Fun with cotehardies, first installment

At Gillian and Leohtulf's housewarming party a few weeks ago, Gianetta and I decided that because
A) we both needed 14th C dresses / cotehardies, and
B) we know that there are several schools of thought as to how to make them, and
C) Gianetta had taken a class from Robin Netherton on how to make one according to her method,
we (Gianetta and I) would take this year and experiment by trying out different methods, and figure out which approach we liked best.

Yesterday was our first time out, and the day's task was to try out the Robin Netherton method that Gianetta has learned in the class. In preparation for the day, I had gone though the photo essay's at tashadandelion's site La Cote Simple on making both the straight front and curved front versions.

And, for those of you that are familiar with this stuff, I'll say right up front that we deviated from what you're supposed to do right away because we decided to first try making the patterns with the cotton muslin that I have on hand for pattern making. This decision was a matter of discussion, because Gianetta explained that, according to R.N., cotton muslin would not work because it behaves so differently. My issue was that I'm poor, and I just can't afford to waste what linen I have (at 7-8-14 bucks a yard, depending) on making patterns. So we decided that that would be part of the experiment, namely, that we'd make patterns with muslin and with linen and see what sort of difference it made for ourselves.

A whiney aside: ( Read more... )

Anyway, what we discovered yesterday is that, as many of you predicted, the curved-front method works *way* better than the straight-front method. On me, who doesn't have much anymore in the breast department, the straight-front took away what little I had to start with. :-/ The crabby opinionated Laurel in me at that point took over and we switched. The curved front looked *significantly* better and felt more comfortable to boot.

When I transfered the draped peices to paper and 'trued' up the seams here's what I got:

( Read more... )

Pay not attention to the neckline at this point.

The first thing worth noting is how much more curve there is in the front peice's side seam than the back. I'm assuming that's because that's where most of the stretch is coming from. I'm also assuming that the different angles of the shoulder seams is also because of (bias) stretch. Oh, and I have a straight back and a flat butt, there's no denying it. :-/

Next step is to try out this pattern using the sprape linen I mentioned above and see how that fits. Probably will do that this coming weekend.

And, productive me, I got 2 more St. Louis-style shirts cut for J/S, incoporating the fitting notes I took at Estrella from the first shirt. :-)

My house and sewing room look like hurricanes have come through, but at least some sewing got done. :-)