*Please note that the original title of this project was “The Regency Spencer Project”, and that post titles have been updated with the name “The Regency Redingote Project” …

Explore CharmaineZoe's Marvelous Melange's 25344 photos on Flickr!

This image is from The Delineator magazine, August 1917, when fashion was heavily influenced by the First World War. Click on the image to enlarge. Related posts that may interest you: Vintage Ladies’ Fashion Illustration Vintage Lady Picture Clip Art Vintage Lady Picture Clip Art

Primary sources dealing with how clothing was washed in the 18th century, as well as laundry-related images.

It’s a neckline often seen on what’s called “Durer dresses” or “housebook dresses” though it’s found in other sources from late 15th century Germany. Here’s some primary sources in my collection with...

We know from our research into the life of Grace Dalrymple Elliott, one of the fashion icons of her day, that she spent a considerable amount of money on clothes, hats and finery. Looking at some o…

Proseguiamo con il sequel sulla moda femminile nell’antica Grecia con una curiosità: oltre alle già nominate tuniche e ai pepli, le fonti parlano anche di un ornamento detto adi, una sorta di cintu…

Manuscrit enluminé sur vélin. Début du XIVe siècle. Reliure sur ais de bois, XVIIe siècle.

Since baron Måns and I think it's cool with matching outifts and I have been fond of 13th century gowns with wide borders for a quite long time I decided to make a set of wool gowns for us. Both have sleeves that can be worn hanging at the back and replica pewter buttons at the cuffs, but Måns' tunic is split at the front and back. Another photo of me in my gown: The inspiration for my gown are a collection of 13th century images showing cottes/gowns with horizontal wide stripes. End of the 13th century France Lausanne, Bibliothèque Cantonale et Universitaire U 964 - Biblia Porta fol. 240r. From Illumanu. Bréviaire de Belleville, 1320s, Bibliothèque Nationale de France The Life of Edward the Confessor, from wikipedia They were really fond of horizontal stripes in the 13th century and while it is likely that most of the striped garments of the 13th century had woven stripes I thought that maybe, just maybe, when there was just one stripe, or a few, but placed at uneven intervals, they might be embroidered. Or applied from another fabric, but I'm going with the embroidery theory here ;) Since her stripe has the same background colour as the rest of the gown. So, I have started the embroidery. In chain stitch, which isn't typical of the period, but my split stitch doesn't produce half as nice results. The combination of fleur-de-lis and lozenges where taken from this 13th century image showing Edward the Confessor. Though white fleur-de-lis on a blue background also form part of the SCA barony of Gotvik's arms. The Life of Edward the Confessor, from wikipedia In addition to the border there is also embroidery at the neck and wrist, and at the armscyes, as on the first illumination, from the Biblia Porta from Lausanne.If you look at where the sleeves join the body in this illustration you see that her cotte is of the kind with sleeves which can be worn hanging from teh armscye - I have med a couple of these before: blue, with pattern diagram, a green for me and a murrey one for hubby. I hadn't intended to make loose sleeves on this gown, but I got so inspired by the Biblia Porta image, which obviously is my main inspiration for this gown, and the fact that they even had added decoration, which really shows that the sleeves are detachable. So I just couldn't help myself. Måns' tunic was inspired by the split tunics so often found on upper class men in 13th century art: This is the Flight to Egypt from Ms K 26 at Cambridge University. Mens gowns with broad borders appear to mostly have them both at the hem, the neck and the cuffs, so I ended up doing some more embroidery on his tunic than on mine. It was not my original plan, but after researching it - and blogging about it here - I decided that if I wanted him to have a split tunic, which I think looks very nice, and wanted to add embroidery that's the way that it had to be. Like mine, Måns' tunic has a single row of embrodiery at the armscye. I used perle cotton for the embroidery. I would have preferred silk of course, but since I coulnd't really see myself travelling either to London or to Turkey to buy silk thread before I wanted this gown finished I settled for cotton. I could comfort myself with the fact that cotton was available in parts of Europe at this time, but this was probably more in the form of fabric or batting, so I don't think that is really a valid argument. But I will look into it further. The construction Since the tunics are made from a fulled wool fabric which already in the 13th century could have a width of over two metres and which has no direction they are both is made in a fairly simple way, from A-lined pieces. Mine also has triangular gores added below the hip for extra width. My sleeves are based on the sleeves from the preserved gown of St. Elisabeth of Thuringia, which dates from the 13th century and for Måns' sleeves I modified a sleeve pattern based on one of the Herjolfsnes tunics to make it puffier above the elbow. . I decided to add buttons for a bit of sparkle - you do see buttons on sleeves in the 13th century, though not as many nor as high up on the arms as in the 14th. The pieces are sewn together on machine, but Ifelled the seam allowances by hand. I sewed all the seams on the body of the garment before adding the embroidery. The hems are of course hand sewn and I also sewed silk tabby tape on the inside of the neck and and wrists, to make it neater. Mine has hand made button holes, and Måns' tunic has loops for the buttons, both made with silk buttonhole twist. Accessories In some of the photos I am wearing a "St. Bridget's cap", because if there's one thing you see a lot in for example the Maciejowski Bible, it is women with blue gowns (with detachable sleeves) and those caps. In others I am being more well dressed, with my lined, striped veil. On the photos without the crown it is pinned to the cap (but could just as well have been pinned to a wimple or chin band) and here I also find inspiration in St. Bridget of Sweden - since I follow her instructions to pin the veil with one pin on the top of the head and two at the temples (it's from the Birgittine rule about the nun's clothing, mid-14th century). With the crown on the veil stays put without pins. In the image with both of us I am wearing a tablet woven belt with bronze buckle and mounts from Armour and Casting. I didn't weave it, but I did weave in all the threads from the tassel at the end, which actually took a couple of hours ;) While we mostly see leather belts with metal ornaments among modern re-enactors there are period examples of textile belts with metal mounts too - for example Fernando de la Cerda's belt, which also is from the right time period for these costumes. Mån's belt is leather, but with similar mounts. The bag that I use, can be seen more clearly here, where I also discuss the making of it.

