Remaking my light green italian 15th century gown

I have now re-made the light green damask gown that I made in 2015 after falling in love with Florence, so that it fits my current size.

More photos and information about the gown here, on its page.

Post about the old version of the gown.

Midsummer in folk costume

If you have a folk costume, Midsummer eve in Sweden is the traditional day to wear it. Which meant that I spent last week taking in the bodice sothat I could wear it today ;) This one comes from
Åse and Viste, which is close to where I lived when I was younger, and I've made it myself - for more details and information on this costume, and general information about Swedish folk costumes, look here.

Iwent with my best friend, her family and her sisters and their families to a Midsummer celebration at Gunnebo House, a lovely 18th century house and gardens. There was a group showing folk dancing, which really is the one thing I don't want to miss at midsummer.

Folkdanslaget Näverluren:

I even shot a very short video (despite being a total luddite when it comes to using my cell phone)

And my best friend inger took some photos of me in my costume, before it started to rain...

And after

The last image really show how the headwear should be worn; historically the cap was always covered out of doors, to protect i from both sun and rain.But nobody does that nowadays. And it would be a waste not to show the pretty cap.

Immediate corset crisis solved

Not that I'm going to wear 16th century clothing to an SCA event before I step down as baroness, but I have a plan for a photo session by the fake Tudor castle Tjolöholm, south of Gothenburg some day this summer. Alfhild and I should dress up in green Elizabethan dresses and look pretty together.

So I decided to try my effigy corset, which was rather tight last time I tried (and I haven't worn for years), and now it was comfortable, too comfortable - my boobs slid down :)

Fortunately I have another corset, a hand sewn version of Pfalzgräfin Dorothea von Neuburg's corset. I made it at about the same time as my hand sewn effigy corset, but never wore it, because it turned otu to be a little too tight for comfort.

Not anymore!

Image from 2007.

I may shorten it a little, which easy since the tabs aren't boned, because apparently I wasn't that good at finding my natural waist bacek then.

This goes for the green dress I planned to wear too, which isn't only too long in the waist, but also (of course) too big.

Empire corset revisited

 Yesterday my friend Alfhild came by. She had visited another friend who wants to make both regency and Victorian clothes and was really inspired to  to make some too.
So we dug out my books, and then I got inspired to show my stuff and ended up opening boxes with costumes which hadn't been touched for years.
They are kept under our bed, and unfortunately our cat Mysko had managed to get into one of them and had puked on my 18th century shift, and an antique lace shawl. The shawl was too delicate to wash, so I just gave up and threw it in the trash. The shift will be washed next time we have the laundry room, next week, and hopefully it can be saved. But Mysko was very cheap for anyone wanting to buy him then ;)

Anyway, I dug out clothes and I tried on clothes, and to my great joy my empire corset still works, though it has to be laced wholly shut at the back. The same was the case with the smaller of my 18th century stays, though they should ideally be taken in at the waist - they're too tight at the top if I lace them shut, and too loose in the waist. I'll see if I'll do something about that, I have a partly finished robe à la francaise that I started 14 years ago, which would be fun to finish I guess.

Rickard took a photo of me in the empire corset, but I didn't get any in my 18th century stays.

The petticoat, gown, bonnet adn shawl that go with these underwear can be seen here. Unfortunately I suspect that the gown is too big, I didn't try it on, because I needed to pack away stuff for the night.

Gotvik summer picnic

Despite the weather forecasts today turned out to be a lovely sunny day, and those of us who made ti to the picnic had a really good time.

I was pretty in my green silk bliaut, which fits again.

I brought Icelandic chicken, and a salad with lettuce, spinach, rocket, green peas, broccoli and green grapes to eat.

Photos from the picninc.

Working on my mint green surcoat

I hae now made the sleeves, though one needs a few more beads. The gown and linign are also sewn together, bu tnot joined. They will also need trim and beads of course.

For this Italian outfit ca 1330-1340.

The under tunic is made, though it has turned out a bit looser than I first intended.

That won't be noticed under the over gown though.

