Catching Up

Hello again!

As I said in my last post I have been working on my project even though I took so long to join the challenge and write my first post. So here I'm going to start trying to catch up. I've been keeping a journal on my desktop about my project so I'm going to cut and paste from there. I have written quite a lot so I will only cut and paste a little at a time:

Early July 2009: A Bad Experience with Hot Water and a Dryer

After some initial research I decided that the fabric for the outfit would be made from wool. I was happy to find some red wool fabric at my local fabric store that would be perfect for the surcoat. There was only a limited amount of it but considering how much fabric I had needed for a previously machine made surcoat I believed it would be enough. Because the fabric was very loose in its weave I was instructed by one of my sewing mentors, Baronne Estela du Frayse (Kelly Grant in the mundane world…henceforth to be known as Estela), that I should “full” it by washing it in hot water and drying it in the dryer. I was aghast when doing this resulted in extensive shrinking! Alas, there was not going to be enough fabric for the project!

Mid July 2009: Research

I went to a local branch of our library in Halifax to do some research in the reference section. In the book, “Survey of Historic Costume”, Chapter 6: High Middle Ages: 900-1300 it describes fabric manufacture. Available fabrics during this time would have been wool, linen and silk. With this information I decided that using wool would be fine.

I also did some research online and found this quote from a book called “Science and Technology in Medieval European Life” by Jeffrey R. Wigelsworth: Under “Clothes and Cloth Making” found in (I believe) “Chapter I: Earning a Living: Agriculture and Manufacturing”: “Most everyday medieval fabrics were wool or linen…” and “The warmth of wool made it a natural choice for outerwear, while linen cloth was used to make underwear.” From this quote I again concluded that I would use wool.

From the same chapter and section of the online copy of “Science and Technology in Medieval European Life” as mentioned above I also found quoted: “Sewing thread used in medieval clothing was made from linen. On more expensive pieces of clothing, the thread was silk…” From this quote I concluded that the thread I would want to use was linen.


August 2009: Beginning the Design for the Surcoat

The time had come to start thinking of the design for the pieces of the outfit. I had made a dress from a McCall’s pattern in the past that seemed to fit me rather well so I thought this dress pattern might be appropriate for the outfit. It was laced up at the back, though, which I had discovered was incorrect for period garments. I decided, then, that I might be able to make it with no lacing at all. I tried it out on a brown dress I would be wearing to an event at the end of the month and was happy with the results. I decided that this was probably going to be the pattern I would use for the gown.

For the surcoat I decided to design one that I could make and wear at the same event as I would use the brown dress. I thought I could try modifying a surcoat from the same McCall’s pattern where the dress came from. I had made a surcoat from this pattern in the past and thought it might give me a good start. The pattern, however, was for a rather open sideless surcoat. The one in the Codex Manesse plate is much more closed at the sides as well as at the neckline.

I started off making my own pattern for the surcoat by laying out the original one I had made from the McCall’s pattern on brown paper and tracing out the pattern, making modifications for the armholes and neckline. I then cut out my mock up pattern from some scrap fabric and sewed it together. The result was not exactly what I wanted. The neckline didn’t seem to lie properly as it bunched out somewhat. Also, the bust line seemed to be a little tight. I took it apart and modified it further. I didn’t have too much of a problem with the bust line but it took a few attempts to get the neck line to sit properly. I finally found a design that seemed to fit well enough so I used that pattern for the surcoat I would wear to the event at the end of the month. I was happy enough with the result although I was a little disappointed with the fullness of it. The result was produced from rather heavy fabric, which I thought may be the problem. However, I didn’t have much more time before the event to try to modify it so I left it as it was.



The first photo shows my first attempt. You can see where the neckline is puffing out and how the bustline is a little tight.

The second photo shows how I adjusted the neckline so it would lay better and how I made the bustline less tight.

The third photo shows the result of the outfit I used for the August event including the brown dress and the surcoat.
I'll let you digest all this before adding any more...there's still lots to catch up on!