One Afternoon Tutorials--Miscellaneous Accessories

Today's collection of One Afternoon Tutorials focuses on  a few specialized accessories, such as Victorian watch fobs.  They are short projects mainly because they make small items and don't require a lot of expensive materials to create. 

Cravats.  A cravat is a neckcloth used to give varying looks to suits, mostly during the Victorian periods. The tutorial on this item, by Folkwear, the pattern company, comes with a quick bit of history for the item. 

Ribbons for Victorian Shoes.  Try the link here.

Suffragette Sashes. It is possible to buy these from vendors on Etsy, but once of those vendors made a nice tutorial on how to make one for yourself.

Victorian Watch Fobs.  This is the kind of fob that consists of a ribbon, in satin or velvet, that is about three-quarters of an inch (about 1.9 cm) and about 3 inches (381 cm) long.  They require inexpensive metal fittings.  Consult the blog of The Pragmatic Costumer, here.

I have a few ideas for posts, but mostly I haven't had time to sit down and develop them.  Hopefully, I can do that next month. 

One Afternoon Tutorials--Underwear

Sketch of a chemise, by David Ring.
Found on Wikimedia Commons

Having covered almost every other type of quick costuming project, I come to what is perhaps the most basic category of all:  one-afternoon projects about underwear.  

Underwear is the layer of clothing closest to the body.  It includes shifts for women (also called chemises), breast bands and bras, men's shirts, loincloths (wearable by either sex though usually associated with men) and equivalents of what Americans now call "panties" for women.  Before the 20th century, underwear was most often made of linen in Europe and America, but in modern times it's usually made from cotton or cheap synthetic fabric worldwide.

Until at least the end of the medieval period, stockings and socks arguably qualified as underwear under the above definition, because they typically were not made to be seen.  However, stockings and socks require special fitting and design, which is why they are not included here, though some stocking projects can be as quick to make as the items discussed below.  Corsets are also underwear, but because they require way too much detail work to be a one-afternoon project, I will not include them here either.

NOTE:  A man's shirt or woman's shift likely will take longer than a single afternoon to make (even during the summer) if completely handsewn.  If one cheats by using a sewing machine, it should be doable in one afternoon, as it involves mostly long straight seams.  For that reason, I have included shifts and shirts here.

As always, unless I have said otherwise here, I have not made any of the items in this collection of tutorials myself.  

Breast Support: 

• Mammilare or Strophium:  These are Roman terms for a simple band to constrain and support the breasts.  The simplest form is a long, narrow rectangular piece of fabric, ripped along the grain to provide a straight though unhemmed edge.  This website shows a very basic one made from wool, whose natural stretch would make it a good choice for folk who do not get an allergic reaction after wearing wool against the skin.  See it here.  (Frankly, I'm surprised to find this post still available on the Internet, since I first discovered it more than two decades ago.)
  
• Late Medieval "Supportive" Smock:  This is a kind of smock that is cut to provide some support for the breasts.  Elena of Neulakko explains its use, as well as how to make one, here.

Men's Shirts: 

• Early Modern Shirt: The Costume Historian provides this tutorial, which is suitable for the period from roughly 1530 to 1660 CE.
  
• Regency Era Shirt:  The Tea In A Teacup blog provides an illustrated tutorial as to how to make a shirt from the Regency (roughly, the early 1810s to the early 1820s).   You can find that tutorial here.  
• 18th Century Shirt:   From La couturière française comes a genuine shirt tutorial and pattern from the mid-18th century, with clarifying text from the owner of the web site.  Potentially a lot of fun, if you have the right mindset and skills.  

Women's Shifts and Petticoats:  

 

Shifts did change in design, slowly, over time.  Early medieval shifts were fairly wide through the body, with long sleeves and a neckline matching the neckline of the gown under which they were worn.  Later medieval shifts could be sleeveless as they were often worn under form-fitting gowns.  Renaissance shifts (such as the Venetian camisia below) were extremely wide, both in the body and sleeves, and were gathered with tiny gathers into a band that usually matched the neckline of the gown with which they were to be worn. 18th century shifts could have three-quarter-length sleeves and were quite short.  19th century shifts were short-sleeved or sleeveless, about knee-length or came just below the knee, and were finally replaced with "combinations"--which were closed with loose legs on the bottom.  Below are some examples of tutorial on how to make a sampling of female undergarments through the ages:

• Viking/Early Medieval:  It is believed that these garments were shaped just like an ordinary gown or robe, but were often made of linen and worn underneath one or more garments. (The Viborg shirt, a male equivalent, is too complicated to be a one afternoon job.)  They can be made quickly if done anachronistically with a sewing machine; handsewing them, though a simple matter of making many long straight seams, takes much longer.  Handsewing History has a well-illustrated tutorial about how to make such a garment, here.  
• Byzantine (10th century):  Peter Beatson's pattern for a Byzantine undershirt is based upon an actual archaeological find, the Manazan shirt, on display in a Turkish museum.  This style may have been worn by both men and women; the gender of the wearer of the Manazan shirt is, to my knowledge, still debated. NOTE:  My Manazan shirt, which I wrote about in several different posts starting here, used Beatson's original proposed pattern, which his page now explains was probably erroneous.
• Venetian Camisia (16th century): Shown for informational purposes, though handling the fine gathering is more easily done by hand and probably takes the end result out of the range of a one-afternoon project.  Bella's Realm of Venus site includes a tutorial here.   I have also found an "easy to wear" version that's a bit less thoroughly historical, where the construction seams were sewn by machine, though the gathering was still done by hand. 
• 18th Century Shift:  Like medieval shifts, these are made from geometrically shaped pieces of fabric and connected with straight seams.  Mara Riley's tutorial explains the technique and gives supporting sources and suggestions for obtaining needed supplies as well.  Find it here.    
• 18th Century Petticoat:  Petticoats were worn from the Renaissance through the end of the 19th century. Construction does not change much; these are essentially a quantity of fabric pleated or gathered onto a waistband.  Since the waistband is never when the garment is worn, how you make the petticoat matters less than the type of fabric you use and the length of the garment.  Try this tutorial from the American Duchess website.   

