1590s Peasant Gown Project Statistics: Mission: To placate my sewing muse while my serger was out-of-comisssion. Project Started: 8/6/05 Project Completed: 8/6/05 Cost: Completely from the fabric closet - main fabric was something like 75 cents/yd originally... sale!! :-) # Broken Needles: 1 # Injuries: I've been reminded to add the few layers of skin I lost while handsewing... Time Spent: One day Materials: 6 1/2 yards rough thin wine-colored cotton, 3 yards blue cotton/linen blend, 1/2 yd green linen for lining, 1/4 yd tan canvas for lining, misc thread to sew it together, small piece gold cotton brocade for trim. Everything, and I mean everything was already on-hand. So don't be surprised to see completely non-matching fabrics for lining and odd colors of thread such as fuchsia and chartreuse. September 6, 2005 9:30 am: So, there I am, innocently minding my own business while having my morning coffee when all of a sudden, the sewing muse attacks. As the muse must be kept happy, (so that it doesn't get cranky and disappear entirely for random lengths of time), I gave in due to the fact the serger had a broken part which wouldn't arrive for a few more days, putting off any other projects. As I'm reading through LiveJournal and going through my e-mails for the day, I decide to give the skirt of the Mary dress a second try, thinking of wearing it out to the Texas Renaissance Festival this fall. However, I also realize that I will probably completely melt from our good 'ol Texas heat in the thing and find myself wishing for a simpler, keep-the-heat-at-bay, drag-through-the-mud type of faire dress. So what do I do? I run to the fabric closet and pull out various lengths of breathable cottons to see what I can come up with. 10:00 am: I decide while I'm at it, I may as well draft a simple pattern for the bodice of said garment. Taking my current measurements, I drafted a *very* simple bodice pattern that would be appropriate for several eras, although the idea of a late 14th century Italian just would not get out of my head. The good thing about drafting this type of bodice? No corset needed which means less layers therefore less heat. I used the same pattern for the front and the back - just changed the neckline on the front a bit. From then on, I just kept going with whatever step came next, and my 'Dress in a Day' was born. 10:30 am: I cut the first muslin and then got interrupted by normal babysitting activities (keep in mind, I probably could've been a bit quicker about some of this, but sometimes I have to wait until naptime while the kiddos are sleeping) 11:30 am: First muslin needs the necklines a tad deeper, needs the straps lengthened the tiniest bit, and the bodice lengthened slightly also. 1/2 inch is taken from the armhole region and added to the middle to help with a small puckering issue. I probably could have cut the fabric at that point, but decided to make a second muslin just in case. 12:30 pm: It's naptime!!! :-) I try on the second muslin, which fits like a dream and proceed to cut the fabric. Using my single pattern piece is quite easy. I line the middle of it up to a fold to cut the lining pieces and fabric for the back and just cut as usual (*not forgetting to leave seam allowances!!!) for the front pieces. I sew the shoulder seams on the lining pieces and the fabric and then bag line the entire thing (sew around the entire front opening/neck and armholes, and then turn right-side out through the shoulder straps). As lacing normally puts weird strain on the front closure, I decide to just use hooks/eyes. (and I'm getting quite quick at sewing the little things onto stuff) I put a French seam down each side and viola! It looks like a bodice! 1:30 pm: At this point, I decide to browse around for some ideas on trim for this thing. I decide to go ahead and do the late 14th century (based on some charming paintings/drawings I fell in love with years ago over at Festive Attyre - see links page - again, I cannot express the depth of my thanks to this site's amazing webmistress), about 1590 to be exact, since I've wanted to do this for quite some time, but have previously hesitated due to the fact that it's been done before. I normally like to be fairly original in both research and design, but doing this in one day made that part a little hard. The back trim is based on a black/white detail of a painting by Pietro Ronzelli (I looked at every art source I knew of - except the ones that a person has to be subscribed to since, well, I'm not - for the full painting entitled Nativita di Maria with no luck whatsoever). I really wanted to see what else this painting had to offer, but this will have to do for now. Since I'm doing a front closing bodice instead of the side lacing one pictured, I had to use the highly scientific art of guessing to determine what the double trim on the front (from a drawing by Cesare Vecellio depicting a peasant woman in 1590 - couldn't find more of these online, but I did request the book from my library) did once it got over the shoulders. I cut a 12x22 piece of bright gold cotton brocade (I love the contrast between it and the wine color of the rest of the dress) into 10 strips (ended up only using 9 of them) and made something that resembles bias tape that ended up being about 1/2 inch wide each. It took 4 strips for each side and 1 for the middle of the back/back neckline. (Editor's Note: I think it's taking me longer to document this than it did to make it...) 5:00 pm: Another lull in kiddo land... So, I cut the pieces for the skirt. Three 45x52 inch rectangles - this was what was left after making the bodice. I lined it with random blue linen/cotton fabric out of the closet since the wine cotton is so thin and wouldn't pleat or gather very well. Now there's the decision of whether to cartridge pleat or pleat in some other manner. I really like knife pleats, so I decided to do small ones all the way around using my Pleating Without the Math method. 7:00 pm: Dinner's out of the way and it's time for some peace and quiet while my own kiddo watches the movie she politely asked for (how can I resist politeness from a 2 year old?). So, I pleat and then sew the skirt to the waist of the bodice. After this, I trim the excess skirt fabric with my pinking shears and turn the rest of the bodice over and under the raw edges and tack it to the skirt to hide all the messy parts. Oh yes, almost forgot to mention that there is a small gap of about 6 inches as seen in artworks from this time so that one can actually get into the skirt of the dress and there are a couple of hidden pockets because I put pockets in everything. I even have a chemise with pockets somewhere.... (while typing this, I just noticed how deep-purple the pictures look. It's really a bright medium wine-colored plum, I promise.) I ironed a 4 1/2 inch hem and machine stitched all the way around the lining and pinned up the outer skirt to hem. I pinked the edges and turned under for a hem. Can I just mention that I don't do "real" hems unless I absolutely have to. If I've ever done a "real" hem for you, consider yourself a person I like enough to do it. 9:30 pm: The kiddo is in bed and it feels like it's waaaaay past my bedtime, but I'm determined to finish at this point, so here go the hooks/eyes. 11:30 pm: 2 hours, one movie (Pirates of the Caribbean if you were wondering), and several less layers of skin on my right middle finger later, we have A DRESS!!! :-) Now I just need to take final pics and make an apron or something to go with it since I already have an appropriate chemise. All original content of this site © www.aflightoffancy.com, 2005-2011.  For more information on the use of anything contained on this site, please see my Copyright Information page.