HSM 2025 February: Under it all - a 16th century underkirtle

 February: Under It All (2013 & 2014, 11th and 3rd most popular respectively): Make something that goes under your outer garments, to protect them from sweat/grime or provide the right shape/support.

During most of the winter and spring I worked on a new supporting underkirtle for my 16th century wear. This post is a summary of the individual posts that I have made during the project. 

It started out with a day of constructing the pattern using the bara system as developed by Mathew Gnagy - the Modern maker.   I detailed the work in this post. But basically the system allowed me to make a better fitting bodice than ever before. It still needed quite a lot of adjustments to make it sit tight enough though, this has a lot to do with my bust shape.

This is the work on the pattern, making sure that I get a deep neckline.

The construction of the kirtle can be found in this post. The kirtle was constructed from one layer of wool and one layer of linen. I opted for side closures, to make sure that it fit really well over the bust. The skirt was cut in gores. I had to keep adjusting the straps to give support to the bust, but I finally had a well fitting bodice and skirt.

AFter that it was only the hemming left, and I used a fairly wide strip of wool to make a hem facing, to give the hem a bit of body and make it stand out from the legs.

I started using the kirtle during the medieval week in Visby, but since it's an underkirtle it's been hard finding photos of me where it's not hidden under my outer gown or my big work apron, I found this photo of me and my husband though.

Just the HSM facts

What the item is: a supportive underkirtle
How it fits the challenge: It's the supporting garment that makes sure that everything else sits nice on the body
Material: 4 m of wool, 1 m of linen
Pattern: Constructed using the bara system by the Modern Maker and the pattern by Magnifica Sylvie La Chardonniere based on that system
Year: first half of the 16th century
Notions:linen thread, lacing cord
How historically accurate is it? Around 80%
Hours to complete: A month, it was an on and off project
First worn: Medieval Week in Visby
Total cost: $2500 for the wool and linen

HSM 25 april: Procrastination - a 17th century loose hood

April: Procrastination (2016, 9th most popular): Complete a garment you have been putting off finishing. Or make something you have been avoiding starting.

I tried to find a post about it, but I am pretty sure that I started thinking about making a loose 17th century hood some time back in 2017 or 2018, when I was asked to dress historically at the annual Christmas fair at Falu Gruva. Most paintings and drawings of 17th century women show a tight hood, but I have always wanted to recreate this image from the margins of a map over Falun mine in 1683.

That loose hood or veil is quite distinct, the artist was local so he has probably used the local residents as models. I was also very happy when I found this extant example of a loose hood at the V&A museum. It is dated to 1610-1620, so earlier than the image of the map, but I still decided that they are so similar that I would use it as a model.

I found that I had some very fine linen in my stash, but the main issue was finding insertion lace. All the laces for sale in the (few) craft stores here only had cotton lace for edging, so with points. I also only found lace that was too wide to look good.

The solution was to go to second hand stores, and in the final one (ironically the smallest one and the one just across the street from where I live) I found a table cloth with white work embroidery, and handmade lace at the border.

I ripped off the lace border, and then I cut it in two to get a really nice and narrow lace that I could use.

Here I am midway in the project, and you can see the pieces of the hood. The original V&A hood only has the gore inserted in a slit, but I cut a separate front piece. I was sure that there was a seam all the way, so this is a lesson to actually look at images on the computer, and not just on your phone when doing decisions like that. So instead of just one piece with inserted gores I had a straight front piece, two gores and two curved back pieces that I sewed together to shape the hood. All the seams had lace insertions.

For the edging of the hood I was in a dilemma, I had a nice off white lace in my stash but it wasn't enough. And when I went to the craft store the only options was to buy either a bright white or ecru coloured lace. It was very good that I had brought the hood with me to hold up against the lace. I would probably have bought the white lace white, but when I held it to the hood it was glaringly white compared to the rest, so the ecru coloured lace was much nice. It was also daintier and more delicate than the white. Even if it isn't the same colour as the rest of the hood, the effect was quite nice and they went really well together.

When finished the hood was really soft and nice, so before wearing it I starched it, I am not sure yet if I prefer the look of the soft fabric or the starched, so I might destarch it before I wear it the next time.

This is me wearing the hood last Saturday at an event where my group demonstrated early 17th century.

I am actually pretty happy with my impression of the woman on the top image.

So here are the HSM facts

What the item is: A loose hood from the 17th century
How it fits the challenge: I had planned and talked about doing this style of hood for at least 5-6 years, and when I was finally getting the chance to attend a 17th century event it was time to make it.
Material: 1 m of fine linen, 1 lace edged table cloth, that I ripped the lace off to use as insertion lace in the hood
Pattern: My own, based on a hood in the V&A collections
Year: 1610-1690 (the hood is dated 1610-1620, I have based my costume on an image from 1683)
Notions: linen thread, 2,5 m of cotton edge lacing
How historically accurate is it? This is pretty close, both when it comes to materials and techniques so around 90%, (deductions for the machinemade edge lace and the quality of my stitches)
Hours to complete: 1 week
First worn: September 30th when celebrating the 400th anniversary of our local regiment
Total cost: linen from stash but $7 for the table cloth and $13 for the edge lace.