Men's Underpants:

• Loincloths:  People living in cultures who do not wear any other clothing often wear loincloths.  The simplest form of these requires a cloth about 18 inches wide, which is wrapped around the man's waist at least twice.  The hanging end is then brought between his legs, from back to front, tucked into the wrapped portion, and allowed to hang over the wrapped portion in front.  This website, which discusses loincloths worn in Borneo, also gives a surprisingly good tutorial on how to wrap a "generic" loincloth, here.   
• Dhoti:  The dhoti is a wrapped, lower body garment worn in India.  It may be short or long. It's essentially a loincloth with pleats used to control the extra fabric, and thus comes farther down the legs than a loincloth does.  This page provides a useful tutorial, with sketches, in how to shape and drape a dhoti.  NOTE:  The page is not in English, but the drawings are clear and easy to understand.  It even includes a video! 
• Braies:  This article (in both Finnish and English) suggests that the type of knee-length underpants shown on men in European medieval art could have been made by draping, belting and tying a suitably-sized piece of cloth.  The technique is speculative, but would make for a very quick project indeed!
• Civil War (Men's) Drawers:  More complicated than a loincloth, but still reasonably simple.  This link will take you to a blog which explains the construction and includes an image of the original pattern, which should be sufficient for some people to reproduce such a garment, though it's not a project for a beginner.

Women's Underpants:  

Until the Renaissance, women do not seem to have worn underpants, at least not after Rome fell.  There is some evidence for the use of a garment by Ancient Roman women called a subligaculum. (However, it's possible that the bikini-type garment shown in this ancient Roman mosaic by women engaging in physical exercise was not worn anywhere other than in a physical exercise context.) 

From the Realm of Venus page we have an illustrated discussion of the evidence for long (knee-length) drawers being worn by at least some Italian women during the Renaissance.  

I have not hunted for free tutorials in this category because there is no consensus about the shape of Renaissance-era underpants, and commercial patterns are easily available for many later period undergarments.  If I find additional tutorials on female undergarments, I will write another post on this subject.  

Do your own research if the maximum possible historical correctness is your aim, but whatever else you do, have fun!

One Afternoon Tutorials--Aprons!

Today's collection of one-afternoon projects is about aprons.

Aprons appear to have been made throughout history, and could be practical or ornamental (like the bronze ornamented one found upon the woman in the Eura grave in Viking age Finland, or the 16th-17th c. lace aprons worn in France and elsewhere in Europe).

Aprons come in a wide variety of styles and fabrics.  Work aprons can be as simple as a piece of cloth with a band sewn to the top, to tie around one's waist, but can also be full length overgarments.  There are a plethora of modern apron projects to be found on the Internet also; ruffled bib or half-aprons in cheerful colors or prints; silly "chef's aprons"; pinafore aprons for little girls; and more!  Because this is a historical blog, I have stuck to patterns/tutorials for historical designs instead of diving into the vast array of modern patterns of all types. 

Please don't assume that, because I have listed only one pattern for a period, that the pattern shows the only way aprons were made in that period!  Although I have not conducted detailed research on the subject, there appear to be a variety of different apron designs for every historical period, and no reason to believe that aprons didn't vary by region as well.

Because I am not (yet!) a reenactor and have no present need for a practical period apron, I have not tried out any of these designs (except for the Eura apron, which I did a bit differently).  As always, do your own research to ascertain whether a particular tutorial suggested here will work for you.

• Viking Apron Dress:  Viking apron dress designs are still conjectural, but two types have a substantial amount of evidence and support; the pleated-in-the-front tube (Kostrup) and the fitted tube (Hedeby).  The tutorial featured here is from the Handcrafted History blog and is a fairly typical fitted tube kind of pattern (though not necessarily what was used at Hedeby).   We don't know if the Vikings used the apron dress as we would an apron (to protect other clothing) but we do know that some aprons (notably lace aprons--17th-18th centuries) were worn for style purposes, so I am adding an apron-dress pattern to this list.  Note:  Making such a garment might take longer than a single afternoon if you stitch it entirely by hand.
• Eura (Finland):  Based upon an archaeological find near Eura in Finland that has been dated to about 1100 CE.  The apron appears to have been simply made of a length of cloth, belted to the body with a piece of tablet weaving, but it was clearly an ornamental garment because the bottom edges was decorated with designs crafted from small bronze coils.  Making and sewing on the coils would likely take the making of such an apron outside the range of a one-afternoon project, but finishing the apron by fringing the bottom and hemming the other edges is another possibility and would be fairly quick to do.  A diagram illustrating how archaeologists believe the Eura apron was made may be found here; the original blog site (which was used by a Finnish college student to house her thesis) is no longer live.   
• Medieval:  Here are several different types of medieval period apron.  Edyth Miller of The Compleatly Dressed Anachronist provides instruction on a type of late medieval apron associated with midwives--it's a full body overgarment.  Edyth's tutorial is here. 
• Medieval, part 2:  The second type of apron is a smocked top apron tied around the waist; you can find it in Matilda La Zouche's LiveJournal here. (Note:  If you have not done smocking before, you may wish to look for instruction on how to do smocking before you attempt this kind of apron.  Gina's Medieval Silkwork blog gives a list of smocked apron tutorials, with links, here.  She includes Matilda's tutorial, but you may wish to try some of the others, which give more detailed instruction about doing the actual smocking.)
• German Renaissance: (15th-16th centuries)  Genoveva has a video tutorial she claims will teach you how to do a smocked apron, much like the medieval ones above, in one hour!  Find it here.
• 18th c. work apron.  Burnley & Trowbridge have a series of three excellent clear videos demonstrating how to make a basic 18th century style work apron.  The set is in the "Sew Along" playlist; you can find the first one on YouTube here.
• Regency:  The blog Sewing Empire features two different apron styles for the Regency period:  this one for a quick waist-length apron, and a second one for an apron with full-body coverage.  
• Victorian:  Sew Historically has a tutorial on how to make a "pinner", an apron with a bib that pinned onto one's clothes. Find it here.
• Edwardian:  From a blog called Cranial Hiccups comes a tutorial for a rather plain and basic, full-body apron; find it here.
• 1920s:  Also from Cranial Hiccups comes this 1920s apron tutorial; yes, it's a period tutorial, complete with an image containing the actual period pattern!

Feel free to dive into the Internet (Pinterest is not a bad place to start) to look for other possible apron DIYs/how-tos/tutorials and patterns.  Have fun!

