Are buttons historically accurate?

[Dinobabe]

I am just about finished with my upper class garb.  I was going to put a string on the cuff to tie close but I think a button would look better.  How accurate is a button?  What kinds of buttons?  Buttonhole vs. loop?  Any suggestions?  Thank you!

[isabelladangelo]

Yes and no.   

It sounds like you are putting a button on your chemise.  If so, then no.  Ties are accurate for the chemise due to washing issues.  You don't want to loose your pretty button or have it cracked as it's getting beaten on the rocks, do you?   

For an oversleeve, yes, absolutely.  The dresses, doublets, gowns, other non-underwear items had buttons and many of them were false buttons since they were purely decoration.   

[Lady Kathleen of Olmsted]

Buttons are HA as they were done with threads and large seeds, sometimes embellished with Gold threads and tiny pearls.. The Janet Arnold Patterns of Fashion 1 book for clothing 1560 to 1620 illustrates buttons.

Buttonholes were done by hand. Looping is also HA. I perfer to do Buttons and loops for garb.

[Dinobabe]

Yes, it is a chemise.  I thought buttons would be cleaner looking but that is a good point about the washing.   I will go with the ties.  That's exactly what I needed to know!  Thank you guys!

[gem]

Buttons are very common on partlets:
http://www.lib-art.com/imgpainting/4/5/12354-portrait-of-a-lady-with-a-squirrel-hans-the-younger-holbein.jpg
http://www.uvm.edu/~hag/sca/tudor/roper.jpg
http://www.uvm.edu/~hag/sca/tudor/1532woman.jpg

And there is at least one extant shirt in the latest Patterns of Fashion that closes with buttons. There's also a ruff shown with a very nice closeup on the button closure.  So I think there's plenty of pictorial and extant clothing evidence to suggest that buttons were likely used on smocks sometimes, even if they're not the most common closure.  If you want to do ties, it actually looks as though a tie on one side, with a worked eyelet on the other, is the most common (instead of two ties, like we'd do today).

Lady Rosalind actually recently posted that she much prefers buttons to ties for her smocks, as they stay closed better and are easier to undo at the end of a long, hot day performing.

[Dinobabe]

I went ahead and put the ties on and don't really like the way it looks.  Mainly because it covers up the beautiful diamond pattern on the cuffs.  And since that is the main part of the chemise that shows (when the sleeves are attached) I would like to show it off!  Do you have a pic of the single tie with eyelet?

[DonaCatalina]

button on partlet/chemise

[gem]

Do you have a pic of the single tie with eyelet?

Alas, no. The pix in Patterns of Fashion show just the worked eyelets; there're no pictures of what it looks like when tied up.

[DonaCatalina]

Voila!
tied cuff shirt from the Victoria & Albert Museum

[Dinobabe]

Oh, OK!  Thanks!

[gem]

Dona C, FABULOUS pictures!!!  I'm betting the garment shown in the portrait is definitely a chemise; the Italians were using finer and more elaborate fabrics in their camicias, and as they did so, the necklines of their gowns got lower to show them off. It looks like there's some beautiful smocking along her chemise neckline, which would fit.

[Lady Rosalind]

I've used small hooks and eyes for smocks and shirts, too. Much nicer than ties!