IRCC 3 - The Results

The results of the third annual Realm of Venus costume competition were announced and, well, I won second place! This was so much better than I was expecting. IRCC3 was the first competition where competitors were offered the opportunity to begin work on intricate items before the competition proper started. I didn't avail of this as I only decided to enter the competition quite late in the preparation process.I was sure that losing out on that time meant that I'd already lost too many points to place. But no, I won silver.

I'm finding myself very inspired by this. I want to work that much harder the next time. My dress is based on the fashions on 1560's Florence, but next time I'll do more research, more documentable research, so I can feel happy about submitting my costume as a full A&S project.

The Fourth Annual Italian Renaissance Costuming Challenge, once again allowing extensive handwork to start immediately, has been announced. And this one I already know what I'm going to be making.

IRCC3 Final entry - a review

The Italian Renaissance Costuming Competition finalists are even now being updated on the Realm of Venus website, with my own being one of the first up! My own entry can be seen here, and now that's it's over, and I have a little more time, I'm looking at it with a critical eye to think of how I could improve things for next time, though overall, I am happy with my costume. Plus, this is a nice excuse for a photo dump post :)

One of my biggest worries with this gown, especially as I was making up my own linen cardboard, so that it would wind up too stiff too be comfortable, or would chafe in all the wrong places. I have never been more delighted to be wrong. Sure, if doesn't fit in the way my regular day clothes fit, so it will take a little getting used to, but as the cardboard warms to my body, I anticipate it becoming even more comfortable. I couldn't get the lacing to come all the way closed for the photos, as the style should, so I'll have to see if another lacing strip is required, or if it will close further as the fit improves.

The hem of the veste gave me no end of trouble. I wanted to take it up enough that it wouldn't drag, as this is intended to be my "outdoors" garb, but it decided to fight back. After four different pinings I settled on a length and sewed a tuck into the skirt. This has the added advantage that when the end eventually does become too muddy to save, I can let down the tuck to form a new hem. It's just a shame I didn't remember to check and tuck the underskirt too, so that's one more sewing job I'm left with.

For the bag, I leaned heavily on the experience and details provided in this blog entry, on Bettina's pages. I adored the example she made, and would have loved to have had my bag a little more trimmed or adorned, but that's something I can work on as time goes on. As it is, the leather I choose for the bag is that of my personal device, and I'm tempted instead to decorate the bag with some embroidery pertinent to that. But we'll see how that goes.

This was my first attempt at an Italian style hat, so I shouldn't be too hard on myself. It fits, and it's unlikely to come off except in the stiffest of breezes, but it bothers me a little that the brim isn't lying as flat as it could. I think it's mostly a seam allowance issue, and I'll have to take care to cut out the brim pattern a little wider next time.

The Zimarra.. no, I wouldn't change anything about it, I love it so. I just couldn't resist the chance to show it off again.

That's all I'd change though, just a few minor adjustments, so I think I've learned a lot this year about my time management, so maybe I'll get away with my ambitious ideas for next years competition...

And needles down

And I'm done.

Sure there's more embellishments I could do, but with a little under 24 hours to go, I've decied to save myself the stress and stop now.

I have everythig packed away now to head out to my friend Laura's on friday, who has once again very generously offered to help with the picture aspect of the competition, and I was pleasantly surprised with all the bits I had to remember to add to the box. I'd honestly forgotten I had so much done!

My costumers ADHD kicked in in full force this week, and I have several more costumes planned out, that will provide some nice picture posts even if I never get arount to them. A girl needs dreams, eh?

Yes, focus. I'll do a more complete post on the competition when I have the pictures to go with. But most importantly for now, I am very happy with my new, fully complete garb. That's one up I have on last year too!

Finished Zimarra

And it's finally finished! The last parts too a lot longer than I thought they would, once more confirming in my mind that the small, fiddly, almost invisible parts are always the ones to break your heart.

The embroidered buttons took, on estimate, about 12 hours to complete 21 of them, and that's just a simple buttonhole stitch, nothing fancier. The buttonhole loops, also hand embrodiered with 4 strands of cotton floss, felt like they took the same time. Or at least, they took up a day and a half of my time-off-work-to-get-costume-finished time. There's 8 metres of each width of ribbon sewn down, and I am so glad I took the time to pin it down first. It would have been a nightmare otherwise. 

And as I mentioned before, this Zimarra is an old curtain, purchased from an SCA trader. I've known almost since I boguht it what I wanted to do with it, and yet it languished, buried in my to-do pile for over a year. I'm so utterly delighted it's done now, and looking so beautiful. I'm very much looking forward to showing it off at the upcoming Crown tournament!

IRCC3 distractions

23 days left.

Even if I wasn't watching the calender, I'd know the dealine was approaching, because the usual gremlins are making their presence known. Three weeks to go and I should be putting every effort into the final details (and correcting the mistakes), but what am I thinking of instead?

- Quotes on trousers
- Project Hollyhock!
- Petticoats! All of the petticoats!
- Parasols...little mini hats too while I think of it
- Project Cinnabar - wasn't entirely sure about this name, but eh, it's stuck now.
- Corsets! I miss corsets...