One Afternoon Tutorials--For the Hands

This month's collection of tutorials consists of quickly made items that are worn on the hands or arms.  I couldn't find any jewelry items I had not featured before, but there are still a surprising number of tutorials available.  The types of items they produce include mittens, gloves, mitts (i.e., sleeveless gloves), muffs, and cuffs.

As always, I have not tried out these tutorials, unless my description expressly says otherwise.  That being said, I read the tutorials and limit the ones I include to those that appear from my experience to be workable by a reasonably experienced sewer.  Just about all of these items are for historical items belonging to 18th century European clothing, but some may be adaptable to other periods.

Now, on to the tutorials!

• 18th century mitts.  This tutorial comes from the blog A Sartorial Statement.  It makes up a pair of 18th century mitts, which in this case are gloves made without fingers or any covering for the fingers where the shaft comes up the arm to the elbow.  They could be made from kidskin, wool, silk, lace, or almost any fabric, depending on whether the intended use is for formal dress or just to keep warm.  The Sartorial Statement's tutorial gives a technique for making mitts, more than an actual pattern; you will need to be guided by your own research to achieve the specific result you want.  For a more scientific approach that will help you make your own mitt pattern, see SewLoud's blog, here. 
• 18th century muffs.  In the 18th and 19th centuries, well-off women often kept their hands warm with muffs--a kind of cushion with a tunnel through the center into which the hands would be placed.  Koshka the Cat features both a muff (base) pattern and a muff cover pattern on her blog, The Fashionable Past.   That way, one can make only one muff base and have a coordinating muff for every outfit by making an array of different muff covers.  Again, your research will be necessary to come up with suitable fabrics and patterns.
• 17th century gloves.  This tutorial comes from Tammie Dupuis at The Renaissance Tailor,  The site has many other tutorials (she calls them "demonstrations" or "demos") as well.
• 18th century sleeve flounces. Eighteenth century gowns, particularly formal gowns, have a kind of ruffle along the ends of the sleeves; these are known as flounces.  Not sure what I mean?  This tutorial from The Fashionable Past will clear that up for you, and show you how to make them yourself.  
• 18th century cuffs.  Don't care for sleeve flounces?  Some 18th century gowns have pleated sleeves, and The Fashionable Past has a tutorial for those too.  You can find that tutorial here, also with helpful photographs.

Enjoy!

One Afternoon Tutorials--Shoes

Since I have not attempted to gather shoe construction projects for my collection of "one afternoon tutorials," I figured that I would do that today.  

Now I have, in the past, posted links to tutorials for shoe ornaments (such as rosettes) or shoe modifications (such as shoe dyeing).  But those are different from making, from start to finish, a pair of wearable, at least plausibly period shoes in a single afternoon.

There's a reason for that.  Shoes have to be more than pretty; they also need to protect the feet and be reasonably comfortable to wear.  That means that most shoes are made from leather or similarly tough materials, not fabric alone.  The toughness of leather makes it physically challenging to sew, so making shoes from scratch usually takes much longer than a single afternoon.

That being said, there are historical shoe projects that can be single-afternoon tasks.  Two of the three tutorials here are for prehistoric shoes, and involve nothing more complex or strenuous than cutting and lacing pieces of leather to fit the feet.  

• "Net-Top" Shoes.  This tutorial comes courtesy of Heather Rose Jones.  The historical examples of this style that Heather gives are associated with "barbarian" cultures of the late Roman Empire.  
• "Iron Age" Shoes.  The designer of this tutorial refers to them as "Iron Age/Viking," but these designs are not Viking.  Like the "net tops" above they require cutting a single piece of leather in a manner that can simply be laced to the foot; the result resembles traditional Irish dance shoes more than anything else.  This particular design may not be historical, but lace-on shoes are documentable for early periods in Scandinavia and probably for Ireland and Scotland as well, and the result is not offensively anachronistic for other prehistoric cultures.
• Regency era dance slippers. This tutorial describes how to sew Regency dance slippers by sewing machine; they have fabric uppers and light (synthetic) leather soles. [NOTE:  This tutorial is old (2010) and the internal links in it no longer work.]  These slippers are meant for wear indoors. [SECOND NOTE:  The recommended pattern mentioned in the tutorial, Butterick B5233, is still being sold but the current version does not include the shoe pattern featured in this tutorial.]

I have been looking for sandal tutorials but have not found anything that I think would, or even might, be a one-afternoon project.  If I find anything else of interest, I will share it.

One Afternoon Tutorials--Many Hats

My last collection of one-afternoon tutorials was an assortment of how-tos for making different types of bags. Today's collection is all about headwear: caps, hats, and other forms of headwear.   

From time to time, I have posted headwear tutorials in the past. I have tried not to duplicate any tutorials (since you can look up my old posts simply by checking out the "one afternoon tutorials" tag). Apologies if I have duplicated  any of those tutorials here.  

As with my collection of bag tutorials, I have tried to list these tutorials in roughly chronological order for the item in question (i.e., tutorials for items earlier in history will be nearer the top on this list).  Also, (as is true of all the tutorials I mention in this blog), unless the description of the tutorial says otherwise, I have not tried these tutorials out!  Nor have I made any judgments about how historically accurate the products of these tutorials may be.  Research the items you want to make, and decide whether the tutorials reach a level of authenticity suitable to your objectives.  

On to the current list!

