I has a RenFaire dress!!!

[JoitheArtist]

I'm so happy, I finally have a Renaissance dress!! Every other time I've got to the RenFaire, I have worn a more medieval style dress, because I prefer the way they fit. But this time, I made a much more Renaissance gown: it's mostly deep purple satin with flowers embroidered all over it in white, with poofy white sleeves with purple stays on them, and a white underskirt. And it laces up the back with pale good ribbon. I love it!!!

Pics coming soon I hope.

[AccountingDrone]

yay, cant wait to see it :)

I made this about 6 years ago, it should have a pair of sleeves in black velvet lined with a beige and cream brocade plastron that matches the sleeve linings, but I was being a slacker as court wasnt for another 6 hours and I had some last minute sewing to do on the sleeves.

[XCashier]

What patterns did you use / do you recommend? Or where did you get the dress? I want to sew more medieval clothing, but I want something that looks legitimate, and not Hollywood. I hate spending money on something only to find out I can't use it.

[Emrld]

ummm which time period are we talking?

The terms being used cover a wide variety of dress options.

Of course my home fair is known as "Tudorbeathean" (combination of Tudor and Elizabethian)

As for where to shop . . .I know of several good places. One of the best ways is to start at your local Fair and check out the fairs which gives you the option to touch the fabrics, see the seams, check the way their patterns fit.

(alot of fairs have links to vendor web sites)

You can then change/ adjust the commercial patterns found in your favorite brand (Simplicity, McCalls, Vogue etc) I have friends that will combine 2 -5 to make one dress.

(note my sig line- been around it for a while)

[JoitheArtist]

Honestly, I just buy a McCall's pattern. The Ren Faire I go to is more about fun than strict accuracy, though they try. The characters there are Elizabethan, but you get faire-goers in all sorts of get-ups. I've seen everything from togas to Victorian dresses to goth fairies. :rolleyes: But it's all in good fun.

I'm taking my fav prof's youngest son and daughter to the Faire this year, they're so excited!

[JoitheArtist]

ok, here's some very poor pics of the dress on my dress form.

[draggar]

Very nice and good job!

[XCashier]

ummm which time period are we talking?
I haven't decided yet. (I know, bad SCAdian! :ashamed: ) I'm thinking very early period (like 900-1100 AD) but there are few pictures and fewer patterns from that era. That might be too early to research, I may have to settle for about 1300s. Everybody does Elizabethan, I want to be different! :D

[AccountingDrone]

ok, here's some very poor pics of the dress on my dress form.

so post one with it on you =)

Dresses always look better on people than on forms.

[JoitheArtist]

so post one with it on you =)

Dresses always look better on people than on forms.

I will. :) There aren't any good mirrors in my house to take pics there, so I'll wait and have someone else get pics at the Faire. Besides, then my hair will be done up all nice and pretty to match. :D

[AccountingDrone]

What patterns did you use / do you recommend? Or where did you get the dress? I want to sew more medieval clothing, but I want something that looks legitimate, and not Hollywood. I hate spending money on something only to find out I can't use it.

Um, well. I made a pattern for a pair of bodys and more or less duplicated it in velvet. I used metal boning in both because I hate the plastic boning, even though it is a close duplicate of whale bone, but it can snap through misuse. The skirt is box pleated until it fits, then put on and hemmed for length. No pattern there either.

Have a go at:
MOAS Atlantia (http://moas.atlantia.sca.org/wsnlinks/index.php?action=displaycat&catid=10)

I basically work out of portraits for the sillhouettes and styles, and I know how to do most fine handwork thanks to my grandmother teaching me how to hand sew and do finework as a very young child, though I did teach myself several forms of embroidery and embellishment.

My current project is


Roger if Sicily (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_II_of_Sicily) shows a period manuscript illustration of Roger, and if you scroll down a smidge on this article (http://www.virtue.to/articles/extant.html) you can see pictures of the original clothing worn. Also more pictures are available if you snurfle around.

