The Brain Hat

I am working on the "brain hat" from the American Duchess book to go with my anglaise gown. I bought a straw hat base on Etsy from a lady in the 18th century sewing Facebook group to start with. I decided to use leftover taffeta (which is not silk) from my bat dress, and bought some silk organza to use for the brain puffs.

First step was lining the inside of the crown:

Next I covered the outside of the hat.

I also covered the outside of the crown, but forgot a picture of that step. You can see it here, with the organza tube attached. I stupidly basted it closed in white thread because it was on the machine and I was lazy, but thankfully it doesn't show.

Figuring out how to "puff" the organza was really hard, the book didn't have very good directions or any decent pictures, but I think it looks alright!

Last step was to put a ruffle around the outside. I am not wild about how it's kind of sticking up and might take it off and redo it with box pleated ribbon instead. The ties are only pinned on here. Isn't it ridiculous? I think it will look better with proper hair! I have also made the cap to wear under it, but I haven't finished trimming it, so I haven't taken pictures yet. It seems a bit big, I might need to take it in.

1890 Worth Gown

I found this gown last year when I was searching for inspiration for the butterfly gown. It's a c. 1890 gown by Charles Worth, and I fell crazy in love with it.

Unfortunately this was the only photo of it that I could find. I found that the gown was held at the Newport Historical Society and emailed them, and the lovely person who responded sent me additional photos of the gown.

I then went on a fabric hunting quest. I searched high and low, found some things that were similar but the wrong color, experimented with dyeing fabric, all to no avail. Then one day, browsing on eBay, I found this and nearly squealed with delight:

I think it's pretty darned close. I emailed the seller asking if he'd provide any kind of discount for large yardage purchases, and he kindly agreed, so I now have all 10 yards that he has on its way to me.

I cannot find any more images of this gown. The Newport Historical Society website has a good description of the construction, but it's definitely going to be a challenge to figure out that over skirt. The description says there is a "complicated system of tapes" holding all the poofs in place. I am planning to use the Ageless evening bodice pattern that I used for the Butterfly Gown for the bodice, it's extremely close. The under skirt is simple. The over skirt is going to require a lot of draping/practice to figure out though!

I bought a book on the House of Worth on Amazon - supposedly it has a ton of photos of gowns including construction details, so I am hoping that will give me some insight for draping the over skirt.