18th Century Riding Habit Shirt

I finished my waistcoat for my pirate costume a few weeks ago and just haven't taken the time to update. I did end up putting buttonholes in it, and I am kicking myself for avoiding anything needing buttonholes in the three years since I started sewing. My sewing friends told me that buttonholes were easy, and OMG THEY WERE SO RIGHT. That little attachment is awesome and the machine does all the work. I was surprised that it was so easy to do the buttonholes through all that gimp trim, and I had no problem cutting through that either.

I made the riding habit shirt following the measurements given by Saltpetre and Pins when she was making her blouse. Aaaand I did it all by hand! (okay, I'll admit that I hemmed it by machine because by then I was so very sick of the project and ready to move on) It was very pleasant and went surprisingly quickly. There are times when I just don't want to sit at the machine, especially since the lighting in my sewing room is terrible.

It isn't perfect.

• I believe I should have made the collar wider, so I could fold it over. I'm thinking of adding an extension to it, because when I put on the cravat, the collar gets crumpled underneath and I have to fiddle with it a lot to get it to show above the cravat. 
• Also, I think the collar is too big. 
• And I should have left a vent in the sides of the shirt towards the hem so that when I tied it the back and front would overlap a bit. But no one is going to see that. 
• It's possibly too short in the back, but again, no one is going to see it.
• I wasn't able to flat fold the seams because I'd screwed up on the width of the shirt and had to fix it by cutting off an extension I had put in it to make it wider, which turned out not to be necessary at all and would have made the shoulder seams come halfway down my arms. 

I had a stressful week trying to figure out how to attach the lace at the neckline and wrists so that the raw edges wouldn't show. In the end, I just gathered it, folded a piece of bias tape along the gathered edge to hide the raw edges, and then stitched it into place.

The lace at the neckline is modern and partially synthetic, so it's heavy and slippery. I worry that it's too much and will make the neck opening gape, but I think I could just use a brooch to hold it closed if needed. Maybe not historically accurate, but this is for a pirate costume so I think I can take some liberties.

The lace at the cuffs is vintage, and I purchased it on ebay. I worry that it's not fluffy enough at the cuffs but there's nothing I can do about it now. I am not worried about it enough to redo it at this point, and I can possibly use the leftover yardage to embellish the collar of the shirt? Again, I know it's not historically accurate but as I said, pirate costume.

Oh, and I used mother of pearl buttons at the collar and wrists. I had collected quite a few over the years, don't ask me why, and was really happy I could finally use some.

NOW FOR THE ENSEMBLE

The cravat is this really cool looking synthetic paisley jaquard, but it's really thick and I think will be really hot, so I bought some dark red silk dupioni to make another one.

I would like to make a new, lighter weight petticoat to go underneath. The one I've been wearing is just so bulky. I have a pattern for a gathered skirt set on a yoke that I think I'm going to use. Not historically correct, but I think it will be very comfortable and provide the fullness I need for the skirt.

I haven't even attempted the jacket yet. Now I'm realizing it's almost October and I only have 6 weeks to make and embellish it. This sounds like a long time, but I am such a slow sewer, I'm not sure if it's enough time.

18th century riding habit -- Waistcoat

I've been working on my pirate costume for the Texas Renaissance Festival, which I will be attending with my sister in November. My goal this year was to actually put together an OUTFIT, not just pieces, and to use historically correct patterns.

So I bought the Mill Farm riding habit pattern to help me accomplish my goals. I already had stays from the Sherwood Forest Faire, which I posted about in March. But they are a little large, and I wanted to have something that fits a little better. I may still use them, and just overlap the lacing grommets at front or back. I've tried it, and it works.

But I also finished up my costume closeup stays, which I'd worked on over Christmas. When I first tried them on, they were wayyyyyy too small, because I hadn't taken into account the fact that putting all that boning in would shrink the panels. So I made a stomacher for it so I could adjust them a bit better, and now they fit, and they feel wonderfully comfortable... However. They stick out from my shoulder blades if I slouch the tiniest bit. Here are some examples:

See what I mean? I know several bloggers have made these stays, and they haven't mentioned this as a problem. If anyone reading this has experience with these stays, can you tell me what I'm doing wrong? I am slouching with a bit of exaggeration in these photos to illustrate the point I'm making, but this does seem a problem. How can I fit it? Is this just a common thing with fully boned, strapless stays?

