I can’t believe we are already in the middle of January. Time is so weird! It seems like yesterday my kids went back to school, but then November and December seemed to drag on incredibly slow thanks to back to back home repair issues, and now it’s hump day in the middle of January! Anywho, I am still sticking with the Georgian January challenge! So here are the last couple of days of prompts to catch up on:
Day 13 of #georgianjanuary2024 is Elaborate. Even though I hopped onto the Bridgerton train fairly late, I IMMEDIATELY fell in love with the wigs that Queen Charlotte wore. I already wear pretty colorful locs that I change every 3-4 months or so, but these wigs are EPIC! I’ve made my own wigs before and installed braids/locs/twists on myself for years. But now that I know how to do a wig cage, I can definitely take my historical hair style game even further!!!
Yesterday was day 14 of #georgianjanuary2024 – I’m honestly surprised im still sticking to posting every day (or at least every other day when I forgot and have to do a catch up post), yay me!!! The prompt for Day 14 was: Simple. Now for as much as I LOOOOVE being extra, and wearing fancy outfits, with fancy jewelry and actually out time and effort into my historical looks (as opposed to my everyday wardrobe which is Eclectic art teacher meets comfy witchy vibes), I feel that a #chemisealaraine is such a simple garment and beautiful enough on its own. One color, an easy piece to work up, and accentuate with a large ribbon around the waist, and bam! You have a simple look that is super cute!
Forgot about day 15 of #georgianjanuary2024 – the theme was Miniature. For our wedding anniversary last year-I got my husband the greatest gift of all! A historical style painting of ME!!! And then I turned it into a pin that he can wear on his fob, or just to carry around (thanks to @ladykatehs for the materials!)
day 16 of #georgianjanuary2024 – the prompt was Large. One of the things I love about historical costuming, but in particular the 18th century were the BIG HATS!!! 🙌🏾 I am already a giant, and I like to have big hair, big accessories, and just everything big because it balances out in my eyes!
georgianjanuary2024 day 17: Atop – bonnets and tiaras! (Guest appearance by @sewloud in the second pic 😂)
I had coffee this morning after a good nights sleep at the end of a productive day, so I’m on a roll!!! Anyway, I picked a couple of different images for today’s theme. The first two being #underpinnings No matter what time period you decide to costume in, it’s always important to have the correct underpinnings to give you the silhouette (the shape, ah! Get it!) that was fashionable during that time period. So the first up is a custom set of #hippanniers for an 18th century gown (I have yet to start working on the #robealafrancaise that it is to be worn with) that I won from @hannah_alice_costumes . The second are my #regencyera stays made by @paupers.modiste . | the next two shapes are circles. My black #bergérehat, and my diy macaroon pattern weights. | last two are from when I decided to make a #chemiseàlareine to wear to a friends party. At first I was kind of intimidated when looking for a pattern, but then I came along the tutorial by @freshfrippery , and realized that it was basically three large rectangles sewn together into a tube basically, with shoulder straps and sleeves! | #historicalcostuming #historicalcostumer #costumersofcolor #blackwomensew #blackwomenstitch
So for Day 5 of #georgianjanuary2024 it is: Town. here are two photos in the towns we visited. The first one is at a colonial tavern called @jessopstavern, which is located in the town of #historicnewcastledelaware . The second was from our anniversary trip to the @innboonsboro , in the town of Boonsboro, Maryland. Both places, I love dearly. Jessops has AMAZING food! And the InnBoonsboro has themed rooms based of famous literary couples. We stayed in the Darcy & Elizabeth room.
My costuming year in review! This year I made the most ensembles and went to the most events that I ever did. I love this little #costumingcommunity 💜 Looking forward to #2023 – my projects will be bigger and better, and hopefully there will be more awesome events! (I may take my hand at hosting another one!)
This past weekend was just amazing. On Saturday I headed down to Virginia to attend my friend Jennys autumnal bonfire party. This was an all day into the evening party in which we donned our finest frocks, and the theme was dark & spooky autumn. There was no set time period to come in, so it was lovely to see the array of historical era’s displayed. As you all know, I have been working crazy hard since October to make an 18th century Italian gown, The Angelica gown from scroop patterns, and I had already made a black chemise a la reine for the event. And they both made their debut! I put the chemise a la reine on for the first half of the day, with the angelica gown for the second. Let me tell you, the way the angelica gown looks and moves is EVERYTHING! Believe it or not, I was originally going to go with a color named Hex from the Silk Baron, but by the time I went to buy it, it was sold out. So the color of the gown, Bruja, was a color they had just released and I knew it was perfect for me. The petticoat is a shot silk petticoat in a sapphire blue that I already had. But enough babbling, let’s go to the pictures!
