Fingerloop braiding

 Over the summer I have realized that the most correct cord for me to use on my 16th century gowns should be made by fingerloop braiding. Lucet cors had gone out of fashion by that time. I have tried to follow instructions on fingerloop braiding, but I hadn't understood them. Then I found this video about an easier way of doing fingerloop braiding, and it really was easy.

I think I picked up the movement of the fingers within just a few turns, and then I could do it while watching stuff on the computer.

I worked in my kitchen. My kitchen table turned out to be perfect to create the loops around it's ending, and I could tie the loops to my kitchen aid. I could also put the loops down on the table, and then continue to pick them up later. The little metal thingies were used when I stopped overnight and I wanted to make it easier to keep the loops apart.

Now one thing I noticed straight away is that fingerloop braiding hurts my shoulders. I get this after a while when doing lucet cords as well, but then only in one shoulder. Fingerloop braiding is slow and I would not be able to do it all in one go, due to the shoulder pain.

For this test cord I used heavy linen thread. It wore out and one of the loops broke. Thankfully it broke at the top of the loop, so when I tied it together the knot didn't end up in the middle of the braid. The knot made this loop shorter than the others, and it turned a bit fiddlier to work after that. The video tutorial had the same problem, so you can see how she worked it out.

I continued, but after a while the knot on the broken loop broke as well, and since this was a test cord I didn't feel like continuing. So this is the finished fingerloop braid. To finish it I took the bows and tied them into a simple overhand knot.

So my impressions of fingerloop braiding compared to lucet cord.

It was easier to pick up this method of fingerbraiding than it was for me to learn to lucet. The finished fingerbraid cord is very strong and stiff, while lucet gives a cord that is much springier. 

It is possible to do a very long lucet cord, while the fingerloop braid is restricted to how far you can stretch your arms out to tighten then braid. If you have a friend that can help you it is possible to make longer cords. I don't think it's a coincidence that a lot of medieval manuscripts that show fingerbraiding show two people working together.

When doing lucet cord it's possible to bring it with you, I've been working my lucet while watching sports and listening to lectures, while the fingerloop braid needs a fixed spot when you work it.

With fingerloop braiding it's possible to work with colours and different techniques to make beautiful patterns, and even eyelets, while with lucet you are basically stuck with just one piece of string.

This very thin cord that I made is thin enough that I think there would be a risk for it to cut into the fabric if I used it to lace my gowns and kirtles. I need to find a yarn or thread that is a bit thicker than my linen thread, and I need to find a friend that can help me make a really long cord for the lacing, but I definitely think if I get those then I rather use fingerloop braiding than lucet for my cords.

Star Wars Celebration in the back mirror

 When this year started my plan was to spend this week in Anaheim and having fun at Star Wars Celebration. This headline of this blog is that it's about Star Wars and historical costuming, and this year I have hardly posted anything Star Wars. There is a simple reason. With everything being cancelled I have realised that for my cosplay projects I really need an event to make them, while it's easier to keep me motivated with historical projects even if I don't have anything particular planned for them.

Anyway I feel like a bit of retrospective, so here are my favorite Celebration photos that I have found here on the blog, I haven't found any from C3 in 2005 and C4 or CE in 2007, they were saved on photobucket and have been lost from the web.

My cancan trooper from 2010 and 2012 is the biggest success I've ever had with a costume at a Celebration.

2013 in Essen, and the joy of finding another A-wing pilot. 

The tusen ladies are also from Essen, I actually sold my headpiece on the convention, but still haven't built my new one.

Anaheim 2015, and I finally made my dream gold handmaiden costume

A wonderful part of Celebrations is to team up with people who costume the same costume as you.

London 2016 was my first Running of the Hoods, and I was made a meme

Celebration is mostly about hanging out with friends though

My Tudor Leia made me have a bit more fun with costuming and doing cross-overs insted of perfect screen accurate things.

Orlando 2017, and the fun thing is last time in Chicago me and Holly recognized each other by our hair colours!

Me and Ryan had matching moustaches for the Running of the Hood

It's something special to gather so many SW fans in one place. Nowadays I feel that the huge group photos are a bit too much of a hazzle and I only do them if they don't clash with anything else.

The Cloud Riders group in Chicago 2019. I really should finish up my Enfys Nest costume, and seeing this photo inspired me for it.

This is probably the biggest Nordic Garrison group photo we have managed on a US Celebration

As much as I love my NG/NB people it's even more fun to meet up with the people you only meet at a Celebration, like Jenna (Song of Amazon)

It is fun looking back at all these photos. I also see my own costuming journey, where I think I have moved on a bit from making a new costume for every Celebration, and more doing my own thing. Still with two years to go until the next Celebration I will probably come up with something new to wear. It's also a fact that I have gained so much weight that I can't use many of the costumes that I'm wearing in the photos above.

Me and David, my convention travel partner since 2004 was at our classiest at the 501st party in Anaheim 2015. He said he was going to bring his top hat - well I didn't want to feel underdressed

Here are links to my Celebration reports that I've posted on this blog

2015

A short update from Anaheim

Other people's costumes at Anaheim

My costumes at Celebration Anaheim.