• Scythian inspired hood.  This is the type of open hood, resembling a Phrygian hat, that appears in the art of the Scythians.  This tutorial gives double value, as it includes directions on how to felt wool fiber into cloth from which to make the hat.  Tutorial provided by Lara Baker-Olin on her blog, A Magyar Jurta.
• Viking women's headwear.  On her blog, Jenn Culler includes an article about speculative but plausible Viking age women's headwear. Most of these are made with unsewn pieces of cloth worn as turbans, headscarves, or veils.  Find it here.  
• Early Medieval coif.  A common piece of headwear for both men and women (often under other hats, hoods or veils) is the coif, a tie-on garment. From the Maille Is Riveting blog.  
• Medieval "beanie."  The same page on Maille Is Riveting that has the coif directions also have directions for a kind of skull cap with a stem on the crown of the head, which often appears in medieval art.
• "Coffee Filter" Hat.  This is a kind of pleated coronet with a chinstrap, often worn with a hairnet.  I do not know what this type of headwear was called during the Middle Ages, but today costumers also often call it a "coffee filter" hat.  Cynthia Virtue provides these directions for such a hat on her website.  
• Open hood (15th c.).  Hoods like this one turn up on peasant and farmer women depicted in the Tres Riches Heures and other manuscripts of the same approximate date.  You can find Sidney Eileen's directions on how to make one here (though, unlike hers, most of these do not seem to have been embroidered).
• "Butterfly" hat (15th c.). Cynthia Virtue also has a tutorial for a 15th c. "butterfly" hat.  You may know this hat by the term "hennin" (or henin).  The tutorial is here.  
• French hood (English/French Ren).  This is the ornamented crescent with a veil hanging down its back that you see in the art of Henry VIII's day. The Elizabethan Costuming Page (which still lives, after all these years!) has a page about how to make one, with links to other relevant pages on the same site. I suggest you start your journey through them here. Note:  I used this tutorial to make a French hood once, long ago, and it was quite satisfactory except for the chinstrap (which may have been due to my misreading or misapplying the directions).  

The next few tutorials all come from Genoveva's German Renaissance of Genoveva blog.  

• Split-brim hat. Similar hats were worn in other countries during the period. The tutorial is here.
• Platter hat.  This hat is commonly associated with Landknechts, but women wore them too. Note: The directions are packaged as a PDF.  
• Wulsthaube.  This hat looks like a smooth headwrap with a bulge at the back.  Directions are here. 
• False braids.  False braids made from stuffed tubes of cloth were a common addition to certain German Renaissance hairstyles, and not all of them were made in the natural colors of hair!  Illustrated tutorial here.  

Now for more modern stuff:

• Late Tudor hats. Directions for a Tudor-style flat cap and a high crowned hat can be found courtesy of Tammie Dupuis at the Renaissance Tailor site, here.  
• 17th c. coifs. Late 16th-early 17th century women's coifs were worn with a tie-on kerchief or cloth underneath them.  The Marquis of Winchester's Regiment gives directions on how to make a set for yourself.
• 18th century hat.  The Pragmatic Costumer shows you how to turn a modern, circular straw placement into a hat here.  Martha MacGyver's Imaginarium has a tutorial on making a similar hat from a modern straw hat; find it here.
• Regency (1800s-1810s) poke bonnet.  Kelly of Tea in a Teacup has a lovely, detailed  tutorial with plenty of pictures about how to make a Regency poke bonnet from a straw hat; find her tutorial here.
• U.S. Civil War (1860s) bonnet. From Kim Morton comes an illustrated tutorial on how to make a 1860s bonnet from a modern straw hat. You can find it here.  
• Mid-Victorian day cap.  Sew Historically provides directions on how to make a pattern for such a cap, and how to assemble and hand-sew it here.
• 1940s hairscarf.  Ever wonder how to duplicate Rosie the Riveter's headscarf?  Wonder no more. Retro Chick at Lipstick, Lettuce & Lycra shows you how in this video.  The accompanying blog post also provides some useful information.

Have fun!

One Afternoon Tutorials--All the Bags

Today's collection of one afternoon tutorials has a built-in theme.  All of these tutorials are instructions for how to make various kinds of bags to carry things in.  Some of these can be very ornamental, while others are plaintly utilitarian.  I suspect that many of us would greatly value the opportunity to have a period-appropriate bag to wear and use with historical costume.

Some of these patterns, obviously, are simpler than others, and a few require special skills (such as knitting or crochet, and the ability to interpret knitting or crochet pattern notation), but most of them are simple enough to finish in a single long afternoon.

I've already provided a link to a good tutorial for the Viking age wood-framed bag elsewhere, but I'm going to list it again in this post along with all the other bag tutorials to make it easier for people to find it through my blog.  Although this list does not, and cannot, include tutorials for every type of bag ever made, it includes a significant cross-section of items that are not commonly written about or made by costumers or reenactors.  I have listed the tutorial for each type of bag in rough chronological order of when the original bags were made and used.  

• Anglo-Saxon Ring Bag.  Another interesting bag type shows up in early Anglo-Saxon finds.  It's a cloth bag with a ring, big enough to admit a hand but smaller in diameter than the rest of the bag.  Such bags don't truly have a closure; the contents stay put because the bag is hung from a belt so it stays more or less upright in position, and because the ring is sized as small as possible to allow a hand, and the contents, to be inserted.  It has been theorized that they were used by well-to-do women to keep small sewing projects close at hand.  A similar design turns up in the late Middle Ages,* apparently to hold small game collected during a hunt.  This one comes from Brígiða Vadesbana's eponymous blog.  The tutorial may be found here.
• Viking Wood-Framed Bag.  I've already tried out Kristine Risberg's tutorial for a wood framed bag; it works very well.  Wood frames have been found at several Viking sites, and reasonable reproductions can be found on Etsy and other places if you are not brave enough to make your own frames based upon photographs of original finds.  The bag I made using Kristine's tutorial may be seen here, and the tutorial itself is here.  
• Medieval Trapezoidal Shoulder Bag.  Next come tutorials for a medieval bag with a trapezoidal shape and a shoulder strap.  These could be made as large as a modern messenger bag, but the period art shows them to be quite small, more the size of a small modern handbag.  Here are two different tutorials:  one by Coblaith, and one by Sabine Scholl.
• Medieval Carry Sack.  Here is a tutorial for a medieval "carry sack" that looks like one of the "miser bags" from the Victorian era (see below) enlarged to military duffel bag size.  This tutorial was written by Peter on the blog of the reenactment group Albrechts Bössor; it may be found here.
• Late Medieval Coin Pouch.   Cathrin of Katafalk shows how to make a no-sew leather coin pouch here.  The original purse was found by archaeologists in Bergen, Norway and dates to the late 13th-early 14th century CE.  (This tutorial inspired me to write today's all-bags post.)
• Medieval Drawstring Purse, with Tassels.  This tutorial on how to make a type of textile drawstring bag commonly seen in artifacts and art in the late Middle Ages, may be found on Cathrin's Flickr, here.   
• 18th C. "Ditty" Bag.  Here's a design sketch and instructions for an 18th century sailor's "ditty bag", the period term for a sailor's bag for carrying useful small items.  Tim Abbott provides these resources on his blog, "'Another Pair Not Fellows'; Adventures in Research and Reinterpreting the American Revolution".
• Regency Reticule.  Drawstring purses were also fashionable during the Regency period (1800-1820s), when they were called reticules.  Here's a pattern for a cut-and-sewn reticule from DawnLuck's Photobucket account. For further guidance in reticule-making, here's an interesting article with useful, general advice on making cut-and-sewn reticules by Kelly at Tea in a Tea Cup.  Some reticules were crocheted, and AllaboutAmi has a pattern for a crocheted reticule. 
• Metal-Framed Coin Purse.  Most people have seen, and many own, small purses with a metal frame at the top, and a kind of snapping clasp at the center.   Depending upon selection of frame and materials, this type of purse can be period for nearly any time from approximately the 18th century onward.  Such frames can be bought on line or in sewing and craft stores.  A tutorial for supplying the rest of the purse and uniting it with the frame may be found here.  
• Miser Purse.  This is shaped like the Medieval carry sack mentioned above.  Like that bag, it has a relatively slender center containing the entry slit.  The contents are meant to be stored in both ends, and can be kept from falling out by pushing rings toward the contents.  They were commonly used as coin purses during the 1800s.  They were usually crocheted; it was unclear whether any were knitted.  Here's one tutorial for a crocheted purse, as well as a second one that is knitted, courtesy of Severina and Koshka the Cat, respectively.
• 1940s Purse.  For those with more modern interests, here's a free pattern for a 1940s crocheted purse shaped like a conventional handbag, not like a miser's purse.  

