The Wait is Over...

Hello once again dear readers and I'd like to take some time to explain my two month absence from all things frivolous and costume-based; namely, research.

Oh, you need more of an excuse than that for leaving you shivering alone in the cold, dark woods?  Oh, okay.

Let me explain then.  Pull up a seat and get a cup of tea, I'll wait, it's only fair.

Good?  Good.  Let's take a walk through how my brain works when I'm trying to make something - there are certain points I'm trying to hit whenever I put something together.  As well as looking good, I always try to ensure that my costume pieces are strongly constructed, easily maintained (machine washable for sweaty days at conventions), well fitted, true to the source material and most importantly (to me anyway) have some base in historical accuracy.

Now I'm all for weird and wonderful out-there costumes, in fact that's one of the best parts of this slightly bizarre hobby, getting to see and take part in the creativity of the costuming community, but for my work the garment needs to function as a garment first and a costume second.  This is why all of my pieces feature working button-holes, no zips or Velcro, limited use of press-studs (which, incidentally were invented in 1885) and not feature any synthetic fabrics.  Fine rules to live by I hear you say, but what the sweet baby Jesus does this have to do with a lack of blogging?

Research, that's what.  Knowing that there were a few new pieces I'd have to be making for May's Comic-Con, I needed some inspiration as to which direction to take.  As has become customary, I'd be sporting a new coat for the event, plus Scott over at www.mudbagrunner.blogspot.co.uk was in dire need of an update.  Seriously, his costume was one of the first I'd completed and it's starting to show.  Mainly because he hasn't washed it in about a year, but more for this comparison:

See the difference?  I was still finding my feet when I put Scott's costume together, adding pieces as I thought of them, inventing ways of constructing things and generally botching the whole thing. An updated, better made version was needed.  Badly.  

So, the research began.  Having just finished off Assassin's Creed Unity (buy it for the graphics and the side story, the main story-line is lazy and often boring - play Rogue instead), I started reading around the history of the French Revolution of the 1790's, a subject I had a passing knowledge of but little more outside of a computer game.  The Reign of Terror, the Sans-Culottes, Robespierre, the Enragés, the Hérbertists, the Jacobin club, I really got caught up in the subject, down to the dress of the period and fashions.  It really is in interesting period of history, both the Revolution itself and the years surrounding it in terms of developments of fashion and clothing.  Indeed, the very idea of the revolutionary army being made up of the common man and woman termed sans-culottes, which translates as "without culottes," culottes being the word for the fashionable knee breeches worn by the aristocracy in 18th century France, really caught my attention. 

This led me into various avenues of enquiry, including but not limited to styles of button, the cut and cloth of the various social class's clothing, symbolism within dress and colour palettes.  Without realising it, I'd unwittingly stumbled across the idea I needed to push ahead with my next batch of costume-making.  The little 'un (on the right in the right-hand picture above) was fine, her coat, hood and shirt were all of a standard and style I was happy with, while my other half (on the left in the same picture above) could do with a new coat and corset, but neither were desperately needed.  We'd reached the conclusion that we'd buy a corset instead of me making another one, which I'm still not happy with but I lack the time and capability to make a convincing corset (so far...).

So what will I be concentrating on then?  Well, simply put, I have two new coats to make, along with two new hoods for myself and Scott.  This issue of fabric choice was always going to be a foregone conclusion, the same range of cotton drill that I normally work with, lined with either the same material or a lighter weight cotton depending on the demands of construction, as were other details, such as buttons choices and thread.  What I really needed was to choose the style and pattern to use. 

After some back and forth, I settled on Simplicity's 4923, a pattern I'd made years ago for a work Hallowe'en costume contest.  Which I won. 

I'd be using the coat from this one, which I adapted according to my taste; the two side darts were originally included on the coat, but I later remove them as they added too much bulk to the skirt section, being as I'd constructed both the shell and lining of the coat in heavyweight cotton.  The back dart was left in place, but cut down the middle to leave a divided skirt.  Alongside these changes I also modified the sleeves to remove the enormous turned-back cuffs, plus pulled them in tighter down to the wrist to reflect the historical changes in the justacourps coat going into the 18th century.  Enough talk, time for some pictures:

The complete coat, knee length and constructed of dark blue cotton twill, medium-weight interfacing through the body and lined with a cream cotton twill.  You can also see the start of the bias-binding on the edges, applied in dark blue with a "rustic" decorative stitch to hold it in place.  This was a standard setting on my sewing machine, which I applied by eye in a contrasting brown thread.  Here's a picture of the completed cuff, though the sunlight/camera flash has thrown the colours off a little:

I wanted this slightly rough and inaccurate look for the edging to give the coat a rustic feel to it; indeed in researching the style of coat I wanted I came across several pieces online describing the general crudeness and rough finish that the average man or woman's clothes would have historically - while high status pieces would impress even today's most scrupulous fashionista's, the day-to-day wear of you or I would often feature unfinished hems, raw edges and crudely executed button-holes.  For this coat I was using a roughly accurate pattern for a justacourps 18th century coat, cut in the style of the aristocracy (plus the addition of side slits and modified sleeves), but realised in more everyday fabrics and decoration.

Above you can see the back of the coat, though somewhat badly affected by the unseasonably sunny day we have today.  On the left is a picture of how the front lapels will button open and turn back once the coat is complete - this will take some time to work out exactly, but more on this once the hems are completed.  

But wait a minute, surely I've achieved more than this in the two months since my last post, right?  Right.  I've been designing hoods.  Well, I say designing, more like drawing, cutting, patterning, fitting, getting frustrated, throwing things around, drawing cutting, etc. The long and the short of it can be summed up in the following photo:

And that's not even all of them.  It's gotten to the point where I've had to name the patterns so I can tell them apart, including such delights as the "Stalker Mk.1," the "Hero Mk.2," the leather "Brute," the Mk.1 and Mk.2 "Revolution" hood, the list goes on.  I'll be featuring a few of these designs in a future blog post, just as soon as I can find and buy a freaky mannequin head to photograph them properly - laying flat you can't see the structure I've worked in to make them sit correctly.  That and you don't want a post full of pictures of my face, trust me.

Apart from that, there's been a start to Scott's new coat in the form of a divided tail section, plus the start of a side project, that may or may not see completion - I'm not entirely pleased with the set-in sleeve:

I'll leave it here for today as we've got houses to view this afternoon.  Stay tuned in the next week for the upcoming posts about whether I've achieved my goal of designing a hood that doesn't need wires to hang correctly (spoiler - I have!), plus updates featuring exciting news on buttons, sword stand-ins, belts and more.  I'll leave you with two images from my research that inspired me - note the "Revolutionary Cap" above the coat in the left image, there's a hood inspired by that and the "Sans-Culottes hood" in Assassin's Creed Unity coming...

Until next time.