Recreate this easy DIY kids marching band costume by starting with super soft Primary basics. Get inspired with hundreds of no-sew Halloween costume ideas for kids and baby.

Costumes are better with friends.

Host and share all of your images, photos and pictures on Servimg.com

Small image of a female deity, perhaps Aphrodite. Museum of Ephesus, Turkey.

I made a silly mistake. You may have noted on the photos of my in-progress blue wool dress that I had several wrinkles and creases on the pieces from storing it. I decided that I'd just toss it into the hand wash cycle of my dryer sans soap, and then tumble it a bit in the dryer to work the creases out- after it was completely sewn together. It had been machine washed before storing, so this wasn't really off the wall. Unfortunately, my husband (who transferred the load) took me literally when I said "low" heat, instead of just air drying it. And I ended up with a new blue wool fitted dress about 12" too short. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed. I was also on-the-verge-of-crying disappointed because I had decided, completely randomly, to hand-sew it. So yes, my friends, my very first completely hand-sewn gown got shrunk in the wash. Not a total loss, though. The advantage of the specific wool flannel I used is that, though tight, it does actually still fit. So it's mostly just not long enough to be the 1390's fitted gown I was aiming for. So, let's move on to the Project Log to see what I was able to do with it, shall we? Project Though originally intended to have the quality of a hand-me-down, 7-panel surcote altered to be fashionable in the 1390's, the final result is more appropriate as a mid-14th century layering gown. A "Hunting" gown, if you will. BL Yates Thompson 13, "Taymouth Hours", circa 1320-1350, f. 72. Sources When paired with my pink wool fitted cotte (now with buttoned forearms!), I get a look that's quite reminiscent of the lady pictured above from the mid-14th century Taymouth Hours. Many of the over-gowns pictured on the lady-hunters in that particular manuscript have a long slit up the sides (this one does too, it's just folded over so the inside is showing, rather than the slit), but there's enough of a similarity without a slit on mine to go with it. The issue, however, is that I was trying to make a late 1390's gown, like the full-skirted examples spotted in the Grande Chroniques de France. (You can see my first progress post for a look at that.) So I was aiming for a tightly fitted torso, which suits the turn of the century, and is much more modern in overall style than the hunting gowns of the Taymouth Hours. Since fitting of this type- in the sleeves, bust and ribcage- isn't seen among women's gowns until after the 1360's, I'm dating this one to plausibly 1370's. Method The real purpose of this gown was to test using a 7-panel construction to achieve a fuller skirt. In my first progress post, I shared what the gown looked like after assembling the 7 panels (without godets) directly from their straight-cut format. The front and back panels were rectangles, and the four gores (side panels) were trapazoids, angled on one long edge, but straight on the other. Then, in my second progress post, I showed what simply fitting those pieces on the body was able to accomplish. Introducing curves in every seam except for the center side seams, I (with the help of my mom) was able to get a very shapely fit, with a good amount of support on its own (though it's never intended to be supportive alone- it needs a fitted kirtle underneath.) While cutting all the pieces down, I decided, very randomly, and very late one evening, to start hand sewing the dress together. I pulled out a spool of navy blue silk thread I didn't really have a use for previously, a long needle, and went to work. I used a tight running stitch, which is surprisingly sufficient, though I may need to reinforce a few spots given its final fit. Looking at the photos I had my husband snap when I was patterning the sleeves, I saw that I wasn't getting the correct drape in the skirt. The skirt wasn't as full as I was hoping, but I was getting a fairly good drape. The problem, though, was that I'd started the flare too low, and I wasn't getting the sudden fullness toward to top of the skirt that I wanted. The front gore, especially, was not draping correctly. Which was a shame, since I'd gotten it perfectly sewn in on the first try. It was also too short. I had somehow managed to shift the side panels up when I reassembled the dress after fitting and it was about 3" from the floor, instead of just a hair above it like it should have been. At this stage