There are actually a few actual garments extant, and if you can connect with the right historians, you can luck out and get detailed drawings of garment construction. Frequently you can get lucky and score a copy of Tilke's work (http://www.indiana.edu/~librcsd/etext/tilke/) on extant clothing from various museums. If you do steppes or middle eastern costuming, it is fairy good. I got lucky at a libraby auction and own a copy. I also own Queen Lizzy 1st's Wardrobe (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Queen-Elizabeths-Wardrobe-Unlockd-Arnold/dp/0901286206) which has details down to specific cord weaves for specific uses in her clothing. janet Arnold wrote severa good reference books on the cut of elizabethan clothing.

I was Gilded Pearl when I was in the SCA. I think I have something on the order of 3 or 4 thousand hours of old style preinternet research on my roman persona, probably 2 thousand hours on my steppes persona and about 1000 or so hours involved in an elizabethan persona. I know that I have something on the order of +/- $5000 invested in reference books and that doesnt count the cost of stamps for correspondence or phone calls, and time diverting from vacations or business trips to visit museums. [props to the Berlin museum staff for speaking english!]

[AccountingDrone]

I haven't decided yet. (I know, bad SCAdian! :ashamed: ) I'm thinking very early period (like 900-1100 AD) but there are few pictures and fewer patterns from that era. That might be too early to research, I may have to settle for about 1300s. Everybody does Elizabethan, I want to be different! :D

Join the club, when I got my start in 1978, everybody was viking and celt. So I became roman [Didius Hyapatia, alexandrian roman ca 50 ad] and then I got into turkoman steppes by accident about the time 1989 rolled around and everybody was doing italian renn and elizabethan. Then allof a sudden middle eastern and mongolian hit, and someone wanted me to ake them an elizabethan, so I researched up on it, and decided it was an ok look for me, and did minimal research on it so I could make educated decisions for fabric and findings and embellishments.

Ill actually consider making anything, as long as I can find decent documentation, If you want to go premade, there used to be a company called Medieval Miscellaney that made patterns, but from what I saw, they had decent documentation, but they were a mess unless you were very experienced at modifying premade patterns. A mess of lines going everywhere, and I am not certain they drew the original slopers using a human torso as the model.

Hm, very early.

http://www.personal.utulsa.edu/~marc-carlson/cloth/tunic2.html

Viking burials are actually fairly good for getting actual clothing, oddly enough. One of the earlier viking finds actually had a preserved wisp of purple silk that found its way all the way up there demonstrating traderoutes from china to somewhere in scandanavia [for some reason Birka springs to mind but I dont think that is it] in like 900 ad.

Have a go at http://www.theweebsite.com/ for a bunch of costumers links.

[Amina516]

Joi, the dress is beautiful! Have fun and post pics of you there. When is the faire anyways?

[JoitheArtist]

Joi, the dress is beautiful! Have fun and post pics of you there. When is the faire anyways?

This Saturday. We have a pretty big group going, 10 or so. I have three people who have never been to a Ren Faire before, and they're so excited. :)

[AccountingDrone]

This Saturday. We have a pretty big group going, 10 or so. I have three people who have never been to a Ren Faire before, and they're so excited. :)

:cry:
it isnt the season for renfaires around here yet ... and I GAFIATed from the SCA because I got tired of the bullshit...

Though I admit I have been debating getting back into making accessories now I am unemployed. It is amazing how well little things sell like embroidered cloths for wrapping stuff in/lining baskets with, or making 'favors' to hand out to the fighters [typically an oversized scarf in a plain bright jeweltones like burgundy, emerald or sapphire with an elaborate initial or heraldic thingy embroidered in a contrasting color and embellished with pearls or bullion] and certain headgear for women.

I think I have around 100 yards of miscellaneous velvets and brocades hanging around - she who dies with the most fabric wins?

[XCashier]

:D Great links, AD! Thank you so much! And some of those clothes...wow!

