, so I had to adapt my sewing/study/other balance to be a sewing/study/other/work balance. There were a couple of months when I just didn’t have the time, so some of my planned outfits didn’t happen. I am also putting more care into my sewing. Where previously I did hems and braid by machine I am now hand sewing a lot of things. Instead of zigzagging seam allowances together, I now iron them out and finish each side separately (which I’m pretty sure is ‘how you sew properly’ but it takes more time. And more thread.)

Learnings and new skills:
I had an epiphany at the start of last year: I finally worked out what seam allowances are for. For most of my life I had left the smallest seam allowance possible because I couldn’t see that they did anything. But now I know better. A wide seam allowance holds shape better, strengthens the seam (so there is less risk of seams giving way) and gives you some leeway with fitting.

When I first heard about ‘no visible machine stitching’ I thought it sounded like far too much work, but I have come around to this way of thinking because it looks so much better. Even with my every day clothes I now expect to do a significant amount by hand. This year I also started doing some of the more fiddly construction sewing by hand because it gives me more control. 

The grey swathes were hand hemmed, then sewn by hand to the black.

As mentioned above, I introduced myself to leatherworking this year, but I need to do a lot more before I approach competent. 

I never expected that costuming would affect my writing ability, but I have found that writing this blog has improved my writing and made writing easier for me to do.

A new tool I have found very helpful to my sewing this year is photo editing software. I use Gimp 2 (which is free) to touch up photos and add watermarks and also to experiment with designs. This year I used it to try different colour schemes on a scanned drawing, to trace seam locations over a reference picture and to draw additional features on photos of a garment.

So many seams!

For my Assassin’s Creed outfit I developed a pattern from my body block rather than adapting pattern pieces from one or more ‘similar’ commercial patterns as I have done in the past. I expect I will use this method more often as most things I want to make are not similar to available patterns but I do not enjoy the process. I’ve spent a fair bit of this week cleaning the house instead of working on my costumes because I’m currently patterning!

When I started costuming my interests were largely historical, but since then my focus is continually changing as I discover new ideas. This year my interest has moved more towards designing everyday clothes for myself that incorporate fictional costume conventions. My distinction between costume and real clothes is becoming more and more arbitrary.