Onto the riding habit. I made the waistcoat first, since it may be too hot to wear the jacket when I go to the fair. You never know, in early November. Could be 80 degrees, could be 45. If I have a waistcoat, I will have a workable outfit.

First came fitting the pattern to my dress form. The way I did it was by pinning the side seams of the paper pieces to the sides of my form, and then studying it to see what I'd need to do to fit it.

You can see that the main thing I needed to do was add a couple inches to either side of the center back. Oh, and I always need to take the waist up a couple of inches on every pattern.

The front was very large at the top, so I had to pinch away the excess material. I also took it in a little bit at the center back.

Sorry about the shitty pictures, but I didn't have anyone home to help me. I am wearing those blue stays underneath this. I'd actually made up the waistcoat once already at this point, and it didn't fit AT ALL NO MATTER WHAT I DID. I finally tore it up in a fit of rage and it felt AWESOME. Turns out, I didn't fit the paper pattern to my dress form after all, though I could have SWORN that I did. Maybe I just fitted it to see if I had the waist in the right place and forgot to check everything else.

I wanted it to look a bit rustic, so I used a sort of homespunny looking linen from Joann's, lined it with olive green silk from a 100% silk curtain I found at Goodwill, and trimmed it with this awesome antique gold colored gimp trim. I sewed up the vest by machine, but of course tacked all the trim on by hand which took FOREVER. I used plain gold buttons from Walmart.

I can't close the vest properly on my form because the boobs aren't in the right place.

I still haven't learned how to use my buttonhole attachment. And I don't know how to do a buttonhole stitch. I've watched YouTube videos on it a hundred thousand times and still can't manage it. So I decided to just do loops of coordinating trim to button up the vest.

I think that looks really cool. So I need to sew the button loops on, and I've been making a riding habit shirt a la American Duchess and Saltpetre and Pins, and I am sewing it by hand! All I need to do on it is put buttons on the cuffs and collar and add the lace trim. Then it will be ready to put up here. I almost have an outfit!!!!

New Renaissance fest costume in the works

How do the days pass so quickly? It seems like just yesterday I decided to make a new pirate costume for the Renaissance fest, but it must have been more like 3 weeks ago. I've been thinking about it and planning and thinking about it and stressing and thinking about it and suddenly I realized this weekend that I only had about two weeks left to make the following:

Corset
Chemise
Bodice
Skirt
Underskirt

To this end, I ordered a bunch of lovely 100% cotton jacquard fabrics from FabricMart.com for just $3.50 a yard! I will post about these later. But in a stunningly practical move, I am not using any of them in my costume. I feel really stressed out whenever I spend more than $50 at a time, but they had a 20% off coupon for first-time shoppers so I got 25 yards of fabric for just $78.00 and that includes the shipping. And I mean, the price was unbeatable.

I made am making my corset from a vintage tablecloth that my lovely friend Kristine gave me. It's pale yellow and is printed with dogwoods, so it already has two of my favorite things going for it. It's a tight weave, so I can use it in a single-layer corset.

I think it's darling. I am using Simplicity 2890, which I picked up at Joann's for $1.00. The corset was designed by fashion historian Kay Gnagey and I have actually worn one of her corsets a few times and loved it. It's my ideal corset. Originally this was going to be a practice piece but I decided to just make it all the way because a) I am too lazy to fit a corset properly to my figure, b) my figure is pretty much made for Victorian/Civil War era corsets, being an hourglass shape, proportionate boobs to hips, and short-waisted, and c) I don't have time to make another one before the Ren fest.

This was my first time inserting gussets into anything, and it could have been a rage-fest but I found this wonderful tutorial before I ever started, and that made everything a breeze. That being said, I forgot to do a 5/8" seam allowance, doing a 3/8" instead, so the bust is too big. I don't really care right now.

I'm still trying to decide if I'll use 1/4" zip ties for the boning or order steel boning. Steel boning isn't really that much more expensive than zip ties. It's the corset busk that's kind of expensive--and that damn shipping--so I might as well just get proper boning. I need to make a decision soon.