A page for my high-waisted late 13th - early 14th century gown from Verona

It took a while, but now you can read all about one of the weirdest gowns I've made here.

A painted chest

So, you don't only need clothes to go to events, at least not to camping events. You also need somewhere to store your clothing. 16 years ago my stepdad and I made nice solid wood chests, without nails. They were, however, both heavy and too large for our storage. We ended up leaving them with friends on Gotland, since at that time we went to Visby medieval week every year, and that was the only place we used. Seemed much smarter to pick them up there instead of lugging them across Sweden every summer.

And then we stopped going. It was so much work, and it's so much easier for us to go to Double Wars, the other great camping event in Sweden. Of course you miss out on the lovely medieval town and all the concerts, lectures and other happenings, but it really was too much work. We may go again, but we haven't done it for six years.

So then our big chests ended up on Gotland, and since I couldn't figure out a way to get them here, and we really didn't have the space anyway, I donated them to people on Gotland.

For Double Wars I used a couple of chests made from wood chip. But one of them is getting old and rickety and they also have this very 19th- 20th century look. So I decided to make two breakdown plywood chests, inspired by the ones made by House Greydragon. My plan was to have them finished when we went to Double Wars, but with the work load that I had in April and May that was impossible. So now I am slowly putting the panels together and painting them. This far I have painted one lid and one large panel.

Thos chest will have motifs from the Grosse Heidelberger Liederhandschrift on all sides, the other one will have other courtly motifs.

1940s-ish

Not really historical, but since I mentioned two dresses in the 1940s style in my previous post about my sewing list I thought that I'd show how they turned out.

Sewing list

So, on Friday I went to a viva, where a colleague defended his PhD thesis. While interesing enough I do have a problem concentrating for two hours, unless I have something to knit och sew with me, so I started makign a sewing list.

I love making sewing lists, I find them everyhwere in my notebooks from seminars or from travelling. But I haven't made many the last years, because I sort of had all the historical clothes I needed. But since I became a baroness in March 2016, and even more since I lost so much weight (34 kilos) I've started sewing again, and hence: making sewing lists.

So, this is what this one says:

Sewing list June 2017
Mint green Italian  sleeved surcoat ca 1330.
Wrap dress (1940s style) in printed cotton in blue end red This one I cut and almost finished yesterday. It only needs to have the skirt and ties attached.
Sun dress (1950s style) in mint green cotton with tiny blue dots
Italian late 15th century gown in red velvet with turquoise velvet brocade sleeves
New hose for Rickard
New hose for me
Green wool surcoat without sleeves
Supportive linen shift - re-make
Lengberg bra?


Re-make in the future 
Red velvet Swedish 16th century gown with green brocade
Mint green Italian 14th century
Purple silk bliaut 
Green Swedish 16th century wool dress (no images, never worn, I wasn't happy with it)
Red Swedish 16th century under gown based on a statue from Dala Järna (no images, never worn, I wasn't happy with it)
Blue over gown gown based on a statue from Dala Järna (no images, never worn, I wasn't happy with it)
Burgundy ("modern") grosgrain skirt
Light yellow 1940s style summer dress. Re-made to a wrap dress yesterday.

Sewing (Again. I ran out of re-make stuff)
Giornea - colour?
Saya?
Italian 16th century in turquoise blue
Pisa gown from red velvet 
Tudor gown?

Laurels and apprentices

During Double Wars Jonas Evertsson/Lord Edricus filius Offaeus took this photo of Mistress Helwig Ulfsdotter and all her apprentices, her former apprentices, now mistresses themselves, and their apprentices - the "grandchildren"

Mistress Helwig is the woman in the middle, she is my mistress, to the right of her are my "siblings", her other apprentices: the king and queen of Drachenwald, William and Isabetta, and viscountess Filippa.  To the left of Helwig are first Mistress Tece de Kaxtone, the newest of the Laurels, and former apprentice to the woman next to her:  Mistress Lia de Thornegge, Mistrsss Helwig's first apprentice. Lady Silva standing on the far left is Lia's apprentice. Sitting down it's me, and duchess Agnes Odygd, who just had become Mistress Tece's first apprentice.

Family!