If you could make garb to match a portrait........

[DonaCatalina]

This is Isabella Clara Eugenia de Austria. Daughter of Phillip II of Spain.

[Merlin the Elder]

I swear, DC! You're a walking encyclopædia!  You never cease to amaze me... I was thinking Liberace in his younger years...

[Magpie Flynn]

This is Isabella Clara Eugenia de Austria. Daughter of Phillip II of Spain.

Thank you Dona!! It was driving me crazy that I couldn't find it!

[operafantomet]

This is Isabella Clara Eugenia de Austria. Daughter of Phillip II of Spain.

Thank you Dona!! It was driving me crazy that I couldn't find it!

To put it like that: every time you see a hefty jaw sitting on top of noble clothes of the 16th and 17th century, it's probably a member of the Habsburg family... They were so notoriously known for their heavy jaws that the prognathism syndrome is still called a "Habsburg jaw"... The princess Isabella wasn't the worst example, she was fairly early in the run. But interbreeding in the 16th century cause the mid and late 17th century Habsburgers to look like this:

http://hoffstrizz.typepad.com/.a/6a0128773aba66970c0128775b7393970c-800wi
http://speedy.theanneboleynfiles.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Charles-Vs-Habsburg-Jaw-300x300.jpg

But it is a nice portrait of the princess Isabella, and a gorgeous gown!

[iain robb]

Actually that red dress is a Portuguese style made popular by Isabella of Portugal.

[/quote]

Wow, this is an inspiring thread! Thanks for so many great examples.

This painting is making me want to make something like this for my wife, in blue with gold and red trim.

[Anna Iram]

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Pisanello_016.jpg

I came across this one day and it's been on my mind since. I'm thinking this is wool? So unusual. I could almost imagine this being worn on the fashion runways of today. Wish I could see the rest of the gown.

[DonaCatalina]

I swear, DC! You're a walking encyclopædia!  You never cease to amaze me... I was thinking Liberace in his younger years...

lol there is a strking resemblance.

[DonaCatalina]

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Pisanello_016.jpg

I came across this one day and it's been on my mind since. I'm thinking this is wool? So unusual. I could almost imagine this being worn on the fashion runways of today. Wish I could see the rest of the gown.

In Italy it is more likely to have been a weave of raw silk or silk combined with wool, or silk combined with linen. Though they did use wool also.

[operafantomet]

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Pisanello_016.jpg

I came across this one day and it's been on my mind since. I'm thinking this is wool? So unusual. I could almost imagine this being worn on the fashion runways of today. Wish I could see the rest of the gown.

In Italy it is more likely to have been a weave of raw silk or silk combined with wool, or silk combined with linen. Though they did use wool also.

I think Anna Iram might be right. In mid Italy in the 1300s and 1400s people were more likely to wear wool cloth than silk. The wool industry in Florence alone employed around 25,000-30,000 of the city's population of 95,000; partly for export and partly for their own use. They did have a solid silk industry too in Tuscany, especially in Lucca, but the silks were mainly exports or for grand events like weddings and processions. It wasn't common for regular clothes, not even for nobility. Their silks were exported to European courts, and to the Ottoman empire.

But it should be remembered that wool cloth made of imported English wool or Spanish merino wool, and with rich Italian dyes, was considered very fine fabrics. A good wool fabric with a dark, saturated colour was more worth than your average silk.

For the Pisanello dress it is hard to tell. He was a Tuscan artist (from Pisa, hence Pisanello), but the lady in question is thought to be from the Este court in Ferrara in between Florence and Venice. If her dress has Venetian influence she might very well use silk. The pattern on the back could remind of a fine damask. But a patterned silk would usually be patterned all over. She only has it on the back of what I assume is hanging sleeves. So I would think an embroidery adorned with pearls. It's the dry texture of the fabric that makes me think it's wool.

My guess would be that her dress looks like that of the lady in Filippo Lippi's double portrait from the 1440s. There the sleeves are "a gozzi", which basically means they had a bag shape with a large hole around the elbow, and a smaller one at the wrist. It could hence be worn hanging or "regular". Underneath a dress of accenting colour was used, and the width was gathered with a belt in the waist. It's a style showing transaction from Mediaeval to Renaissance fashion.

[Anna Iram]

Thankyou ladies.  Don't see myself making this, but I'm so curious about how it's put together. I understand Tudor and Elizabethan garments, but not so much medieval. I tried to search for
gozzi but nothing came up. I'm thinking it's a cousin of the houplander?

As for the underlayers, not sure what I'm looking at. Is there a sort of linen shift that I see at the throat above the rope of the gozzi and at the shoulder, the cap sleeve of linen between the orange sleeves and the gozzi? Are the sleeves tied in or sewn to a matching undergown?

Can you point me toward a link where I might see how it all goes on? Thanks!

[operafantomet]

Thankyou ladies.  Don't see myself making this, but I'm so curious about how it's put together. I understand Tudor and Elizabethan garments, but not so much medieval. I tried to search for
gozzi but nothing came up. I'm thinking it's a cousin of the houplander?

As for the underlayers, not sure what I'm looking at. Is there a sort of linen shift that I see at the throat above the rope of the gozzi and at the shoulder, the cap sleeve of linen between the orange sleeves and the gozzi? Are the sleeves tied in or sewn to a matching undergown?

Can you point me toward a link where I might see how it all goes on? Thanks!

Italian style is easy enough to understand. A chemise (shift, smock, call it what you want) towards the skin, a fairly plain main dress, and a more elaborate overdress. They didn't always use an overdress, but for this particular style they did.

The last picture I posted shows the plainer dress to the right, with a high waist and wide upper sleeves, and the outfit with an overdress to the left. The overdress follows the lines of the main dress, but the sleeves are different. What I wrote - A GOZZI - just refers to the sleeves, with an opening on the elbow, and an opening at the wrist. It means "like a ball" or thereabout, if you translate it through google it calls it "goiter". :lol: Probably same origin of the word.

What you see around the neck opening and the sleeves is merely a trim, or possibly the lining of the gown finished like a roll meant to be visible from the outside. You can see the same in the double portrait I posted.

A cousin of the houppelande seems like a good description! A houppelande with two sleeve openings.

[Anna Iram]

Ah! a gozzi. I didn't put in the search corectly.  That opened up a whole bunch of information!
Including your site, Anea.

Yes, now that I look at it better I see the cap at the shoulder and the drape at the throat is just a continuation of the ovrrgown. If that is indeed wool it has an amazing drape.

So, I now know she is wearing a  chioppa with sleeves a gozzi over a gamurra. Now I know a little more than I did.

..and houppelande. *laughing* I knew houpelander wasn't the right word..mean't to work on that before sending

[DonaCatalina]

I am always on the lookout for a new sleeve treatment in portraits.


As well as this one.... Though I wish I could find a larger version that shows the sleeve detail better.

My new sage green dress is modeled after the dark dress of the kneeling woman on the left. The caplet sleeves proved much more difficult to design as a one piece sleeve than I would have thought. If I make these again, I will do the 'petals' as individual pieces and not use a thick pile velvet.

[gem]

My new sage green dress is modeled after the dark dress of the kneeling woman on the left.

I knew it!! You should post the image to this thread, too, Dona C! 

[Lady Kathleen of Olmsted]

As one can see, I am attracted to the color RED!