I’m Bound Away
June 5th, 2011
If I am suspiciously silent for the next fortnight, it’s because I have set off on a journey and left my computer behind. Perhaps I will drop in from time to time while I am away, and perhaps not. Regardless, you may expect me back by the end of the month, with plenty of pictures to show and tales to tell.
Until then…
A Long Night
April 28th, 2011
I spent another evening working on my faux historic dress. It’s going fine, but I am reminded how much I hate sewing with upholstery fabric. It’s so darn bulky!
And I’m exhausted.
I’ll be the one crying in the corner.
Goodnight.
Distracted Again
April 6th, 2011
I’m still working on the final stages of the Civil War exhibition at the Museum where I work — boy, wait till you see this one! It’s probably the most unusual Civil War tribute that is being mounted in New York. Truly. I will explain as soon as I am able. Until then, consider yourselves tantalized.
I’ve also been hard at work on the Nineteenth Century Society website. You can take a peek at nineteenthcenturysociety.org. And please don’t judge too harshly — it’s still a work in progress. We’ve yet to add much content, and you would shriek in horror if you could see the sloppy, un-commented, presumptive PHP that I’ve used to animate the Google Calendar event feed. The important thing however is that it works. I will make it neat later on. And add all the neat little javascript tid-bits.
I’m particularly excited about the Nineteenth Century Society forum…
Aside from a few half-hearted stabs at my neglected broderie anglaise, I haven’t been sewing at all. Just working all day and hacking the Google Calendar API all night. I am eager to get back into my stays again though, and see if this latest pattern tweak will do the trick. More soon on that, including a big vote of thanks to the lovely folks on The Sewing Academy Forum for their brilliant fitting suggestions.
Time to Try Again
March 12th, 2011
It’s official. My stays are an utter failure.
I wore them for 30 minutes last night, and though they were not at all uncomfortable, it was crystal clear that they don’t quite fit. The pattern still needs to be tweaked — I measured the corrections while I had the stays on, and marked up my paper pattern in red for the next go-round. I am planning the following changes:
- Reduce back piece 3/4 of an inch at the bottom, creating more of a sloping shape from the hip (as originally shown on the pattern)
- Move bosom gores 1 inch towards the center
- Move front hip gores towards the center, and angled in the opposite direction
- Eliminate side bones (not in the original pattern, and already taken out of my first mock-up because they pinched terribly)
- Make the buttonholes at the bottom of each bone place on the INSIDE of the stays
I like the idea of a pair of long front bones, sloping from the bosom gores to the busk at the bottom, to help form that early 50s point. I’ve seen it in other stays of the period, but it’s not in this pattern, so perhaps I will leave them out for now. I do need to find a wider busk though. It should be closer to 2 inches instead of 1/2 an inch!
I also intend to make my next mock up of firmer fabric, and sew them by machine. Not that I regret the hours of hand sewing I’ve poured into my first set of stays — I worked out a lot of kinks in the process (and know what I’ll do differently next time) — but I want to get this pattern perfected quickly so as to begin on a real pair of serviceable stays as soon as possible. I’d also like a pair of silken stays too…though don’t know for sure if they even existed in the 1850s.
With a nod to The Dreamstress, one of my favorite costume historian bloggers, here’s an images from the Met’s Collection Database that seems close to what I’m shooting for, if not exactly the same pattern:
May the god of costume blogs strike me dead for pointing this to an existing URL instead of a picture on my own server…I’m not sure which is worse, stealing images or stealing bandwidth? Tell me if I made the wrong choice.
Nothing
March 9th, 2011
That’s what this post is about, nothing. I am not going to share my latest cello practice (too politically incorrect). I am not going to show you all the sloppy flossing I did on my stays (I left my camera at work). I am not going to tell you about the talk I am preparing on March 23 (not done yet). And I certainly won’t mention that the very first meeting of the New York Nineteenth Century Society Hand-Work Circle is schedule for Saturday, March 19, 4-6 p.m. at the Old Stone House in Brooklyn.
So there. That’s what I have to offer this evening. N-O-T-H-I-N-G.
The End.
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