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.

Almost done with the anglaise

I am almost done with the gown! It needs front closures (I'm using hook and eye tape) and trim. 

I really wanted box pleated trim out of self-fabric, but I also played around with using some of the organza. I tried box pleating that too, but it looked awful.

I also played with a ruffle from the organza. I like this too. In the end I decided to do the box pleats in self-fabric, and I'll probably also make a tucker out of the organza that I can add if I want to dress it up. I cheated on the box pleats after a friend gave me the idea and sewed a tube of fabric, that way I don't have to hem all those edges by hand! I had about 150" of fabric and was NOT looking forward to hand hemming all of that. Plus the duvet cotton is very thin and soft, so this gives the pleats a bit more body.

Then we had the moment of truth - trying it on to see if it actually fits me, and I am pleased to say the modifications I did to the neckline and back of the armscye worked out perfectly. Now I know where to put the front closure. 

Robe a l'anglaise

So yeah, I am working on another 18th century gown, this time a robe a l'anglaise. I am using a JP Ryan pattern. I decided to do the pieced back gown instead of the en fourreau since my francaise already has a pleated back and I wanted something with a different look.

To start with the underpinnings, I only needed to make a bum pad, since this is a later 18th century dress and hip panniers were on their way out. I used the tutorial in my American Duchess book for a split bum pad. I like big butts and I cannot lie!

I wanted a quilted petticoat, but I don't quilt. I did research and found that matelasse is period appropriate, and found a beautiful blanket on eBay. Boy was this a pain to work with. It's 78" by 78" and I wanted to use the whole thing. Pleating a 78" panel down to about 16" took a lot of trial and error to get the pleats right. It's very bulky and heavy. I had to overlap the pleats quite a lot to get the width right. I ended up sewing on a linen waistband and attaching twill ties to the edges. I first was going to make both panels the same length and level the waist ala the AD book, but that was just too hard, so I decided to scoop out the waist in the same fashion that I did on my francaise petticoats. Then I made a crucial error and cut the fabric in the wrong spot!! I figured it out halfway through cutting. I had no choice but to piece the fabric back together and hope it won't show too much once it's pleated and the gown is over it. I think it will be okay. It's really pretty though, and the cats LOVE this blanket. I had Bobo and Fiona both on my lap while I was mounting the waistband.

The gown itself is made from a queen-sized Ikea duvet cover! Apparently Ikea did a lot of period-appropriate prints. The fabric is very soft, almost like flannel. It smelled weird so I washed it, and apparently Fiona approves of it even stinky!

I made a mockup out of the linen from my aborted bleached chemise fabric, and it fit pretty well, only requiring a little tightening in the neckline and back armscye. I was lazy and didn't iron the duvet after washing it, which I realized was a crucial error, because when I pressed the bodice pieces they didn't match the pattern piece at all! Luckily there's plenty of fabric so I ironed and cut new ones. 

The gown went together pretty easily. This one has a TON of hand sewing, I had to roll hem the silk organza for the sleeve flounces, then hand stitch them to the gown. Then I had to hand hem the gown facings, and tack the lining down once it was finished. All in all it went together pretty quickly. The point in the back was a bit challenging, and I think one of the back pieces was slightly larger than the other because the point isn't perfectly symmetric, but it looks pretty darn good! The front will overlap into a point on me as well, Petunia has a pretty different shape than me and is not wearing stays.

It's almost done now. I need to tack down the sleeve lining, then try it on for hemming. I also want to do a box pleat trim for the neckline, and am debating between self-fabric or using more of the organza. I thought the flannel-like cotton might be too flimsy, but ladies in my sewing group assure me it will pleat up fine once it's hemmed, so I think I'll give that a try because I like the look of self-trim.

Ball pictures!

I finished up all my last bits on Friday - I made pockets, tacked in the sleeve flounces, and tacked the bodice to the lining under the pleats in the back. I decided to hold off on gloves/mitts as they weren't needed for this event. We watched Marie Antoinette on Saturday morning for inspiration, and I am glad I did - I got the idea to stick the foam rollers in my hair, which helped a lot with the back of my hairstyle.

