16th century outfit for a one-year-old

 Made in 2005

13 years ago I made this outfit for Maja. It consists of  shift,  hose, a kirtle with tie in sleeves, a loose gown and a linen coif.

The shift is  made with rectangular construction, without shoulder seams and with a gore in each side. It closes at the neck with a tied ribbon. The hose are also from linen and cut on the bias. They are made from two pieces, one leg piece that wraps around the back part of the sole, and a foot piece that wraps around the foot and is sewn together under the foot, just like the leg piece. This gives a seam under the foot, but I have used that pattern myself without discomfort from said seam.

The stockings are just tied around the knee for the photo, but will later be tied to loops on the "panties" that keep her cloth diaper in place. As soon as I have sewn ribbon loops on them.
   
The kirtle is based on this very famous Holbein portrait of his family.

From wikimedia commons

 It is made from thin 100% wool tabby. The bodice is lined with linen twill and there is also an 8 cm deep facing at the hem of the same linen twill. There was when this photo was taken also a tuck just above the facing, to make the dress shorter but which was let it down as she grew. It closes with hooks and eyes. The sleeves are unlined and are tied to the kirtle with ribbons that are thread through two metal eyes on the inside of the shoulder straps.
 
On her head she's wearing a coif made after the description and pattern on the Elizabethan Costuming Page. It is made from thin linen with a woven pattern (which can be seen clearly if you click on the pictures) and a lace edge. It is lightly starched beacuse that linen really is soft and flimsy.


For cooler weather she had a loose gown from red fulled wool. It was inspired by the girl's gown on page 102 in Patterns of Fashion, which is from c. 1600-1610 and currently at Nordiska Museet here in Sweden. That gown is probably made up from another gown so it has many more pieces than this gown, which ony consists of two front pieces, one back piece and sleeves. Since Maja was much smaller than the girl who had the original gown there's not much fabric to be saved by making it from smaller pieces either. The trim, which is made from shiny, silver grey thread, woven into a leaf-like pattern, is placed in double rows, just like on the gown at Nordiska museet.

The whole outfit is sewn by hand. And was worn with shoes when outdoors.

This outfit has since then been worn by generations of Nordmark kids.