Weekly SO

Christmas trees should be put up on Xmas eve. O the 24th.

I was adamant about the X,as eve decorating even, when, for many years, I spent this holdiday in the US, where the trees are put up often many weeks before, and, of course after we came home. 

Not weeks, not even days before, but on the 24th. 

And we decorate it together.

Now, this last point came up against PJ's thesis, according to which, the "litle Jesus" is the one who brings the Xmas tree, but then we solved it with a bold compromise: The tree was brought to the balcony of our tenth floor flat, undecorated, by the "little Jesus", who is obviously way to busy at Xmas, so he brought the tree undecorated, and we had to decorate it together.

If you look back on the blog, we had a few adventures with the Xmas tree :-)

In the last couple of years we didn't had a tree, so no decorating it either, but if we would do so (and maybe there will be a time, when we'll do it again), we would do so on the 24th. 

Ps: This is what it is, an opinion, and my opinion at that. I have nothing against those who think otherwise, everyone should decorate their tree when they want. Only I want to do it on the 24th. 

Spencer

 A regency/Napoleonic era, that is. 

For the longest time, something to wear over these dresses,  was missing from my historical wardrobe.

In August, feeling that I finally broke through the block I was struggling with at the first half of this year, and I actually I felt like "I WANT TO sew".

Not that I had much time, as I had (paying) work and other things gnawing on my time, but when the muse hits, you just need to obey, otherwise she might leave you again. 

So I needed a piece of clothing, and I felt the urge to sew, now I needed fabric. I know, I know, it is pretty unlikely, that there is a piece of clothing I do not have at least three fabric ready, but th ething is, what I had was eaither too much... or too little. See, I wrote about the fact that since I started to do historical dresses, I buy fabric differently, especially, in different amounts. Okay, I buy more of it. And yes, I have a big piece, several meters of embroidered microcord, but what if I cut off the 1,8 meters I need, and then that will be the amount missing if I want to do a bigger piece? I was going around in the fabric stores to look for something special, but there wasn't anything catching my fancy. So, the purple courdory it is, and I went over the haberdashery, bought a bunch of decorations, went home, and then I found the perfect length of a taffeta, in a totally different color. Okay, but that would need different decorations, and it was the weekend, and the haberdashery was closed for the weekend. 

I was munching on what to do for literally two days, even whined about (late at night over messenger) to my friend... but then, after much deliberatuon, I stayed with the purple stuff, as the fabric for the dress I wanted to use with the spencer was purple patterned anyway (see the dress HERE).

Fortunately, I found a piece of taffeta in my stash in the same color, which I used as a "contrast" fabric for the collar, the cuffs and the peplum.

I used the pattern I bought from the Black Snail company.

I added some decorations, mainly soutache (I love soutaches, ever since I made my Hungarian dress), though I could not find real soutache cord in purple, but this twisted one, and sateen and velvet ribbons.

There was one bigger change: I made different oversleeves. You all probably know by now, that renaissance slashed sleeves are my weaknesses, and I try to incorporate them whenever I can. fortunately, many later periods reach back for that style, the regency included.

Here it is with the dress...

Modell photos: Bodeszphoto

Fabric: I love Textil

Notions (ribbons, cords, et.): Kézivarázs 

It has POCKETS!

 We were going to Palmanova (Italy) in September, and I knew that as much as I love my Blue Rose dress, I will need another one, partly because the event is 3 days long, partly because... You guessed it, I lost weight. 

I wanted to make something, that is size-adjustable, that can accomomdate my body even if I loose a bit more, or if I regain some. And I had just the perfect thing in mind. 

In fact, I wanted to do that, ever since I first saw the short video on Instagram.

Taylor, of Dames a la Mode made a dress, and posted a video about it back in 2021... and I think it would come as no surprise to anyone, that I had the fabric for the dress ever since.

So this year I decided to finally go for it. I thought of using the pattern I made back in 2018, but I decided to start from the beginning. I based my version of a Black Snail pattern, 

However, I only used the pattern as a base (saving myself to draw up a body block).

Changed the front of it, and the sleeves, as the sleeves in the pattern were huge. (Compare the original sleeve pattern and the one I ended up using.

