Garbing Bucket List ("GBL")

[mollymishap]

OK, so maybe this is going to come across as a bit morbid, but want to share my thoughts with you-all anyways, and risk you thinking oddly of me .

Starting a bunch of years ago, I had one item on my "Garbing Bucket List" (GBL) and it was the Ditchley Portrait Dress.  Though I haven't quite made a reproduction (being that I ran out of time to make the lattice poufy bits and hanging sleeves before my show), once I had made the parts that I made, it was like in my mind I'd said "CHECK!" and crossed it off my list.  I no longer have the *same* kind of investment in completing the gown as I did before.  If I end up doing the show again next year, I may well decide to finish the poufs, etc., but it won't be to satisfy my "GBL" because that's already satisfied in my mind.

OK, so here's the morbid bit:  I've been looking at my HUGE fabric stash and realizing that I make, what?...*maybe* a gown every 2-3 years, and the interval is probably getting longer being that at this point I have a decent wardrobe, spanning a bunch of time periods, social strata, etc., and my garb-making is usually triggered by a need to make something for a character for whom I don't have suitable clothes.  It makes sense, therefore, that the older I get the less I'll be stimulated (or need) to make.

SO, being that I'm pushing 50 at this point, and let's say I make 3 "major" garb projects a decade, I've got some 6 or so projects left in me, so to speak, assuming I live till 70.

Which means I need to do some serious re-thinking of my stash AND only keep fabrics for those projects that are *really* important to me.

Problem is, I don't know what those are.  I've had a vague interest in making the "Eleanora Dress", and the "Anne of Cleaves Dress", but now I'm not so sure.  I've even got a 10 yd roll of (close-enough) cut velvet for the Eleanora dress that's been taking up space in the back of my closet since 2005, and it just doesn't interest me any more.

If I were pressed to start a new "GBL", it would look like this:

• something totally hand-sewn, probably middling Elizabethan.


• More HA corsets to fill in the gaps between the 16th c. ones that I have (Effigy & Dorothea) and the c. 1903 straight-fronted one that I'm working on now, which gives me 200 years worth of small projects to play with.

And then...I have no idea what then...except that if I make the corsets at least it will be easier to make whatever I want to go over them vs. having to start from scratch.

So, what's on *your* GBL?

[gem]

You have achieved SABLE: Stash Acquisition Beyond Life Expectancy. It happens to the best of us. 

The problem with these lists is... what if when you're 65 you have a totally new obsession? (I don't mean a different hobby; I mean an item you now really, really MUST make, that hasn't even crossed your mind yet.) Like with your Ditchley gown--that urge has passed for you now.

That said... two years ago, my GBL consisted of "a supportive kirtle, or else." Or else being, I would hang up my claims of being a historical costumer and find a different hobby. Got that made, thankfully!

My super-important stash projects--I have all of the materials, and have not yet given up hope that I will someday make them:

1.) Promenade Gown I got halted in this by a lack of knowledge and available research on fitting gowns of this era. That has now been remedied... but I've put on 13lbs since I started, and I have to either lose or come to terms with the extra dress size before I continue.

2.) Caravaggio's Santa Catalina I've been working on the design of a reproduction of the embroidery on her chemise for five years. I'm still not happy with it. Two years ago a new book came out with a much better image of the portrait than I was previously able to find (yay!), and earlier this year I had a new idea about the motifs I haven't had a chance to test yet... but even better: There's a new line of French metal thread available in the US for the first time that looks more promising than any of my test swatches! After I finish this year's garb and obligation stitching (gifts for new babies, etc), that's my top priority!

3.) My Snakenborg chemise, and possibly the gown to go with it. This is another looooong-term embroidery project. Not wanting another big DESIGN project (see Caravaggio, above), I decided to take a mental shortcut and fill in the existing machine embroidery on some fabulous linen I found several years ago. But the pieces are HUGE and they're taking forever. Since 2010, I've only managed one sleeve and about 2/3 of the back yoke. However, I sourced some amazing red fabric for the gown and a near-exact trim match... so I'm ready! My utterly realistic goal for this is to be done with the embroidery by the time I'm 50. (I'm 39.)

Now, since having these ideas, I've made: A complete Italian noble gown, a complete Italian working-class gown, a doublet for my FIL, 4 full costumes based on the film "Much Ado About Nothing," new bodices, new chemises, new skirts, new hats, new blackwork, and about half of a Saxon gown. So it's not like I've been twiddling my thumbs while those ideas languish. I just got obsessed with other things! But I know my craftsmanship has improved, and those Super-Important Projects will only benefit.

...If they actually get made. 

[Rani Zemirah]

Gem... is that a full chemise, or is it a sleeved partlet? 

[GryffinSong]

...SO, being that I'm pushing 50 at this point, and let's say I make 3 "major" garb projects a decade, I've got some 6 or so projects left in me, so to speak, assuming I live till 70...

70? I'm planning on at least 90 or 100!!! My mom's 82 and sews almost every day.

That said, I'm new enough to the garb world that I don't yet have much of a bucket list. I'm still at the "jazz up the pirate gear" stage. 

[gem]

Gem... is that a full chemise, or is it a sleeved partlet?

