Calontir Clothing Challenge - January Update (and a new family member)

 

There are still a few days to go on this Challenge, but I *know* I won't get my projects finished. My plans have been completely derailed this month by the arrival of a new family member. 

This little Bean is the best sort of disruption!

It has been seventeen years since I dealt with a puppy, so I am well out of practice and underestimated the destructive and disruptive impact 😊

I didn't get to finish anything from the Challenge this month, but I did achieve the following overall:

* camicia cut out, embroidery marked out and underway

*coat pattern drafted, cut out and underway

*gown pattern and gown sleeve pattern underway

*linen partlet complete

*patterned partlet mostly complete (just needs a small amount of hemming)

*knotted partlet underway

*jewellery made

*masks made

Not even close to what I had hoped, but not too bad considering the massive amount of administrative work I was doing for the first two months, then Christmas projects, and then.....puppy!

I have also got a lot of ideas and inspiration from the other participants and I am looking forward to seeing the completed entries.

I'd like to thank the admins, judges and entrants for giving so much time and energy to this project to inspire others. I would certainly enter again, and even though I couldn't finish this time, I would definitely recommend it as a great way to focus time and energy for new projects.

Hem Finishing - Brown Dress

I have been working on the final stages of a brown tourney dress that I made early last year. I didn't finish it at the time I made it because I made an error with my Frixion marker that stained the bodice and I have been trying to find a way to fix it. The dress needed hemming, trim and tucks at the hem and some internal finishing and sleeve ties.

                                                                Sewing the seams flat

The hem tucks are tacked and then stitched down by hand

Applying trim at the hem

This is a project that I am working on amongst other things. I would like to add some shoulder puffs too, if I can find the leftover scraps from cutting out the bodice.

Tie-on Sleeves in Plum Cotton Fabric

You may remember that an ongoing project is the creation of a suite of tie-on sleeves to complement my Italian style gowns. The other day I was bed-ridden and I was trying to work on sewing down the inside of the seams on one of the pairs.

The sleeves are cut out and zigzag stitch put along the cut edges. Then the side seam is machine sewn (or hand-sewn if I have the time and manual dexterity, which I usually don't).

Th idea with the inside seam is to press or finger-press the seam open and flat on the inside and sew it down with tiny invisible stitches so that it doesn't bunch or twist with wear.

I'll admit that I was struggling with the project, so I was pretty satisfied when I was done.

  I put the project down to admire my achievement........ and looked closer.....
Yep, those are two right sleeves!
Of course, I noticed this after the seams had been machined and then hand sewed flat. (Eyeroll.)

Girl's Italian Gown

Today I finished the girl's Italian gown that I have been working on. It is a gift for a little friend's birthday this weekend, so I just scraped it in in time. It is cotton broadcloth with commercially produced pink gimp braid. The Birthday Girl loves pink, but her mum hates the colour. So this dress  is a compromise. It has cap sleeves with fabric puffs, because the Birthday Girl usually wears only a chemise underneath. It has a couple of tucks in the hem to allow for growth, which also helps to hold the hem out. It is a size 8 so that she will get (hopefully) at least two or three years worth of wear out of it.

This is the third or fourth gown that I have finished this year - I really must try to blog some dress diaries soon. Hopefully I can get some nice shots of the recipient wearing the dress.

A&S Challenge - Seam Treatments and a New Sash

Lots of seam treatments this week, plus I sewed up a new sash. The sash is a simple (very long) rectangle, hemmed at both ends. I toyed with the idea of adding tassels to this one as it is longer than my others, but I decided that I will get more use out of it as it is. I am not usually a fan of orange (the camera has not reproduced the colour faithfully) but I think it will look good against a black gown. I got the fabric quite cheap at a thrift store, so I am pretty happy with this find. I still have enough for an underskirt or kirtle.

A&S Century Challenge - Purple Sash

A quick & easy project for today; I whipped up a new purple sash (which for some reason looks blue in the photos). It is just a long rectangular tube hemmed at the ends, very handy for changing the look of an outfit.

This type of sash goes well with the style of Italian clothing that I like to wear.

Portrait of A Woman with a Book of Music by Bacchiacca
Image from: http://www.getty.edu/art/collection/objects/668/bacchiacca-francesco-ubertini-portrait-of-a-woman-with-a-book-of-music-italian-about-1540-1545/

A&S Century Challenge - Embroidery and Trim Sewing

Today I sewed down another edge on one of the ribbons that will decorate the sleeve of my next chemise. I also found a mostly embroidered chemise sleeve, and did a little bit of work on that.
I hope to get time later on to do some illumination. My energy is very slowly starting to return as the pleurisy improves.

A&S Century Challenge - Gold sleeves

This challenge has been a wonderful motivator to plod along and do those little jobs that are not exciting & that are easy to put off.
Today I'm spending some time on a pair of sleeves. I usually zigzag stitch the edges, but I am trying out pinking the edges with shears. I am stab stitching the seams open.

Ridiculously boring sleeve edging

My smugness at my organisational skills and forward thinking did not last long ;-)
The obvious downside to planning ahead and having a dozen odd new pairs of sleeves cut out waiting to be decorated and sewn is that they (and their linings) all need to be edged for durability. Guess what my sewing time this week will be spent doing?

Striped Dresses in the Renaissance - Research Notes

I love stripey dresses, so I decided to collate some references from the SCA period to inspire me to cut into my stripey stash!