I did it yall! After a long time of wanting to make my own chemise a la reine, I finally did it! Well, this is not my first one. My husband had one made for me in white as a Mothers Day gift like two years ago. Since one of my friends is doing a spooky/dark themed costumed meetup in November, right after Halloween, I definitely wanted a black one.
So to start with, I had to decide whether I wanted to do it from a pattern or from scratch. I headed to Instagram with a poll, and a majority of people suggested the Laughing Moon Chemise A La Reine Pattern. But then others suggested that it wouldn’t be too terribly hard being that at the base of it, it is just rectangular panels with straps and sleeves, so my chaotic goblin sewing brain decided to give that a try.
First, the fabric!!!! I knew that I wanted it black, but didn’t know exactly which fabric to choose. Apparently cotton voile is popular, but on a random trip to a JoAnn fabrics out of town I went the Linen Look Fabric Solid from JoAnn (the fabric content is 85% viscose and 15% linen, and drapes like a dream).
Let’s get in how I went about construction. After doing a lot of online searching, and getting input from friends, I came across the blog post about a simple chemise a la reine from Fresh Frippery’s blog, and decided to go with that. She used 3 panels of 55″ fabric (one back, and two sides). Since I am larger than her and wanted a lot of floor, I went with four panels of 52″ fabric. One back, two sides, and the third panel was cut in half length wise and each one added to the sides, like so:
After sewing the panels together, I then sewed a channel for the ribbon along the top. The squiqly bits shown are where the ribbon was incased, and be sure to leave a 12″ opening (do not put ribbon in the casing) on either side of the back panel for the arms. Then you run the ribbon through each of the channels, gather to high heaven, and sew down at the back two anchor points, and the two side anchor points of the channels. For the front, you don’t achor the ribbon down, as you will use those two ribbons to tie the front of the gown closed. And being that there is a lot of gathered fabric, it closes beautifully once done.
This is what it looks like with everything gathered, those two hanging bits on the sides are where the arms go.
I found that I had to gather the back A LOT for it to not hang, since the weight of the fabric makes it want to drape down naturally. So again, lots and lots of gathering. After gathering and placing on the dress form where it would ideally fall on me, I made the straps. Now these were straightforward, two straps that ended up being about 10 inches in length and three inches in width, with a slightly curved edge at one side. At first, I thought that these would be two short and then I made a second set that was slightly longer, but remember that drape I talked about? I ended up going with the shorter straps.
Now at this point, I flipped the gown inside out and put it back on the dressform, then took a ribbon (as you can see) to tie where the waist band would be. I then marked where that would go. But during the final fitting, I decided that I wouldn’t sew in a channel for a waistband because tying it with the wide ribbon was enough to keep it in place.
Moving forward to my favorite part: THE SLEEVES! I’m kidding! If you know me,you know I hate sleeves and they make me cry. My last two regency gowns, my friend Renee had to come over to help me, because my brain literally locks up when I think about doing sleeves. So of course, I wanted to go with something super simple for me to make. Now, with the chemise a la reine, there are so many paintings of this dress in various styles: fitted sleeves, fitted three quarter sleeves, poofy sleeves, etc. So I decided to go with a poof sleeve with one simple ruffle at the elbow. Definitely not hard. Cue, the panic.
Ribbn casing about to be sewn.
So my good friend Shasta (ScifiCheerGirl on IG) came over to help me! So what she did was make a simple rectangle, and draped it from my shoulders to where the ruffle was. I then sewed a ribbon for the casing on the inside, and finished the top and the bottom of the sleeve. We had to do a little gather along the top of the sleeve to fit it, we then set it, and it worked!
And with all that said, here is the semi-final product! I just got in a wide, deep-purple ribbon for the waist, and of course I still have to hem this beast (205″ of hemming to do!). Introducing…her:
Now all I need is an epic hat like this one!
Now all in all, it took roughly 5-6 hours of work. I would have probably been able to do it all in one day, but again…sleeves, so it took two days. Also, the robe makes for a FANTASTIC vintage looking night robe to flounce around the house in with pretty undergarments.
theplushseamstress.com 