I almost ordered all that stuff this weekend but then froze with indecision because, in my usual can't-do-anything-in-moderation fashion, I thought as long as I'm ordering boning for one corset, why not order boning for FOUR CORSETS??? The shipping will be the same, and I want to make this corset again, and I have another Simplicity corset pattern I want to try, and since that other one looks easy maybe I should just make TWO of it also!?!?!?!

Moving on, I am using a 1970s dress pattern for the chemise/blouse. I get a lot of my patterns at my favorite thrift store, and they come 2-3 in a package. So for every one that I buy, I get two extras that are usually not something I'm interested in. I've been listing those extra patterns on my Etsy store, but there are a handful that I have put in the "No Redeeming Qualities" category destined for my trashcan. This was one of them. But juuuuuust as I was about to throw it out, View A suddenly struck me as an AWESOME lady pirate blouse.

Look at it.

LOOK AT IT.

I am going to use a sheer linen swag that my friend Melissa found for me at the Goodwill outlet last year. I should probably save it for something more important than a pirate chemise, but I'm trying to save money where I can. What's the point of having a fabric stash if you don't use it?

I'm going set the elastic slightly higher on the sleeve and then trim the cuff which white lace bordered with gold lace at the top, like so:

For the bodice and skirt, I'm going to use this Simplicity 3809, View A. I originally had grand plans to make an underskirt out of some of the white cotton jacquard I got from FabricMart, and make a bustled overskirt from the Janet Arnold book, which would have meant rescaling the pattern and being amazingly talented. But for the sake of simplicity (hahahaha), and lack of time, I'm just going to have to settle for a Big Four pattern. But it will still be cute!!

I am pissed off at Joann's for having their linen fabrics 30% off for the past two weeks at least, which means I can't use any of the 50% off coupons I've had. Assholes. I really don't want to spend $45 on fabric if I can avoid it. So after much stress and fuming, I've decided to dye my dark brown linen skirt from my previous Ren fest outfit black. And to make the bodice from a jacquard tablecloth I've had squirreled away and dye that black to match.

I spent 8 hours online yesterday picking out gold Venice lace trims for this outfit, only to realize that if I trimmed it like I wanted to, I'd end up spending some $50-$60 on lace. I can't afford that right now. So after all that, I just got 10 yards of one type of lace and I guess I'll be spending about $27 which includes the shipping, which is nice and cheap as far as that kind of thing goes.

Now I just need to stop thinking about stuff and actually do something about it.

Half-Boned Stays

So I'm on Project 4, which is really an extension of Project 3. Yet I've only finished one whole project (Project 1). Maybe I should rename my blog "Look What I Started To Make And Then Threw Into the Garage In A Fit Of Rage." Although I did complete two skirts for Project 3, neither of which I'm going to use for my pirate wedding costume after all. But... They'll be useful for ren fests. The costume is just not coming together like I had hoped it would.

Here are my pattern pieces. This pattern is already sized up to fit a size 8-10, so I didn't have to ask my graphics friend to resize it.

I'm going to get to work on the mockup. I can't figure out where the waistline is from the pattern pieces, so I'll sew the mockup first and then work on fitting it later, skipping the slash & spread step.

Two hours later, I finished the mockup, put on the lacing strips, laced it up, tried it on, started feeling ragey, looked at the clock and wished it was later so I could start drinking vodka, took it off and resisted throwing it in the garage with the rest of my failed projects.

The lacing strips that I made for the 1911 corset that I stopped working on so I could work on my @#$%ing pirate costume are too big to attach to the back without sewing over the seam connecting the side back piece to the center back piece. Sigh. This is just so frustrating.

So I pinned the lacing strips on with giant quilting safety pins, but then had to unpin half of them to lace them up. The corset fits bizarrely, but it's really hard to tell because I think I'm really going to have to put boning in at least on the front panel, because otherwise I just can't tell at all how it needs to be taken in/let out. So I need to cut out a second piece of the front panel, pick out the seams of the two side front panels, and sew it back together with the boning channel layer.

Also, my boobs are starting to sag, which was horribly obvious in my unboned mockup. I've always had beautiful breasts and now at the great age of 39, they are starting to sag. I just feel miserable about everything right now and think I need to walk away from this project for a few hours and get out of the house.