HSM 2025: Foundations - mending my favorite shift

 The theme for November 2025 is foundations

Make something that is the foundation of a period outfit. This can be a literal foundation (ex: a shirt, stockings or stays) or an item that is a “foundation piece” in your wardrobe (ex: a garment or accessory that can be styled in many different ways). Get creative with your interpretation!

For this I chose to go back to the foundation piece of my 16th century wardrobe, my favorite shift.

This was the first iteration of it, back in 2016 when I posted it for the HSM challenge "tucks and pleats". This really is my favorite shift, it's so comfortable and the linen is so light and soft against the skin. Since I made that first version I quite soon made the neck opening smaller, so I didn't have that very wide opening. I did that by simply making the smocking on it tighter.

Back in 2023 I replaced the worn out facings on the cuffs and neckline, and made proper cloth buttons for closing the cuffs, it went with the HSM challenge "back to the beginnings"

I should probably have gone over the shift even more back in 2023, because this summer I realised that quite a few of the seams had started to go up, and the hem was definitely held in place by just a few struggling stitches. So I took an evening and mended all the holes and rehemmed it. I didn't take a phot of the shift, it looks exactly as before, just not as torn and worn as before.

What the item is: a 16th century smocked shift
How it fits the challenge: The shift is the foundation of all costumes, and this was also the first one I made so it is the foundation that I have based all my other 16th century pieces on. For this challenge I simply mended the worn out seams and rehemmed it.
Material: linen thread from the stash
Pattern: none
Year: 16th century
Notions: linen thread
How historically accurate is it? Mending is always historically accurate
Hours to complete: 2 hours
First worn: - 
Total cost: nothing, just some hours of work and thread from the stash