Rani, I believe it to be a partlet and separate sleeves. You can see that the two fabrics appear to be of different weights (the sleeves look heavier). For the sake of wearing simplicity, I'm making my version like this blackwork chemise, although I suppose there's no reason I couldn't turn my work into sleeves and partlet. When I rough-cut the pieces I used a modern costume pattern, but I wish now I'd used historical construction (rectangular pieces). Ah, well. This is what happens with those loooooong term projects!

[Rani Zemirah]

Gem... is that a full chemise, or is it a sleeved partlet?

Rani, I believe it to be a partlet and separate sleeves. You can see that the two fabrics appear to be of different weights (the sleeves look heavier). For the sake of wearing simplicity, I'm making my version like this blackwork chemise, although I suppose there's no reason I couldn't turn my work into sleeves and partlet. When I rough-cut the pieces I used a modern costume pattern, but I wish now I'd used historical construction (rectangular pieces). Ah, well. This is what happens with those loooooong term projects!

Well, YOU can see it, but my eyes aren't quite as good at picking out details like that!  I thought I was doing really well to pick out the partlet part!    heheh  It never occurred to me that a chemise might only have the upper portion done in embroidery, but that makes perfect sense, since it was so work intensive, and the lower portion would likely never been seen, anyway.  I am constantly amazed by the dualities presented by the wealthier classes during times long past.  This is a perfect example, though... with such obvious displays of wealth and ostentation in the visible areas of their clothing, and what might almost be called frugality in the parts that don't show.  I mean, I'm sure the blackwork chemise was still the finest linen below the embroidered bits... but to acknowledge the sense in saving money by not having that part embroidered would suggest that there were likely many other parts of everyday life that were treated the same way.  It would be an interesting study to unearth some examples of just that... and see how the "upper classes" saved money on things that had a direct effect on their own lives, or comfort levels. 

I seem to recall having a somewhat similar revelation when I first found out that there was such a thing as a "forepart"... and it wasn't actually a completely separate skirt, all beaded and bejeweled all the way around!  Go figure...  LOL 

Sorry... tangent, I know!  I just never really thought of things in quite those terms before, I suppose... and it piqued my curiosity!  lol

[isabelladangelo]

Rani,  the smock Gem pointed to is at the V&A :

http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O78732/smock-unknown/

I've seen it in person and it is drool worthy.  However, on the website it does note:

The smock was made of two different grades of linen. A fine weave linen was used for the bodice and sleeves and, as two small surviving strips indicate, a coarser one was employed for the skirt. Contemporary documents indicate that this was quite normal, the finer and more expensive linen being used only for areas of the smock that might be seen.

You might also be interested in a some later embroidery if you like partlets and smocks:

http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O319537/partlet-unknown/
http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O356616/shift-unknown/

Janet Arnold's Patterns of Fashion goes heavily into a few of the extant items in Britain specifically.  She has the go to book series for anything fashion wise. 

[mollymishap]

You have achieved SABLE: Stash Acquisition Beyond Life Expectancy. It happens to the best of us.   

[snip]

I *love* it!  That's what I've got: SABLE-itis!!!  SABLE-ism, SABLE-r, SABLE-ing--the possibilities are endless!

But in all seriousness, I'm really needing to pare down.  You *do* bring up a good point, Gem: that of changing "obsessions" when you're 65...but I guess that bridge will just have to be crossed when I get to it, otherwise I'll never get rid of anything due to the fear that I *might* need it later. 

And you actually reminded me of a project that actually predates my Ditchley "obsession" and would have been on my GBL had I had one at the time, namely the Phoenix portait chemise: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/42/Elizabeth1.jpg.  I have the linen, the silk floss and even the embroidery design all figured out.  Do I still want to make it?  Not really.  Would I be proud to wear it had I made it?  You bet!  So *will* I make it?  I dunno, maybe--now that it's back on my radar.

[Rani Zemirah]

Ooh, Isabella, those are lovely!  I particularly like the "shift"! 

I do find it interesting that even the grade of linen was different for the skirt of the smock, as though all that mattered to the wearer was what could be seen by others, and even personal comfort wasn't as important as that!  It gives a lot of insight into upper class society of the times, and would seem to indicate that being SEEN to be wealthy and extravagant was much more important that actually BEING wealthy and extravagant...

Hmmm... I wonder if this was common in even the gowns of Royals? 

Ok, I'll stop trying change the subject!  Sorry! 

I probably do have a few things on my mental GBL, I'm sure... although there are so many things I would like to make that it's hard to choose one or two that are worthy of being called "obsessions".  I guess I can't really think of anything that I am absolutely determined to make/own before I die... so maybe I'm wrong, and there isn't any list.  I think I need to give it some thought!  lol

[Cilean]

SABLE: Stash Acquisition Beyond Life Expectancy

That is my world, I have been getting rid of some of my STASH, and I do feel good about it, but I bring more in when I see it, once it is gone it is pretty difficult to get it again.  So I am still aquiring but I am picking better fabrics!

So what do I want to attempt before I kick the bucket?












I am not one to make something 'Exactly' like a portrait I like to use different pieces from several to get my own special look but these portraits speak to me!