Finally, the simplest kind of bag requires no sewing at all; it consists of a circle of leather, with holes evenly made about 1/4-1/2 inches from the edge, and a string or thong drawn through the holes to close it.  In case a tutorial for such an item is required, Martha Stewart has provided one here.  This idea is simple enough, both in design and construction, that such bags could well have been made as early as the Stone Age, and Martha's blog post shows that they are still being made for use today.

* From Les livres du roi Modus et de la reine Ratio, from late 14th century. This particular image was found on Exploring the Medieval Hunt.

One Afternoon Tutorials--A Little Something Different

It's been a while since I posted a collection of quick costuming projects.  The current selection includes directions for items both practical and unusual.

• From Anna's blog, Anachronistic and Impulsive, comes a pattern, instructions, and some documentation material about how to make an Archaic period Greek peplos.  Bonus:  full color photographs of several of the peploses Anna made, and of an exhibit showing several statues of the period, both as they look today and as they may have looked when the paint on them was fresh.
• Also from Anna's blog, a pattern, instructions, and documentation material for an Archaic Period himation.
• Mad about Viking fashion?  Too broke to afford a princely-looking pair of tortoise brooches?  Visit Vorpal Rabbit's blog and learn how to make a great pair--from Sculpey!  Obviously, this isn't a technique (and doesn't involve a material) that was used during the Viking age, but the process of planning and carving a suitable design from Sculpey will teach one more about Viking tortoise brooch designs than simply picking up a pair from Raymond's Quiet Press or another vendor who caters to the Viking reenactment market would do.
• If the Italian Renaissance is more your thing, try this quick and easy Vorpal Rabbit project--ribbon-tied dangling earrings.
• Finally, I recently found a different pattern for a one-hour 1920s dress than the one Kass McGann posted a few years ago. Here it is, courtesy of Bianca, The Closet Historian.

Good luck, and have fun!

Some One Afternoon Tutorials for 2018

It's been a while since I posted a collection of links for short costuming projects that I call "one-afternoon tutorials" because most of them can be completed in a single afternoon, or less.  

Here's another "one-afternoon tutorial" collection.  For a number of these, you will want copper or brass wire and tools for making wire jewelry (e.g., round-nose and other pliers, wire cutters or pliers that can do the same, files) because they are tutorials for making various historical jewelry items.  

1. From Eleanor Deyeson's blog comes a tutorial I should try out--a tutorial for making Bronze Age spectacle brooches or. as she more aptly describes them, double spiral brooches. I have wanted a pair of these brooches for a long time, and reproductions are still more expensive than I am able to pay. 
2. Marya Kargashina's Novgorod to Three Mountains blog has a tutorial on how to make Novgorod-style coil temple rings.  Temple rings were rings, the size of modern medium-sized hoop earrings, that could be worn on a headdress, woven into the hair, or even worn through earlobe piercings, like modern earrings.
3. Konstantia Kaloethina has a tutorial on how to make U-shaped hairpins that reproduce the design of a 14th century London find.  
4. Also from Konstantia Kaloethina's blog is a tutorial on how to make figured bezants--small pieces of metal with a figural design.  Great for early Scythian or Sarmatian costumes.
5. Speaking of the 14th century, the Family de Huntington blog has a tutorial on how to make a frilled-edge veil in 10 hours.  The technique used is not a period technique, but it does give a reasonably good period appearance.  
6. Finally, La Bella Perla describes how she made her own 10th century reliquary pouch in sufficient detail that many sewists will be able to make a similar one on their own.  Her pouch used beading techniques, but other types of decoration were possible in period.

I enjoy reading tutorials even for projects that do not interest me, because I find it fun to see the ingenuity costumers employ in learning period construction techniques (or, sometimes, getting the right effect without period techniques).   Hopefully this collection will be interesting to others.

More Short Tutorials--Early Period

It's no secret to any of my readers that my favorite costume interests lie with the early period, which I think of as from the dawn of humanity until the high Middle Ages.  Today's crop of tutorials consists entirely of projects appropriate to early period costume.

• From Jenn Culler's blog there are two simple and fun projects.  
• First, a tutorial on how to make a peplos dress that hangs more appealingly than a pinned sheet of fabric (what's called a "bog dress" in the SCA). The technique is not documentably historical, but also cannot be ruled out on the basis of archaeological finds. 
• Second, there is a tutorial for making a Bronze Age Dress based upon a design suggested in this article by Karina Grömer, Lise Bender Jørgensen and Helga Rösel-Mautendorfer. The article discusses different ways to recreate the clothing of a woman buried in a Middle Bronze Age grave in Winklarn, Austria.  (Other potential reconstructions of the Winklarn woman's costume are suggested in the article, for those who might be interested.)
• From opusanglicanum there's a tutorial on how to stitch the acanthus motif from the Mammen find.   
• From Ragnvaeig's LiveJournal there's a tutorial on how to stitch the linked circles motif from the Oseberg ship find.
• And, finally, from Anna's blog, Anachronistic and Impulsive, there is good information on how to make ancient Roman garb for both men and women. Note too the current post where Anna seeks donations because she and her husband are in financial difficulty due to unexpected calls on their savings. 