For the hair, I followed an American Duchess tutorial. I used a hair rat on top of my head, and a false long curly ponytail. The ponytail was pinned into curls in the back, and I teased up my own hair in front and smoothed it into place. There definitely wasn't enough hair in the ponytail to cover the back of my head, hence the curls in my own hair helping to fill it in. I pinned white silk roses into it and added some ostrich feathers.

18th century makeup consisted of very pale skin, lots of exaggerated rouge, red lips, and a beauty spot. No eye makeup, which is great because I suck at eye makeup! Here I am in the car on the way to the ball, and the back of my hair once we got there.

The back of the gown - don't those pleats look amazing?

I didn't have time to make boyfriend anything, so he wore his tux. We call this one our '18th century prom picture'.

Front of the gown - the trim looks so beautiful. What you can't see is that the pinked edges have already started to fray badly. Apparently silk in the old days was much more tightly woven and didn't fray when pinked. So I need to re-pink the fraying areas and am going to treat the entire thing with fray block, or possibly gum arabic that someone told me about at the ball.

Showing off my shoes! 

And the post-ball hair! You should have seen it the next morning!

Gown is nearly complete!

I have been busily sewing since the Colonial Ball is this coming weekend. The gown is done though! I need to tack on the sleeve flounces and stitch the bodice down to the lining under the pleats, but otherwise it's done. This will be a picture heavy post since I have been neglecting the blog. Not that anybody reads it, since I haven't shared it publicly yet.

Here are the pleats pinned into place on the back of the gown.

Gown over petticoat, with sleeves set in. Of course I put them in backwards the first time; sleeves and I never get along. But they set in nicely with minimal gathering.

Petticoat with trim pinned on.

Stomacher. I didn't like the way the stomacher was trimmed in the pattern so I browsed Pinterest and found one that looks like this. It's not perfectly even since my hand sewing is terrible, but I like it. The buttons are covered buttons, probably not period correct, but they look nice.

Fiona the she-demon is obsessed with Petunia (the dummy). She is contemplating evil here, and yes, climbed up Petunia multiple times. I had to put the gown on the dummy to pin all the trim around the front edges and neckline.

Trim is sewn down on the right front and pinned on the left, and the sleeve flounces are pinned on.

Close-up of the flounces. The lace I bought was blindingly white, so I tea-dyed it to darken it. Funny story - I left the used tea bags cooling in a bowl on the counter and forgot about them. I was cutting some fabric off my roll the next day to do my trim, and Fiona came running across the fabric, trailing crumbly brown stuff, with wet paws. She got into the tea bags. Luckily no damage to the fabric. She then became obsessed with the dyed lace, and found it and played with it no matter where I hid it! Fortunately she didn't ruin it.

Gown pinned over stomacher to see how it looks. I like it!

Last stage of trim, the S-shaped pieces along the sides. This was tricky to sew on with the pleats at the waist, but it looks gorgeous!

I tried the gown on, just over my pajamas, and it seems to fit - phew! 

The rest of my to-do list, time permitting:

- Lace tucker for neckline

- Mitts, probably from lace and silk

- Pockets, which ideally I would love to embroider

New shift and under petticoat, and gown petticoat progress

After the great linen bleach debacle, I bought some lighter weight WHITE linen and redid my shift and under petticoat. I think the original bleached petticoat might still be serviceable and I could wear two, but the bleached shift is a goner. Petunia leans to one side, I promise my hem is more even than it looks. It all needs a good iron to set the pleats.

And here is the gown petticoat. It still needs to be hemmed and have the ruffled trim added. I am scared of cutting the trim, I have a hard time cutting precisely. I bought some scalloped scissors and have to decide if I want to use those or the pinking shears on these ruffles. I am SO in love with the flowered silk fabric! It does appear to have some pulls in the silk but since everything is so full, I don't think they'll be noticeable. The seller included a note that she had added an extra yard or two, woo-hoo!

AD also pointed out on their blog that Simplicity messed up the sizing on the pattern. I am a 14 as usual according to the envelope, but AD said the finished measurements printed on the bodice pattern piece are the correct ones, so I really should be a 12. Sigh. I bought the 14-22 sized pattern. I asked and AD said to cut the 14, fit the lining, then I can take in the seams where necessary. OK I can do this!