 Detail from ''The Finding of Moses'' - Bonifacio Veronese
Image from: http://www.wga.hu/html_m/b/bonifaci/

 Portrait of a Lady with a Boy - Paris Bordone
Image from: http://www.myartprints.com/a/bordone-paris/portrait-of-a-lady-with-a-14.html





 Portrait of Noblewoman and Son - Bartolomeo Passarotti
Image from: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/61/Bartolomeo_passarotti,_ritratto_di_nobildonna_col_figlio.JPG






Portrait of a Venetian Noblewoman at the age of 18 - Giovanni Antonio Fasolo
Image from: http://starlightmasquerade.com/PortraitGallery/Closed-Bodice-Venetian/inspiration-pages/closedbodice52a.htm






Portrait of the Women of the Giusti del Giardino family - Girolamo Forni
Image from: http://bjws.blogspot.com.au/2016_02_04_archive.html






Self Portrait - Marietta Robusti  c. 1580
Image from : http://www.wikiart.org/en/marietta-robusti/self-portrait-1580?utm_source=returned&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=referral







Porrait of a Lady with a Dog - Paolo Caliari (Veronese)
Image from: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmmV50GzVZbSS_a-BdmRaRzWX183-Bph7tKmAE-BPWgVvdxJyx1NbzBzwbIl6HawD4W1NZ4TEj5FGYPCDoVd1-apVPMJmR_EJFzYhf4Qx5YL97aIpsRAIClBG9pVBfjEiX5Xh3p8tM-dN4/s1600/Portrait-of-a-LadyPaolo+Veronese1560-70.jpg





Paola Gualdo And Daughters Laura and Virginia- Giovanni Antonio Fasolo
Image from: https://au.pinterest.com/pin/538883911640923357/


and detail:

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/c8/b0/ef/c8b0ef5ad5f769f462767bb70db5d757.jpg









Portrait of Caterina di Ferdinando I de' Medici - Tiberio di Tito
Image from: http://www.wga.hu/support/viewer_m/z.html







Portrait of the artists sisters and brother - Sofonisba Anguissola
Image from: http://www.artexpertswebsite.com/pages/artists/anguissola.php







Portrait of  Cardinal Granvelle's Dwarf - Antonis Mor
Image from: http://www.artinconnu.com/2009/05/antonis-mor-anthonis-mor-van-dashorst_07.html






Portrait of a Knight of Calatrava - Frans Pourbus the Elder
Image from: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Knight_of_Calatrava_by_F._Pourbus_the_Elder.jpeg




 Portrait of a Man in Armor with Two Pages (Detail) - Paris Bordone
Image from: http://the-earth-is-flat.blogspot.com.au/p/we-were-there-stripes.html







Portrait of a Boy with Fruit - Mirabello Cavalori
Image from: http://the-earth-is-flat.blogspot.com.au/p/we-were-there-stripes.html





Giovanni Battista Moroni
Image from: http://realmofvenus.renaissanceitaly.net/yourgarb/2009/Christy-children.jpg





The Daughters of Giovanni II Bentivoglio and Ginevra Sforza - Lorenzo Costa
Image from: http://thescarletlibrarian.tumblr.com/post/141801959572/how-would-you-rate-the-borgias-costumes-as-far-as




Detail of Madonna in Trono e Santi - Jacopo Bassano
Image from: https://au.pinterest.com/desamona/history-1560-s/




Invitation to the Dance - Giovanni Antonio Fasolo
Image from: http://www.gettyimages.com.au/detail/news-photo/invitation-to-the-dance-by-giovanni-antonio-fasolo-fresco-news-photo/154715850



Portrait of a Girl', 16th or early 17th century. Found in the collection of the Regional A Deineka Art Gallery, Kursk, Russia. 
Image from: https://au.pinterest.com/pin/66639269461585875/

Italian Padded Roll with Seed Beads

I really enjoy making garb-related accessories, because they provide such impact for an outfit, and are usually relatively fast to make (well, compared to gowns, anyway!) So when the Italian Renaissance headwear mini-challenge a few months ago was announced, I was very pleased. I decided to make a padded roll style hat to go with my earlier Italian gowns. I have a balzo, but it is quite big and heavy, so I thought a padded roll would be better for warmer weather.

I found this image on Pinterest. Unfortunately, I couldn't trace the source of the image. The hat is blue with white beads.

These images are from an unreferenced Italian painting (pages 110-11 in  'What Life Was Like At The Rebirth of Genius", Time Life Books. ISBN: 0-7835-5461-3.) A similar style of padded roll can be seen in some Spanish paintings at around 1500 C.E.

I found a damask table runner on special for $2, and decided that this would be the basis of my hat. 

I trimmed it to a rectangle in a size to fit my head, and sewed it into a tube. I then turned the fabric right side out and stuffed it with polyfill. In period, stufffing options would probably have included down, bombast, sawdust, wool or rags/fabric offcuts. I like the polyfill because it is light, cheap and easy to obtain.

I joined the ends of the tube together, adjusting the polyfill inside as I went, and adding a little more near the end. (A big knitting needle is a great tool for this step.)

When the roll was sewn up, it needed to be rolled around and adjusted to improve the shape.

I found that I hadn't made it quite big enough for my head, so I stretched it for a few days on a bucket.

I roughly measured and chalked where I wanted the lines of beads to go, and then started stringing. I used 4mm glass seed beads in white on a double strand of strong thread. I anchored one end of the thread, put all the beads on my string, and then sewed the other end into place. Then I came back through the centres of the beads with my thread again, anchoring it down with a stitch where I started. Then I went through and secured the main thread down between all the beads with a small stitch. I didn't extend the lines of beads all the way around because I find that my hair tends to catch and pull on beads.

The next step was to add the beads in the centre of the lines. I decided on three lots in each space, and three beads in each motif. I sewed each bead into place individually.

Checking the hat against the inspiration!

The finished product!

And views of the inside of the roll.

It is a very comfortable hat!