All of these projects would be good to work on during a hot summer, if it is summer where you live.  Enjoy exploring them!

A Midsummer Crop of Short Tutorials

Because it's been a while since I published links to short tutorials, today seemed a good time for a new collection of them.  Although I can't say for certain that all of these qualify as "one-afternoon" projects, none of them should take weeks or months to complete, even for a beginner.

• From Kristine Risberg at the Náttmál blog comes this detailed tutorial on how to make your own wooden-handled Hedeby type bag (see this post of mine from a few days ago).
• If your interests run more to the Italian Renaissance, here's a post from Lady Ydeneya de Baillencourt with instructions on how to make a simple partlet.  I have posted other partlet tutorials in the recent past, but this one is even simpler and thus more versatile in application.
• Here is a tutorial on how to make a fontange, a late 17th century lace cap. It is without illustrations, and the author admits that she had to "wing it" because she could find little useful material on fontange construction, but it may be amusing to see whether one can improve on her effort.  A fontange might well qualify as a "ridiculous" fashion for the Historical Sew Monthly's August theme.  
• Finally, here is a tutorial on how to make this hood, referred to as a London hood, based upon a late 14th century CE find from London, England. nbsp;

Have fun!

A Tale of Three Tutorials

Last month, I talked about how historical costuming tutorials posted to the Internet may vary greatly in the degree of authenticity they may provide.

By chance, a few days after that post was written I found a perfect illustration of the point I was trying to make. Specifically, I found three different tutorials, from three different people, all purporting to teach the reader how to make a version of a particular historical garment--the Skoldehamn hood.

The Skoldehamn hood is part of a suit of largely intact clothing that was found on a bog body in Norway that has been dated to the 11th century CE.  The body was originally found in 1936, so well preserved that at first the finders thought they had discovered the victim of a recent murder.

Dan Lovlid is the scholar currently studying the Skoldehamn garments.  My costuming friend, pearl, excellently paraphrases Lovlid's description of the surviving hood on her projects page, here (scroll down to about the middle of the page for the section about the hood).  She reviewed the descriptions by Lovlid and other scholars of the hood's construction and describes the hood as follows:

The fabric of the hood is a woolen 2/2 twill, believed to have originally been dark brown in color, with the warp dark grey and the weft a lighter grey, giving an overall buff (yellow-brown) appearance. ... The cutting pattern appears to have used this fabric very efficiently, as the pieces were comprised of rectangles and squares, all approximately 30-60 cm wide. ... The gores in the front and back of the hood, while not unusual in their placement, are unusual in that they are not curved along the bottom edge. In fact, they are simple squares, that effectively widen the skirt of the hood, so that it can fit over the shoulders. It measures approximately 138 cm around the hem.

According to Løvlid, the hood is made from three pieces of wool, not four. The main part of the hood is actually a single piece, that was split up the middle to form the face-hole, except for the final 2.5 cm, and possibly a 1 cm section between the face-hole and front gore.  The top of the hood has an angled seam, that is deeper at the front than the back, giving the hood a protrusion on top that looks similar to a cockscomb. This also causes the hood to sit further forward, providing more protection for the face. The top edges, forming the cockscomb, had been turned inward and sewn together with whipstitches in a grey-brown thread from along the top of the hood. A second seam in a darker brown, beginning near the face-hole ran 3-8 mm below this edge, while a third (seemingly from the same wool as the hoods' warp) is parallel at 10-15 mm from the top. Finally, a fourth seam creates the comb at its final height of 22 to 27 mm. The front and back gores are attached with whipstitching in dark brown wool, which simultaneously tacked the seam allowance to the outside of the hood. The bottom edge of the hood is whip stitched, with neat stitches that run parallel to the grain of the fabric, and there is no evidence that the hem was folded over. 

Thicker wool, now brown but originally red and yellow, was possibly meant to be used in a simple embroidery. A red thread is used on the right-hand side of the face opening, running over the top of the hood for 15 cm, before being replaced by a yellow thread that continues to the bottom, in whipstitch. These threads were knotted at both the start and end of their paths. A second golden-coloured thread decorates the back seam of the hood, but this 'embroidery' is described as an oblique basting stitch. Although all these seams appear to have been sewn from the outside, that does not necessarily mean these stitches were 'decorative' and in a contrasting thread. ...

Two cords, one on each side of the head below ear-height (13 cm from the bottom hem), were sewn on, and were preserved as being tied underneath the chin. The left-hand cord is fully preserved, and 6 cm long with a tufted end, that is covered with a little piece of green woven fabric. It was braided with two pairs of olive-green, and two pairs of red-brown threads in a clockwise spiralling pattern (all internal citations omitted) (boldface emphasis added; italic emphasis in original).

I have quoted this discussion at length as a demonstration of how some easily available "Skjoldehamn Hood tutorials" on the Internet differ widely in the techniques used and the appearance of the final product from the surviving garment.  I have emphasized the primary elements of the physical construction in the above description.  Let's compare the three tutorials I found to this description in order of decreasing resemblance to the original.

1.  Kristine of Náttmál published this tutorial describing how she made her version of the hood. The best part of this tutorial is that Kristine expressly takes note of all the places where she did things differently from what can be observed on the original garment.

Kristine preserves the three-piece aspect of the pattern, and uses a split in the main piece for the face hole, as was true of the original. However, she uses running stitch to join the pieces and then creates felled seams with whipstitches. In addition, she lines the hood, even though there is no sign of a lining of the original, and thus she folds all of the edges to the inside.  With regard to the top seams, that create the cock's comb effect, she uses only a single seam.  Kristine's version adds the cords, but makes a single color cord with a lucet instead of doing a four-strand fingerbraid in two different colors.  She also omits the allegedly decorative stitching in red and yellow.  Finally, Kristine sewed her hood with linen thread, not wool as used in the original.