I have tried to insert the video on how the dress works, but the clip is a couple of MgByte too big, so I'll post it on Instagram, and HERE is the link, if you want to see it

There was another change, or rather addition to the dress, I made... I added POCKETS, to the dress. Yes, historically up until the very late 18th century, women did used pockets, though those were separate clothing items, tied to a waist, under the skirts. Regency dresses were the first that had much less understructures, and the dresses themselves were lighter and thinner, so those separate pockets didn't really fit underneath.

In the 21st century we have more stuff to take with us, and though I would not put my phone in those pockets (as the phone is way to heavy for that), I always enjoy if I can hide my wristwatch (with the stepcounter) in them. 

Weekly SO

 After last week I stood up for the color of WHITE, I also have to stand up for all the colors. 

I mean, who the hell thought that in the dead of winter, when everything is dark, gray and black, we have o wear dark (preferably black) clothes? Not even clothes, but shoes as well. 

I love, I adore colorful shoes. Red shoes are my weknesses, but I also adore all other colors, and I hate that in the shoe-stores you can only buy black and brown shoes, with a few dark navy...

I was always hunting for colorful shoes (I was searching for YEARS for purple boots... I found the perfect pair in Prague a year and a half ago, and though it was above the amount I generally spend on footwear... I had to buy them. For a while I managed to get some stuff on Vatera (an online auction site), but lately I am raiding the shoe section of Vinted (do you want a post on Vinted?).

Just a few of my shoes...

Regency corsets/stays

 When the typical rococo dresses were swept out by the french revolution, the new, "classical" empire line dresses came a new shape of underwear, 

While through most of the 18th century the upturned conical shape was fashionable, with straight lines, without much curves, the Napoleonic/regency era, the fashionable silhuette was more like a column, and the column "head". The passphrase was "lift and separate", in other words, the aim was to push up the boobs as high as possible.

Since the waistlines were high, just below the breats, noone really saw the true waistline of women. (This is partly why the scene in the very first episode of Bridgerton, where mama Featherington is pulling the corset thight and here daughter is panting: "But mother I can't breath"... Since the emphasis were on the breasts, noone cared about waists, no sense in sinching them. 

This was the time, when women (and seamstresses, manutamakers/dressmakers, taylors( were experimenting with many different types of stays and corsets, like the criss-cross-ey foldover style:

The really short ones, reminding us today's sports bras.

Or the ones with longer lines, not to make the waist thinner, but to smooth out the lines under those (sometimes) very thin dresses.

My friend Anna asked me to make her a long lined pair, so I did: 

Look at the horizontal bones, that support the breasts from under, and the little triangle gores, that are almost like the cups of a modern bra.

But before all these styles developed, there was a period, when from the 18th century stays with the rigid, straight lines:

Curves started to develop, and first they tried to modify these stays to leave more space for boobs, and support them with bones:

These are pretty much like the ones I made for myself this summer.

and then with cup-like inserts:

I wanted to try this style for years, especially, because from all the stays and corsets, I find the 18th century ones the most comfortable. Since we had two events in the Napoleonic era, our group decided that we will do this period in the Savaria festival as well. However, when I made my old stays , they were just good enough... almost too big... they worked when I gained even more weight, but since I lost some, they are almost falling off me... It was high time to make new ones. My rose dress is more very late 1790-ies fashion than early 1810's, I thought, it is the perfect solution. 

I used the pattern I bought from an Etsy shop (Corsets by Caroline), watched some tutorials on youtube, and off I went to sew.

I really like them, though if/when I make another one, there will be a few small things I would tweak, but generally, for a corset, it fits fairly well (especially considering that fitting is not my strong suit, and there was noone to help me with the fitting).

Weekly Patterns

And another Knitting Pattern, in connection with KDD because it was publushed by her, it vas designed by  Claudia Fiocchetti.

The Gradient Mesh beanie.

It seems deceptively simple, but the result is spectacular. Great use for yarns with long color-gradients. 

(Fotó a KDD Ravelry oldaláról)

Elf on the sh... street (Short Comment)

Just because the shortest way between Budapest (Where I live) and Kecskemét (where I need to go) goes through Székesfehérvár (where N. works)... Not really, but to save him the trouble to drive through Budapest in the Xmas-shopping trafffic to come and pick me up, I took the train...

And while we were there, we looked the inner city's advent deco...

One of the narrow alley's is decorated with lots and lots of elf.