Curling up with a Good Book

I really wanted a copy of the Tudor Tailor. It's pretty much a 16th century costume making bible. 

It's on amazon, and the Book Depository, and of course available from the website, but all my money is going on fabric!

In a flash of genius, I thought I would check the local library. I seriously couldn't believe it when they had a copy!

Look at me, all excited and everything!

The Coif

I've moved on to making my coif, as I have spare white linen, but no funds to purchase the linen for my petticoat bodice or kirtle lining at the moment!!
Linen caps, or coifs, were worn by women of all social classes - and I am certainly no exception! They are actually very comfortable to wear, and stay on well, although I plan to make a hat to pop on too. If I was one of the gentry, I would perhaps embellish it with embroidery, but obviously mine will be plain and simple.

It's fairly easy to make - plain white linen fabric, and a bit of measuring sprinkled with a helping of guesswork!
I'm using the pattern from Clothing the Rose, which is based on this lovely Holbein sketch of none other than Anne Boleyn.
My large head piece is 16.5" (round top of head from bottom of one ear to the other) x 12" (nape to about 1" back from hairline) - and then with a bit added all round for seam allowance.

**I would rather have made it even longer than this as I don't feel it tucks in neat enough. Perhaps an extra inch and a half**.

I then guestimated when drawing on the 'ear flap' pieces by looking at the sketch, but made them a little smaller as Anne's coif is wired and mine is not. Mine are about 2" wide and 3.5" long, but this includes seam allowance.

**I later had to shorten these as they were too long and flappy. I tucked the material in further and whip stitched it closed. Not the ideal job I know, but it makes them nice and firm. They are now 1.5" long, excluding seam allowance.**

The forehead piece is, again, 16.5" long and I have made it 2" wide - but added seam allowance to these measurements. 

The straps to tie it together are 29.5" long, which is the measurement from bottom of ear 1 round the nape of my neck to ear 2, then right round the top of my head back to the nape again, plus another 8cm (I know I'm switching units here!). I've made them 4" wide as they are folded in half and sewn. Again, I added some seam allowance to all this! At first I only cut one, then couldn't for the life of me figure out how it worked...took about five minutes for it to finally click in I needed to make two! Duh...

I hemmed the two body pieces, and backstitched then turned the straps. Then I sandwiched it together, remembering to tuck the straps inside so that they will be on the outside. I sewed the bottom and sides, then turned and closed the top with a French seam.

Voila!

Making the Petticoat - Skirt

When making the next layer I am splitting it into two (very logical!) parts - the skirt, and the bodice/bodies. The skirt is easy enough to do by myself but for the bodice I need an extra pair of hands to help shape the toile.

Kentwell have recently overhauled and updated standards of dress, and now the petticoat needs to have a linen or wool bodice. We used to have a skirt on a band, which is what is described on the Tudor Costume page.

Mine is a woollen skirt and linen bodice. The skirt wool should be fairly lightweight, but for lack of options mine is a little thicker. There is lots of evidence that red was a very popular skirt colour, but mine is the orange wool I dyed - red would have been nice, but I couldn't find any! 

The skirt consists of two panels - one tapered front panel, and a large back one. For the front panel, the top should be the same width as your waist circumference, and the bottom hem 1.5x this measurement. The back panel is a square piece 1.5x the waist at both top and bottom. For the drop, or length, measure from your waist to about a handspan above your foot.

Instead of hemming the bottom, I will add a 'guard', a strip of black wool. This means that when the bottom of the skirts get mucky/scrappy, I can simply replace the guards. 

Also keep in mind that wool will 'drop' and before attaching the bodice you need to hang the skirt for a day or two to let it settle and drop a bit. 

This sounds rather complicated but if you put it on paper it starts to make more sense. I started making my front panel by cutting a square 45"x32"(drop). I then measured 7.5" in each side on one long side - distance between these points being my waist circumference, 31". Going from these points I cut to the bottom corner on the opposite side to make a trapezoid shape. Back panel was easy - I just cut another square 45x32". 

I was going to whipstitch the pieces together next to create a tube, but I read on the 'Stitch in Time' blog that pleating and attaching a skirt to a bodice was far easier when they were both flat. So with this in mind, I've just whipstitched one side.

Next step is to hem the top before pleating to bodice, but I think I will risk leaving it...I could wholeheartedly regret this, but I think the wool will become too thick to pleat with a hem. Also, from the two washes it's pretty tight so I'm fairly confident it will survive! Time will tell...!

Making the smock - constructing

The weather this last week has quickly been turning foul, but when the rain is hammering the windows and the wind shaking the house there is nothing more pleasant than a good movie and some sewing. I have spent several hours peacefully hemming and stitching away. I could have used a run and fell stitch to construct my smock, but it had quite bad fraying from the stint in the washing machine of doom. I decided instead to hem all the pieces by hand using a blind stitch, then whipstitch them together; this is the method used on the Tudor Costume page. 