2016

A Star Wars Celebration Round up

2017

Star Wars Celebration - what I wore

Star Wars Celebration - Costumes on the floor

Star Wars Celebration - Fan fashion

2019

Star Wars Celebration Chicago - part one

Star Wars Celebration Chicago - part two

I have a gown

 After several days of slowly resewin the skirt to the bodice of the 1520s gown, I now have a gown.

It fits really bad on the dressform since it'sjust pinned shut, the dressform has also lost its hips and is set to a much shorter height than myself. The fabric isn't going to pool quite as much when I'm wearing it, but it is going to be a monster to hem.

It also felt really good to try it on and have it fit. When I realised that the bodice was too long I got quite crushed and was afraid that the end result would not be worth all the time and money that I have spent on it. Now when I tried it on it felt a lot better, and I have my energy back for the project.

Now I'm going to let it rest for a while and then I have only three moments left, reattaching the lacing strips, adding the border around the neckline and then the hemming. I'm hoping to have the whole gown finished before the end of August.

One reason why I really want to finish the gown is that at moment I'm really excited about making the hood with the gold embroideries for the gown, and I can't start on it until I've finished the gown.

I have been working on the 1520s courtgown

 I have been posting about so many other things over the summer, but I have been working on my 1520's court gown as well. The work has been slow though. This is a tendency that I have for any big project. When it's time to finally start assemble it all into one piece, well then I get worried that it won't look good and that I will ruin all the hard work (and money) I've spent. As such I have made some stuff here and there, but now I feel that I really want to finish the gown.

In my last post I had finished the upper sleeves. The lower sleeves where done similarily, but now I also added a cuff of brown brocade.

The brocade is a reproduction of a Spanish renaissance pattern. I chose to work with a polyester brocade here, the silk brocades were simply out of my price range. I also only 1 meter of the brocade, so I try to use as little as possible. That means that I made the cuffs a bit tighter than I had planned at first. I would have preferred to have them fanning out over my hands, but once cut is cut and I can't remake that.

The last step was to make lacing holes at the ends of the sleeves so that I can tie the upper and lower parts together. Lacing holes are not my favorite,but it was so much easier to make them in the silk velvet and linen lining, compared to the heavy linen that I used for my lacing strips.

Then I attached the upper sleeves to the bodice with small back stitches. Now it was time to attach the bodice and the skirt.

I first attached the skirt to a waistband of heavy cotton tape. The opening is going to be in front, so there I made a couple of extra pleates on each side, I'm hoping that will hide the opening in the folds of the pleats.

The finished bodice is then attached with small whipstitches to the skirt, making sure to catch both the skirt fabric and the waistband. When I had spent a day doing this I tried on the gown, only to realize that the bodice was way too long with the skirt attached. Simply put I felt really fat when looking into the mirror, because the waist seam hit me where I'm at my biggest around my tummy. So it was only to rip up a days work, shorten the bodice and start again.

At the moment I'm attaching the skirt again, and I'm only hoping that I did get the measurments right for the bodice this time, since I'm pretty sure that I won't be able to redo it again. The seams leave marks on the velvet that I can't get away. I also ripped away the lacing strips and want to reattach it further in on the bodice, to make sure that the center front edges close properly, without any visible lacing between them.

What I need before events start again

This summer all the big events have been cancelled but my trips up to the viking camp has been good to figure out what I need in my gear to be comfortable. I will not talk about tents here, it's on my list but I will be able to go without them, that's also a much bigger investment than these things.

- A wool nightgown
As of now I change into modern wool underwear for the night. It's comfortable, but it would be nice to wear something more accurate, not the least if I want to go up in the night, and when going up in the morning.

I'm thinking something like a Herjolfsnes dress, or another simple gored cote. This would also give me a dress that would work fom Viking Age and up until the 16th century for a general medieval look. A roomy overgown can also easily be slid over the head for extra warmth in the winter.

A warm cape

I have a tendency to get cold in the evenings, so I need something that can keep me warm, and is bigger than my small red gollar.

For my courtgow I need to make this cape,and I'm thinking about doing a version in wool as well just to keep warm.

A short sleeved wool dress
I have my longsleeved green gown and my sleeveless kirtle with detachable sleeves. Now I feel that I need a shortsleeved dress to have all available options. This would also be the dress that I want to use in the winter and for physical stuff, so I wouldn't line it with linen but keep it as a pure wool gown.

I have already picked out the colours for this dress, I want it to be pink with wine coloured details.

I need a pair of bigger shoes. I like my shoes, but I can't fit my hose in them, so I need to buy a pair of shoes that are bigger, and I'm also thinking that they should go a bit higher up like a boot, so that I can use them in the winter when it's snow. Then I would have my current shoes for summer and a pair of cold weather shoes.

I also need some boring househould items like linen towels for when I'm cooking and don't want to use modern cotton towels. A nice big linen bath towel would also be nice to have.

These are enough projects to keep me occupied well into next season.