HSM2020 Challenge 3 - Green, the goldwork sweet bag

It was time to actually make something usable of the goldwork embroidery. My posts about the embroidery itself can be found here (part 1). and here (part 2) . I decided that the best thing I could do was to turn it into a bag or purse. Small square purses were around throughout most of the Middle Ages, you can find a lot o examples here. It seems as if the highly embroidered bags were mostly religious objects though. In the late 16th century though highly embroidered purses called sweet bags came into fashion, at least in England.

English sweet bag, late 16th century, Met Museum 

 The sweet bags carried sweet herbs and other scented things, for me a bag the size of the embroidery would be perfect for a mobile phone and my insulin pens. Historical sweetbags were embroidered an all sides, I only had enough embroidery for the front, but then on the other the metal threads wouldn't risk getting entangled in the dress fabric.

In order to protect the backside of the embroidery I decided to line it in linen. The pattern is very simple, a long rectangle folded in the middle and sewn up the sides.

I sewed the sides together with backstitch and felled the seams.

I added four eyelets on each side, that I bound with buttonhole silk.

The top was folded down as well, so this is the inside of the bag.

On the outside I added a gold braid that I found in stash, both for the drawstring and for the string to carry th purse in. I also made three tassels from the last of the gold twist thread and soe black silk thread that I added to the bottom.

The gold braid gave the bag just a little bit of extra bling that it needed. The ends of the braid was frayed to create something more tassel like.

Here is the bag worn, by a totally non-historical gown. I would have preferred a longer string to carry it in, but it was simply all the string I had

What the item is: An Elizabethan sweet bag
How it fits the challenge: The base material is green
Material: 40 cm of green wool flannel, 40 cm of linen, gold thread in diferent varietys, natural pearls, glass beads
Pattern: I made my own

Year: ca 1570-1625
Notions: Silk buttonhole twist, polyester sewing thread
How historically accurate is it? This is more inspired and plausible than accurate. The motifs of the embroidery are all ound in 16th century sources, but it would probably have been made more with silk thread. I would say around 30%
Hours to complete: The embroidery probably two weeks or so, sewing the bag together 3 hours
First worn: Not yet
Total cost: Sample pack of gold threads $15, the rest was from stash but probably to a worth of another $10-15, so in total $25-30