I hemmed all sides of my underarm gores and sleeves (TC page says to leave wrist but I decided not to*), and down the two long sides of my body piece.

Next stage was to whip the shoulders onto the body at the halfway point (see cross shaped picture), and then the slightly tricky underarm gores. 

Sleeves attached at mid point

In the meantime I have had news back from the helpful elf - my orange wool is fine, but still too bright and I need to dye it again. Poo. I'm glad it's been accepted at least, and I console myself with the thought that although it is thick and not as dirt cheap as it was when I bought it pre-dye, it's the only 'coloured' wool I have found. As much as I like brown and grey, and I know they are incredible suitable, I don't think I could handle more grey in a petticoat. I'd look like a sheep. Baaaa.

UPDATE:
Rather than making another construction post re shift, I figured I'd just update this one; keep the flow going, y'know.
Re: my ongoing saga with the petticoat wool which I'm sure is getting rather boring now. I rushed out and bought another packet of dye - same brand, but dark brown this time - thanks to my birthday voucher from Spotlight, yay! Shoved it all in the washing machine and lo and behold it appears to have worked. Well, I actually forgot to cut off a small piece before I dyed it for comparison (always do this!), but I'm sure it looks darker.
I've also purchased my kirtle wool. I want to get it all brought before it gets sold, now that I've gone through the process of posting bits as pigeon food to the other side of the world. I'm very glad I got in when I did, because I didn't even manage to get a 3m piece. I decided to go for the remaining 2.4m with an extra 60cm piece (hopefully for the bodice). Fingers crossed that all works out ok.

I stayed up late sewing last night as it was just TOO exciting seeing it all coming together! I knew it was time to turn it in though when I started to make stupid mistakes. 

When sewing in the underarm gores I noticed they have a tendency to move about, even though I pinned the fabric together. By the time I got to the corner I had to put a bit of extra tension on the gore piece so that the corners fit nice and snug. I took lots of photos of the sleeve/gore part as it did take a bit of brainpower to work it all out.

The underarm gores sewed onto sleeve and body

Then fold sleeve in half to sew opposite corner onto sleeve

Finally sew last side onto body

And here it is complete with armpits! :)

Once I had whipped up the sleeves - stopping 3" from the end as I've decided to do a fancy frilled bit - it was time to try it on and work out placement of the side gores. 

There was a slight issue in that there is no head hole. So, I had to make one! I carefully read the instructions and with a trembling hand found the middle then proceeded to cut about 4" to the left, right and down. Unfortunately, although I had remembered not to cut down the back, I forgot to actually physically seperate the fabric so as to not do so. Duh! I said I was getting tired! 

I panicked a bit then frantically sewed it up with a backstitch and a whipstitch. That baby is secure! Managed to get away with only losing about 1/8" in the new tuck.

Proudly showing off my work so far - sleeves sewn, body not so much!

I found the place where my side gores would start and bunged in a pin to mark it. It was basically where I could no longer pinch together the fabric and have a decent seam, so about where my waist is. 

To get the width I measured the length of my stride and halved it, as I could clearly see that my smock accounted for about half of it. Not terribly accurate! I ended up needing triangle shapes 15" wide at the bottom and 26" long. I cut out a rectangle this size then simply cut with my rotary cutter from each corner of bottom edge to just either side of half way on the opposite (short) side. I didn't want to end in a true point as I wanted to allow room for hemming and sewing in easily, so the top of my triangle was actually about 1/2" wide.

Cue basic donkey work; hemming, sewing in, hemming, whipstitching, ironing....the rest of the instructions on the TC page were easy to follow and simple to carry out. 

And that brings me to the happy conclusion - my first item of clothing is finished! I do still need to make a braid and add it to the sleeves so I can tie them closed in the authentic way, but it is basically completed :) cue one very happy me!

Here I am in my smock (basically my undies, ooh err!) :

Err excuse the mess, girls were 'camping'. You can just about see that I have pleated the cuffs - this was easy to do, and I really like the finished effect.

*Ok I'm lying. I didn't read it properly.

Making the Smock/shift - cutting

Right, I'm off! I've decided to make my costume 'through the layers'; beginning with the first layer, the shift, or smock as it is sometimes called - essentially it is my underwear.
It is made from white linen, and it is a very simple garment to construct. Fancy frilled necklines and cuffs can be made, but I think for my first one at least I will make a basic smock with a square neck and straight hemmed sleeves. This style is more suited to the early 1500s, whereas frills came into fashion in the later half of the century - a nod to the Elizabethan penchant for ruffs. I'm not sure yet which year will be chosen for Kentwell 2014, which is another reason for me to start with a basic one. I need two anyway so can always make the other more fancy if my meagre sewing skills allow!