Sorry you had so much trouble with the SCA. Why is it that groups that are supposed to be fun end up tangled up in politics and red tape?! :hairpull:

Joi, your dress is beautiful. I hope you and your friends have loads of fun at the Faire. :)

[AccountingDrone]

:D Great links, AD! Thank you so much! And some of those clothes...wow!

Sorry you had so much trouble with the SCA. Why is it that groups that are supposed to be fun end up tangled up in politics and red tape?! :hairpull:

Joi, your dress is beautiful. I hope you and your friends have loads of fun at the Faire. :)

I cant wait to see the dress on you Joi ... and spiffy hair [getting elaborate braids?]

And if you need help pointing you in the right direction for clothing, let me know. I have time to dig out links and answer questions=) never got my Laurel but I am more than qualified =) I just dont like D/s games in a nonsexual hobby :devil:

[JoitheArtist]

I cant wait to see the dress on you Joi ... and spiffy hair [getting elaborate braids?]

And if you need help pointing you in the right direction for clothing, let me know. I have time to dig out links and answer questions=) never got my Laurel but I am more than qualified =) I just dont like D/s games in a nonsexual hobby :devil:

I'm not going to be super-elaborate with my hair, because it doesn't hold updos well. I'm going to put it in two braids, and do a chopstick bun with them, and tuck some flowers into it.

[JoitheArtist]

I just finished the dress: here's the detail I added to the front. It fits like a dream, if I can get a corset. :)

[Shpepper]

It's beautiful Joi. May I ask what faire you are going to? There are several opening soon. I don't get mine til August.

[JoitheArtist]

It's beautiful Joi. May I ask what faire you are going to? There are several opening soon. I don't get mine til August.

I go to this one: http://www.renfair.com/socal/ It's about 45 minutes from my house, and me and my friends have been going for years, so we know which shows to see, which booths to buy from, etc. :)

[AccountingDrone]

I'm not going to be super-elaborate with my hair, because it doesn't hold updos well. I'm going to put it in two braids, and do a chopstick bun with them, and tuck some flowers into it.

Sounds good ... though with that italian renn, you could do a juliette cap and leave your hair down and brushed smooth and pretend you are a virgin =)

Lets see if I can find it online.

http://www.lynnmcmasters.com/cord.html
They dont have to be netting, but if you can manage it, it looks fantastic. Otherwise for the reta style, if you can find an even pattern field lace like for a panel drape for a window, you can cut it and make a cap like the reta, or use a round doily and draw in the edges with a fine bit of cording as a drawstring to make the small round 'jewish hat' style cap.

http://www.skyridgedesigns.com/accessories/id25.html
I dont like her juliette cap, the veil would be over the hair under the cap, not attached.

Bingo!
http://camelot-treasures.com/patterns/pp41-env.gif

This is the pattern company I mentioned that had killer documentation but could be tricky to use.

I will make the comment that if you go and buy the 5 mm clear plastic that gets used as a floor covering for workmen to walk on, [note it is NOT saran wrap, it is the thickness of the heavy cardboard used to back legal pads with] what you do is decide which pattern size fits you, trace the pattern exactly onto it, and use that as your pattern and *never* cut the original paper ones, and also make a muslin test piece first, you can get good results from it. I made an italian renn using this pattern because a customer insisted I use it for her dress [she wanted a very specific one and it *had to come out * exactly like it looked on the front, #7 . We WILL not go there ... ] The designer took a split front overdress [what your dress is emulating] and the bodice was constructed ok, but the skirt was attached to it, but instead of it being split exactly like it should be, it was solid, and sort of had a flap at the side ... reallly hard to explain, but once you read the pattern and see how it went together in period, and how the designer did it you would be all :eek::confused::roll:]

And with an italian renn, you dont corset. It was actually sort of designed for women who were in a low grade pregnancy all the time, tight at the tits, 'empire' neckline [right under the bust at the bra strap] and full loose skirts so the belly [the bulge of pregnancy being considered desirable for married women] was let pouch out. Lets you use all sorts of elaborately embellished belts =)