But I'm being good! I didn't find out until after I'd cut the fur that I prefere the look of ribbon trim on my zimarra, and over 20m of hand sewn ribbon later, I still have a lot to do. Need about a dozen more buttons too. Onwards!

IRCC3 - layer four

No, you haven't missed a post, I have indeed skipped the update of layer three, but with good reason. I'll come back to it shortly.

For layer four of the competition, I've been making myself an Italian style coat, or Zimarra.

I've been making my zimarra from an old curtain. Just one curtain has given enough fabric for body and sleeve, both flared as the zimarra is not a fitted style. Almost all of the seams are french seams, and all hand sewn as part of the competition. 

Apart from attaching the sleeves, (the one on the picture is just pinned in place for the picture), I'll be trimming the front and open sleeves edges with some white fake fur. For the zimarra front and sleeve closures, I'll be using the embroidered buttones I mentioned in my last post. I have eight of those done so far, which should be enough for just one sleeve. Oh well, it's enjoyable work at least.

Partlets and coverings

The Realm of Venus competition rolls on, and I'm not saying I'm nervous, but I have started counting the days remaining (42). But it's finally given me the incentive to try making that piece of garb that's been most intimidating me - the partlet.

The partlet is like a modern day bolero, designed to cover the skin exposed at the top of the bodice. These could have been made of many kinds of material, and were supposedly used to preserve the modesty of the wearer, but when those versions were made of barely opaque or even transparent silks or lace, you're left wondering...

My first version is made of nice, crisp cotton, in the style of the wedding portrait of Isabella de Medici.

I'm a little miffed the ruffles aren't staning up more, but when I find my curling tongs, I'll revisit that with some of the starch solution I made up for my linen cardboard experiment.

So with the hat, that's two accessories made for the competition. I have an idea of two for the next one, a bag for archery bits, but shall have to see how that goes. There's still a lot of work to go on the veste.

Working the linens

In a previous post, I set out to discern what would be the best modern stiffening agent to use to make linen cardboard.The PVA solution won hands down. The cellulose didn't make the sample half as stiff as I would have expected, and the starch didn't work out at all. I'll have to revisit that, as I want to make stiffened ruffs in the future.


To make the linen cardboard, I cut out two pieces of linen for each pattern section, not including a seam allowance. I painted each piece liberally with the PVA:water mixture, then hung it to dry. The PVA I used was wood glue rather than craft glue. Craft glue tends to be already diluted more than wood glue PVA, so if you use craft glue it won't need as much water to make up the solution.

When the first drying was complete, I painted one side of each piece with more glue and placed the second piece over it, massaging the linen to ensure a good bond, to create a double layer of linen. The pieces curled a little during drying, but this was easily put to right by a pressing with a hot iron between layers of paper. The heat of the iron makes the linen quite floppy, which was initially worrying, but it regained the stiffness when it cooled overnight. I'm hoping this will also mean that the heat of my body will help the bodice to conform to my own torso without becoming so loose that it will lose shape altogether.

I've started the assembly of the bodice now, by enclosing the linen in some polycotton broadcloth, to ensure the linen doesn't start poking me in the delicate regions.

Hat!

Sometimes a good hat can really finish an outfit. Hats aren't something I'd looked into much in my SCA garb, but when Aodh started talking about wanting a hood to keep off the rain during archery, I thought that an excellent idea, though a hood didn't appeal.

In 16th century Italy, hatwear on women was frowned upon, mostly because the women adopted a very masculine style of hat. This, however, made it a little easier to research, as there's a lot more portraits with men wearing their headgear than women. In the end, I decided on an Elizabethan or Italian style bonnet, made with black brocade.

I used two different tutorials to construct my hat pattern - a guide on making a fitted hat brim from sempstress.org, to ensure I could have a hat that actually fits on my funny shaped head, and this guide on bonnet making from renaissancetailor.com, as the look of the top of the hat appealed to me.

As I had mentioned, I used a black brocade as my fashion fabric and lined the hat with black linen.  Essential to this style of hat is an interlining which properly supports the fashion fabric and gives body to the folds and pleats. Modern felt is much thinner than felt that was used in period, so I decided to make my own felt. I used three layers of fibre, knowing that my felt when fulled becomes very fluffy, and that turned out to be just the right thickness.

I made up a separate piece to use in the brim, enclosing it between two pieces of buckram using a technique I like to call "messing" or "mucking about".

The hat itself came together very quickly, delayed mostly by waiting to sew with a friend who I was teaching as I went. Already I want to make more though. I just need to figure which colours go with my existing wardrobe, or what kind of embellishments I can get away with. I'll need a very elaborate type of hat for June next year...


Finally, what hat is complete without embellishments. This is where my love of costume jewellery comes in. A local shop sells very cheap, very colourful costume jewellery that is my Achilles heel. I can't resist the big, brash jewels! Pictured here are the three items, two rings and one brooch I picked up as possible finishes for this hat. In the end I went with the green ring, to match it in with the  colour of the dress I'm currently making. I squished the ring band so I could sew it to the hat brim, mounting it over the bare quill of the pheasant feathers used as part of the embellishment.

