Early Victorian

This post contains a free pattern!! very exciting. :)

So... Early Victorian.... in my mind this spans the time when the young queen took over, and some smarty pants figured out that if you put steel wire in a corded petticoat instead of rope, chicks would dig it. So 1840 ish to 1850 ish. :)

If any paragraph that I have written would clue you in that I'm NOT a reenactor but am a costumer... I'm not sure I could write a more blasphemous one. :) for reals.


But this is actually really accurate. Hand to god. I swear. During this time period... Early Victorian. women liked big skirts... :) but it was hard to get skirts super big. So methods were devised. I guess this started with the romantic era 1825-1830 ish?... but corded petticoats (if not heavy and hot) solved the bigger skirt problem, a little bit. Corded petticoats and heavily starched petticoats (heavily starched in so heavy a starch that the skirts could stand on their own) used together would hold a skirt out pretty well. I didn't mention petticoats made of horsehair or crin... crin is french for hair??... and yes, that would be a crinoline. :) (dropping knowledge like a bomb)


I'm not sure when this particular pattern was published... I'm assuming sometime late in this era. But this corded petticoat calls for 3 rows of reed. Yah... reed, that grows... in like a river... and you can make wicker chairs out of it. Yah. REED.


So this corded petticoat is super BIG. and for the most part is strong, and can support a heavy starched petticoat, and dress.

Did you know... I wrote this post super long ago, and was going to edit it, and add something. I don't remember what it was... I think a tutorial on double piping. Well, it's been too long and if I haven't written that tutorial yet, I might as well post this without it. At least the pattern is there. :)

The first of three Victorians

I like that title... sounds like a historical romance novel. :) But in this context it's just as it sounds. I need three victorian dresses... and I've just made one.

I need a gown for the Victorian Grand Ball, a day dress for a reenactment, and a tennis dress for a contest.

Actually the day dress is practically done... it just needs:
closures
trim
skirt attached
but that's a blog for another day.


To be honest, the ball gown was going to be a MUCH different dress. I was planning on making a dress from one of my favorite Tissot paintings. I have everything to make it... but the weather got hot, and I started thinking that dancing in long sleeves might be a new kind of hell... and opted out. Also, I found a dress on ebay that is so very lovely in it's simplicity, I just had to try my hand at it.

Isn't it lovely? I love how the watered silk makes the statement. I wore off white and gold to last years ball, and only white reads "wedding" to me... although I'm not so sure it did the victorians. Regardless... I couldn't find moire in white. In fact the only watered silk I could find were so expensive I was a bit shocked. I'm a budget costumer. I very rarely go over $20 a yard, and do my best to keep projects under $100. So I was about to give it all up and try to alter the Tissot idea so that the skirt was the same, but with a ball gown bodice, when I found a vintage length of rayon moire... 5 yards! $30. Although I'm a on a budget, fabric content is kinda a big deal to me. So a dilemma. I bought it... because a $30 dress?? and also, buying vintage fabric is good for the environment. Not really sure how... but yah, environment. Plus, it's red. :)

My finished dress:

 

It's a pretty dress... and I like it very much. I've ordered some ribbon to add to the shoulders in long bows... and a ribbon for lacing, both in red.

Next post I'll give you the pattern for the corded petticoat underneath. Also a tutorial for making double, and single piping, and some examples of early victorian ball gowns.