Finished!

Yesterday I had some time and I finished up the jacket. I hand finished the lining and tried tons of pleating, with different lengths of fabric, to come up with the correct peplum ruffle. I ended up doing double and triple box pleats on a half-moon shaped pice of fabric, about 3 ft long by 6 in at its widest point. I finished the edge with pinked scallops.  

I don't have an authentic 18th century pinking tool, because I haven't been lucky enough to come across one, but I did find a great alternative. Its a cast iron, rotary style that taxidermists use for felt. It clips, or rather screws, onto the edge of a table and you crank the handle as you pass the fabric through. It has scallops, which is perfect, but the drawback is the pinking is pointed, instead of rounded, which is more common in existing garments, though it did exist. See view A.

So recently I've been pretty busy, but I did have time to set in the sleeves of the little pierrot and start finishing up the front closure. I also made a false rump, which would have been worn with this style, instead of hoops, which were starting to go out of vogue by the 1790's.

The sleeves are set in.

The fabric came!

Bam! That was fast!

The fabric I ordered for the little brown pierrot came yesterday. And today, after some progress on the chintz anglaise, I thought I would just start cutting out the pieces. Well one thing lead to another and next thing I knew I had half a jacket on my dress form.

I used a mix of pattern pieces, mostly from J.P. Ryan's Robe a l'Anglaise pattern. In the past I lengthened each piece by about 1/2 inch, but other than that, it fits my torso perfectly. So unless I have to drape, I make it easy on myself and use this. I have yet to create a pattern for the peplum. I like to have a paper pattern available for future use if somethings turns out great. I have this great pattern paper I bought from Joanne's ages ago. It feels like fabric and doesn't crinkle, so you can pin the edges and try it on almost like a mock up. I used this for the sleeves. I made a basic long sleeve and then tweaked and tweaked until it resembled a proper, curved elbow, georgian sleeve. The trick here was to get it very slim, like the sleeve on the original jacket.

Inspiration of the Day

So I was browsing 18th century jackets online and I came across this one. 

Lady's caraco jacket of printed cotton, c. 1790

This jacket was auctioned at Christie's in 2009. Its from the 1790's, and its listed as a "Lady's Caraco Jacket of Printed Cotton... of white cotton printed with a brown leaf meander, with charming kick-pleated skirts and elegantly shaped sleeves." It went for 15,000 pounds (about $25,000 US). Wow. 

I found these printed cottons on Nauvoo Quilting and Textile Co. They aren't quite white and brown but they have the same feeling, I think. But I'll keep looking, I'm not totally convinced. The first one is pretty close, but the background is awfully dark...