And behold the finished hat! It counts as the first of my accessories for the Realm of Venus costume competition (though I have to submit it as completed yet). But I'm very pleased with it. Especially as the hat decor will match the fletching on my arrows. And this outfit is intended to be my archery garb...

Just can't get the support...

In making me previous dress bodice, that of my court gown, I used a store bought buckram fabric. It's...adequate, but I'm a well endowed woman so it's not perfect. I'm trying to resist going the stays route, even though there is enough evidence to support their use in the later half of the 16th century in Venice, or the more modern method of adding metal boning to the bodice.

Buckram or linen cardboard was often used in period as support, though the buckram of the 16th century would have been very different to what we know now. We know starch would have been used to set ruffs, and it's likely animal glue, as it was in use in bookbindings, would have been used to make linen cardboard. However, animal glue is likely to crack and shrink as it ages, and given my curves, something that would crack as it conforms to a shape other than a books spine would not be ideal, so I've decided to test a variety of substances, such as a polymer, starch and cellulose. In other words PVA glue, aka white glue, home made clothing starch made with cornstarch and wallpaper paste. 

All three can be used as stiffening agents, though all three have the drawback of dissolving if they become wet. It's a risk, but sure let's try it. 

I made up small samples of all three solutions. For the PVA, I used roughly a 1:1 ratio of glue to water, the starch recipe came from Janet Arnolds Patterns of Fashion, which is to use one cup of starch to 100 mls of water, mix, then add 250mls hot water, and I made up 100mls of wallpaper paste following the packs instructions for the strongest solution. I brushed three approximately equally sized pieces of linen with each solution, and I've now left them to dry. As the starch is only really activated when it's ironed, I'll be pressing all three when they dry, to keep the playing field even.

And if these don't work, the other option is to try cording. Cording involves sewing cotton cord or twice into narrow channels along the bodice. It's a technique I've tried before on the sewing machine, and it gives a very comfortable support, though I'm not sure about trying it by hand. There are only two months lefts to the competition after all.

IRCC3 - layer two

While running an event the weekend just gone, I managed to sit down for long enough to get my brocade skirt finished! My feet assure me that I wasn't actually sitting down for long, so I can only conclude that my hand sewing speed has increased somewhat.

I didn't have enough brocade to do the complete skirt, so I chose to cut it carefully so as to give a full front panel, and a broad back of skirt panel. This was a perfectly in period technique used to stretch expensive fabrics further while giving the impression of wealth. I'm hoping when my veste in in place, the false back won't be visible at all. 

I haven't been brave enough to try on the skirt yet...gremlins have been hard at work this month sewing my clothes tighter, and I don't want to be disappointed by the fit just yet. Though it will also help me to determine if I want to put a waistband onto the skirt for comfort. 

Another point to add regarding this skirt, when I went to buy the linen to line it with, the shop didn't have the colour I wanted. I wasn't willing to wait (just as well as the skirt is finished now and the grey linen still isn't in stock), so I picked up some black linen. This doesn't really affect the brocade at all, but from the back, the brocade sparkles through, making the black linen look shiny and expensive.

So I hatched a plan. With a little careful sewing, I could make myself a fully reversible skirt and double my wardrobe contents in one easy step!

Firstly, I sewing the broacde to the linen to create seperate shell pieces. When this was complete, I stitched the two pieces together, making sure to only catch the brocade fabric with my thread.

With the outer seams complete, pressing the stitching flat meant the linen edges were meeting by themselves. All I had to do was used my stitching to pull and keep the sides togther. And for the most part, I kept my stitches neat enough that the inner seams should be all but invisible.

At some point I'll decide on a trim of some kind to decorate the end of the black skirt, but I'm happy enough with my trick for now.

A moment more...

Coming home from LARP all bunged up with a sinus infection before being thrown into the organisation of a Coronet Tournament doesn't leave much time for crafting.

However, I am still progressing in the Third Annual Italian Renaissance Costume Competition, and I've sent my first entry in, which can be seen here.

Lots more update on a couple of different projects next week though, promise.

Costume Competition - making a start

The Realm of Venus Italian Renaissance Costume Competition started last Sunday, and I having just finished my Victorian costume, I prepared for the competition by having a bath and generally relaxing. It was a good call.

A week later, I have a pair of drawers made and have made a start on the skirt.

The drawer are made of fine cotton, hand stitched with a pattern I draftedmyself based on extant drawers in the Met Museum. The embroidery is done in split stitch, using four threads of varigated embroidery floss. The pattern for the embroidery is a modified version of that which appears on a chemise in Patterns of Fashion 4. Suzie approves, so I'm quite happy too.

Another choice pleasing Suzie is my choice of brocade for the skirt. I didn't have enough for a full skirt, so I'll be making a false back for the skirt, which will hopefully remain hidden when it is worn under the veste. 

I'm lining this skirt with linen to give it body and support. Black linen because I didn't have the patience to wait two weeks for a lighter colour to come into stock. But I'm going to turn this to my advantage and made the skirt reversible, doubling my wardrobe options in one (hopefully) simple move!