2.  The woman who blogs at Geirlaug.blogg.se takes much simpler approach; her tutorial can be found here.  She also correctly uses three pieces of fabric for the hood, but does not cut a slit in the big piece for the face; instead she cuts it as a much longer rectangle than in the original design, folds this long piece in half lengthwise, and fits the smaller square pieces into the bottom. She does not use a seam to make the "cock's comb" at the top of the hood, and she omits the cords on the back. Like Kristine, she sews her hood with linen thread using a running stitch but finishes edges and seams with whipstitch.  However, her versions of the Skjoldehamn hood are unlined, like the original. Her tutorial is aimed at people who want a hood that looks at least somewhat like the Skjoldehamn hood (it lacks the coxcomb shape to the top of the hood and the closer fit around the face) but is simpler and faster to make.

3.   I also found a tutorial on Imgur, here. This tutorial, by probablyilsa, recommends cutting a set of three pieces out of both an exterior fabric and a lining, sewing each set together, putting the lining inside the hood exterior (right sides together) and then turning the resulting hood right side out to complete the process--which is a modern lining technique.  She also recommends cutting part of one edge from each of the two square gores before sewing them to the main piece, on the ground that this will make it easier to sew in the gores.  Interestingly, probablyilsa recommends stitching around the face opening (though she doesn't suggest this is meant to be decorative).  As with the Geirlaug.blogg.se design, there are no top seams and no back cords, and the face opening is even wider than the face opening in the Geirlaug.blogg.se design.  There is no indication of the type of stitches used, and it is possible that this pattern is meant to be sewn using a sewing machine (though the writer does not say so). The tutorial is labeled an "Easy Skjoldehamn Hood", though that may only be true for people familiar with modern sewing techniques.

I've discussed these tutorials to make the point that it's important to understand what you're trying to accomplish with your project before you choose a tutorial to help you create it.  For example, if you want to try to duplicate the exact look of the Skjoldehamn hood, or understand how the medieval techniques used in the original affect the sewing process, you should work with Kristine's tutorial, because that tutorial preserves a lot of the steps that would have been involved in making the original and explains what she's left out.  If you want a simple hood that looks somewhat like the Skjoldehamn hood and are willing to do some handsewing to achieve that objective, the Geirlaug.blogg.se tutorial may work for you. Finally, if you need a lined hood that can be run up quickly on a sewing machine, the Imgur tutorial would suit you best.

In short, don't take all advice you read on the Internet (including mine!) at face value.  Don't be afraid to review carefully whatever tutorial you're thinking of using and doing some research of your own before making a choice.  Not every historical costuming project needs to be a museum-quality replica. Only you can decide what compromises you are prepared to make and what level of consistency with the original will satisfy you.  Just remember:  All tutorials for a historical style are not necessarily alike.

The Latest Crop of Tutorials

Sometimes, when I am tired enough not to want to try to be creative but not tired enough to sleep, I like to browse the Internet for interesting resources. It's at times like those that I collect one-afternoon tutorials to share with my readers.  The collections get published on months, like this one, where I haven't had the time or inspiration to engage in costuming activities worth blogging about, or to put in the time and thought to write as many interesting posts as I would have liked to have done.

Anyway, here's the latest batch of tutorials.   Have fun with them!

• How to make Grindle buttons. What are Grindle buttons, you may ask? They are similar to Dorset buttons, for which I published a link to a tutorial previously. This tutorial is from Mackin-Art.
• How to make a 19th century winter hood for a woman or a girl, courtesy of Romantic History Historical Clothing. 
• How to make a Viking "treasure" necklace, by the Viking Answer Lady, Christie Ward. (Scroll down to the bottom of the linked pages to find it.) The link explains what a Viking treasure necklace is, and describes the proportions used for stringing the beads and pendants used in such a piece.*
• Lauren Reeser over at American Duchess provides this tutorial on how to make a woman's 1920's bathing suit. Better still, she gives information on how to plausibly fake one if for some reason you don't have time for even a quick sewing project. 
• Here's a great tutorial for making a simple leather money pouch, based upon a Norwegian pouch from the 13th-14th century CE, courtesy of Katafalk.
• Also from Katafalk:  a simple (i.e., without embroidery) version of St. Birgitta's cap.  
• From Medieval Silkwork, how to make a number of basic tassels at one time. Tassels are indispensable for Assyrian costume, 1860's Western women's fashion, and certain items in the Middle Ages, and possibly for other periods as well.
• And, finally, from Eulalia of the Medieval York blog: how to make a very simple pennannular brooch, which works for early period costuming well into the Middle Ages.

* There is some question whether "treasure" necklaces were strung in quite the manner seen in the reconstructions, though, because the original stringing cord does not survive in most finds, raising a question as to the order in which the pendants and beads were originally strung.  The tutorial above replicates the look of such finds as they have typically been reconstructed by museums, which may or may not be the way these necklaces were originally strung.

Another Crop of Tutorials

While unwinding from work and finishing taxes, I've found some more one-afternoon historical garment tutorials that I thought it would be fun to share.

• Make yourself a kappe.   A kappe is a kind of late 15th century south German wool, pull-on cap with self-fringe.  The blogger who wrote the tutorial, known as Lady Ursula von Memmingen in the SCA, provides copies of images of period art showing that the kappe was worn by men and women, and could be solid color or made from panels in two different colors. It is a practical garment, and sufficiently modern looking that one could make it for everyday wear.
• Or a spangled strand, for decorating hair or headdresses for more formal women's late 15th-early 16th century German garb. This one is also from Lady Ursula, and is also accompanied by images from period art. The end result might still have a modern use, if you like decorating your hair with sparkly strands.  It should be a super-quick project.
• How about a 16th century partlet, using this partlet pattern from the Truly Hats Store? In addition to providing the free pattern, Truly Hats sells pre-embroidered replica linen fabric, at $25.00 for a half-yard (a quantity sufficient to make a single partlet for most people), making it possible to complete an amazingly period-looking garment in an afternoon. 
• Here's a quick tutorial on how to sew freehand the vine scroll embroidery seen on the Mammen (10th century Viking) cloak, courtesy of opus anglicanum.
• Or you can make yourself a ribbon rose, for Victorian or early 20th century millinery or other uses, courtesy of Jennifer Rosbrugh of Historicalsewing.com.