of the fitting, I was starting to feel like I'd missed the mark, but it was still turning out okay enough that I just kept moving forward with it. Plus the skirt was fairly twirly, and that's always fun. The advantage of hand sewing the dress together, though, allowed me to finesse the sleeves enough to get the sleeve seam and the side back seam to perfectly align on each side. Generally speaking, the hand-sewing on this gown ended up being the easiest and most rewarding part of it. I'd been having an issue, though, with stubborn creases from storage. I tried ironing with no results. I tried a damp cloth between the wool and the iron, and it sort of worked but it was way too time consuming and I would have been at it for several hours. I decided to just finish the gown then wet it without soap in the hand-wash cycle of my machine. The idea was that I would tumble it a little in the dryer afterward then hang it up to dry the rest of the way, and the creases would be gone. My husband had a few wool items that needed the same treatment, so we tossed them all in. When it came time to move everything over to the dryer, I had said "low heat" when I really meant "no heat", and my husband, not really thinking about it, did as I said and the items tumbled around for about 40 minutes on low heat in the dryer. When I pulled them out, I was surprised that the items were dry, and I noticed immediately that the blue wool had felted somewhat. Eagerly, ignoring the signs, I tossed the dress on, and knew right away that it had been shrunk. I mean, really shrunk. I wanted to cry. Evaluation I have to thank my mom. Completely distraught, and feeling that I'd wasted all that time and energy, I did concede, at least, that it still fit (though snug). A few minutes later, mom declared that all was not lost, and she reminded me of the Taymouth Hours. Thinking on it a moment, I decided to go with that idea. A few minutes later, I'd made the mental conversion. The interesting thing, though, was that despite it being just a hair too small, and much too short for what I wanted, it looked (and made me look) much better. The shrunken length, with everything pushed about 6 inches higher toward the middle of the dress, did exactly what my fitting didn't. The looseness of the skirt now starts just under the tight rib cage, rather than several inches below it. The skirt isn't as full as it should be to match the Grande Chroniques example, but I did end up with an extremely loose and twirly skirt that loves to dance as I walk. As we took photos, I told my husband that I felt playful in the gown (and happily started throwing snowballs at him). I also felt well supported, but I was concerned that I would pop a seam. I didn't, even as I crouched down for another handful of snow. Having been felted, the blue wool is now plush and warm, much like the gold wool of my gold wool gown. I've joked that the gold gown is my garb "sweatshirt", but this one now definitely holds that honor. It's comfortable, and I feel great in it. The back godet (two half godet, actually) did end up a bit too high visually, with the point now landing well above the small of my back. It is, however, perfectly placed for the better skirt fit. I'm not sure anybody but me will really care to notice that it's just a bit too high. While I didn't open any seams, there were a few places where the seam was strained more than the running stitch really wanted to handle. A second line of running stitch within the open dashes of the first should do the trick. The heat from the dryer also did damage small spots on the dress, resulting in areas that look slightly faded in the right light. There are two on the front of the skirt, and at least one more on the side. They are hard to actually register in person, so I'm not really concerned about them. Conclusion This project is what Bob Ross would call a "happy accident". By shrinking the whole thing, I ended up with a better fit, a better skirt, and a completely unexpected and extremely fun new item of garb. The seams are perfect, and I'm still patting myself on the back on the craftsmanship I put into the assembly. I'm in love with the way the seams flow into each other and along my height. And, the cycle through the machines did take out the creases. More photos over at Flickr or on Facebook!

Way back in 2006, Prof. Dan Edelstein was having dinner with Michel Serres and Sarah Sussman, curator of the French and Italian collections at Stanford Libraries. The prominent French intellectual and member of the Académie française had just given a talk that mentioned digitalization, and so the topic came up later over wine. Said […]