I purchased 2m of linen as suggested by the costume notes, but then got completely confused as the Tudor Costume page directed me to make a large rectangle that was twice the length of my shoulder to below my knee - about 220cm on me! After much to-ing and fro-ing, neither my mum nor I could work out how the new notes get away with only 2m, as they neither say to cut a very large rectangle to fold in half as per the TC page, nor do they suggest sewing two rectangles together with a hem at the shoulder (and I have never seen this). I concluded I would use the 2m for my petticoat bodice, and purchase 2.5m to try again.

With much glee I carefully measured and cut all of my pieces, save for the side gores which I'll figure out later. I even pinned my underarm gores for hemming. I was poised and ready, looking forward to a night in front of the tv quietly stitching away, mayhap a glass of wine in hand to calm the nerves that always accompany my sewing!

Then disaster struck. Woe is me! I had forgotten to WASH my linen!! It is renowned for shrinking, sometimes rather drastically. Time stopped for a second and I'm sure I felt the floor spin a little. No, not an earthquake, and I hadn't even bought the wine yet. Trying not to think too hard about what I was going to do if all my hard work cutting meant I had random scraps of linen, unusable save for multiple coifs, I bundled up all of my fabric and immediately shoved it in the wash - on a 'delicate' setting, as if that is somehow going to stop it shrinking.

I'm typing this now accompanied by the sound of water swishing about. Far too violently if you ask me. I can almost feel the threads huddling together in protest. Ugh.
Stay tuned for the outcome...

UPDATE: Phew. One and a half hours later, and thanks to the sun and breeze of an early summer evening, I have my washed and dried linens in my hot little hand. A quick perusal concludes that they have, in fact, escaped unscathed. I have lost a couple of mm in fraying (according to google I was supposed to put them in a pillowcase??) but no apparent shrinkage! Yahoo!
So now it is back to merrily pinning and hemming for the evening. Bring it on, I say!

A Glimpse into the Past part II

Me on the butts in 2003 - my costume's pretty shabby. Wouldn't be accepted these days!

As you stroll about the manor, you will pass a variety of people. Some are modernfolk, come to observe and enjoy being immersed in living history. Others are common Tudors about their daily work - perhaps young men carting a load of wood to the bake house, a woman gathering herbs to make a poultice in the still room, or maybe some players leading a merry dance in the courtyard. Everyone has a role to play - sotlers making the noonday meal, spinners turning fleeces into wool for cloth, dyers with their vast bubbling pots, felters, potters, swordsmen, farmers, a family in the cotte looking after their young childer, basket weavers, bakers, brewers, archers, players, dairymaids, still room attendants, cooks in the grand kitchen, ladies creating the sweetmeats, a scribe, an apothecary, and of course the grand gentlefolk; the Lords and Ladies resplendent in silks and velvets - every aspect of the manor is represented and works in harmony, weaving together an incredibly rich tapestry of 16th century life.

When the gates are closed, the merriment continues, often long into the night. The memory is hazy now, but I think my favourite evening was when we celebrated one of the feast days with a massive bonfire; flames licking the sky, and many shouts of 'huzzah!'.

During the recreations, we speak in Tudor English; lots of yea, nay, thee, thou, and mayhap! The toilets are the jakes, littlies are childer, and we talk about things being 'many summers ago'. It became second nature for me, as I think it does for everyone, to the point where it slips into everyday language when the punters have long gone and we are relaxing in the evenings. I've had regular folk tell me that when they have visited they feel a little awkward conversing and being responded to in old English - although it makes the experience more authentic, they feel as though they should reply in kind. I tell them not to worry - personally I scarcely notice I am talking 'strangely'! 

Off to the Shops

I was delighted to wake up this morning to a message saying that my little envelope of samples had arrived in the UK! Unfortunately though, rather worse for the wear; perhaps it had been delivered by some very hungry homing pigeons, as apparently it landed through the letterbox looking half eaten. The sample of my orange wool was deemed to be the most delicious, as that had disappeared all together, and will have to be resent - gah!

Clockwise from top: Hose, hat, kirtle, jacket.

However, the rest mercifully arrived and I can now say that I am ready to purchase my wool! Going on the hopeful assumption that my dyed wool will be accepted, I'll have an orange petticote, a brown kirtle with brown detachable sleeves, brown nether hose, and a grey short jacket (as opposed to the longer 'gown' - because my kirtle wool is already rather thick; for vanity's sake, I felt it would look better next to the orange!)

Can't wait to get started! Here goes...