This batch of tutorials was brought to you courtesy of the letter C (for costume), the letter H (for history) and the letter P (for Pinterest).  Enjoy!

Even More "One Afternoon Tutorials"

Here is another assortment of "one afternoon tutorials."   I'm posting them now because I noticed, after I'd written most of this post, that this set consists primarily of aprons, caps, and other items that arguably protect either bodies or clothes.  Since the March Challenge for the Historical Sew Monthly, has the theme "Protection", now is the perfect time to share these how-tos.

• How to make a D-shaped Medieval veil, by Elina of Neulakko.
• A late Medieval double apron by Edyth Miller at The Compleatly Dressed Anachronist.
• Information on how to make and wear a strophium (a simple breast supporting undergarment used in ancient Rome, and possibly also in the early Middle Ages) by fru Þora Sumarliðadóttir of More Than Cod. 
• A free partlet pattern, with instructions, and instructions for making a lower-class Elizabethan apron and neckcloth, can be downloaded here, courtesy of Margo Anderson.
• An entire web page of variations and instructions for making different 18th century caps, courtesy of Sue Felshin; the page can be accessed here.  
• How to sew a simple 18th century style shift, by Rebecca Wiese; the tutorial page is here. 
• How to make a fichu collar for a late Victorian bustle gown, courtesy of A Frolic Through Time; the tutorial may be found here. 

If hand-sewn, Edyth's apron and Rebecca's shift might take longer than an afternoon to complete if the maker is not accustomed to lots of hand sewing.  Perhaps these projects should be reserved for a long, summer afternoon, or even sewn by machine if completing the item quickly is essential.  The rest of the projects here should be easily completable by even an inexperienced maker in an afternoon.  Try them out, and have fun!

More "One Afternoon Tutorials"

A few years ago, I compiled a long list of historical costume-related projects that could be completed in an afternoon.  It occurs to me that, since I compiled that list, I have encountered (and in some cases tried out) additional tutorials that deserve a place on the list.  So here are a few more tutorials for quick historical costume projects that one could easily do over the holidays. 

From Janet Stephens's video tutorials:

• How to make Ancient Roman bead earrings.
• And a second video showing how to make a matching Roman bead necklace and/or bracelet. 

The earring project took me less than 5 minutes to complete, and the necklace not very much longer.

From Catrijn vanden Westhende: 

• How to make a simple 15th century style cap.

From Teffania's Stuff: 

• How to make an annular medieval brooch.

From Craft Stylish:

• A nicely detailed tutorial on how to make Dorset buttons. 

The photographs on the page will show you what Dorset buttons look like.

From Jen Thompson, at Festive Attyre:

• A one-hour, 1920's lawn party dress. 
• The Downton-esque one-hour dress. This dress inspired the lawn party dress, according to Jen, which suggests that her pattern is rather versatile.

Some one-afternoon garments don't need much of a tutorial, such as my Iron Age skirt. Sometimes it's better to simply look through one's fabric stash,  measure, experiment, and have fun.  I hope these tutorials (and the last-minute projects I talk about on my blog) will inspire someone to do that.

EDIT: (12/17/2015) Fixed two broken URLs in the list; apologies to anyone who might have been frustrated by them.

HSM #3--A Greek Head Wrap, Completed!

The head wrap, laid out before use

A few minutes of rustling through the boxes and piles that comprise my "stash", a few hours with needle and thread, and voilà!  A head wrap, as shown in the photograph to the left.  (Click on the photograph for a larger and more detailed view.)

I ended up whipstitching the raw edge of my wool band to the edge of the linen, and then flipping the band over and tacking it down onto the right side of the linen.  The lumpy-looking border, by the way, is the edge of the selvedge of the flannel; I left it as-is and chose to put it on the right side of the wrap because I think it's decorative, in its way.  In my opinion, the best way to decorate this kind of wool band would be to apply some simple embroidery--probably nothing more than a wavy line down the band, repeated in, say, in white, yellow and red. Unfortunately, I haven't done any serious embroidery in years, and tonight was not the time to start.  Perhaps the task of ornamenting the band will be a good subject for a subsequent HSM challenge, sometime.

While I agree with Stephens that this style looks very much like the style shown on women on ancient Greek vases, that may be due in part to the fact that she demonstrated it on a woman with abundant, coarsely curly hair, a hair type that is more common in the Mediterranean region than it is where my ancestors came from.  My thinning, slightly wavy hair does not give the same impression, but the use of appropriately sized cloth makes it work as a hairstyle even though the shape of the wrap on my head and hair is a lot different than Stephens's inspiration images on ancient Greek pottery.  It's also possible, though, that the purpose of such a cloth head-wrap style was originally worn by older women with thinning hair, like me, who could no longer secure their hair adequately by simply wrapping a band around their pinned hair (the other style shown in Stephens's video). 

One of my commenters noted that the blue fabric remnants from my Iron Age skirt would look wonderful as part of such a head wrap. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any fragments from that cloth!  Did I throw them out in a fit of misplaced tidiness after completing the skirt? Probably. However, I had more than enough of the dark blue wool that I was planning to make into stockings to serve the purpose.  That wool is a bit thick for gracefully wrapping around my head, but I addressed that issue by washing it and drying it in the dryer to full it enough to minimize raveling and avoid having to hem it.  Wool tape would have been much better for this project because it's naturally thin while retaining wool's knack for sticking to itself, but I don't have any wool tape in my stash and, even if I had been able to obtain some before the end of March, buying some would have defeated the purpose of this challenge.

Hairstyling note:  Because my hair is thin, I would need a short bodkin (i.e., a straight, smooth, pointed-ended stick no more than about 3-4 inches or roughly 7-10 cm long) to fasten a bun that would not stick out way beyond the edges of the wrap and interfere with the wrap's drape.  Because I don't own such a short bodkin, I used a spare ponytail holder to wrap around the bun and keep it from unraveling while I tied the wrap in place. I think a bodkin would have held my hair more securely though.  Perhaps I'll improvise one out of a chopstick at some point.

HSM Challenge #3--Stashbusting

How long in stash?   The linen was only in stash about one year (it came from the leftover fabric for my bog blouse project last year). The blue wool flannel was purchased for a project at least as far back as about 2000, and thus is approximately 15 years old!

Fabric:  A scrap of linen, left over from my bog blouse project, cut and ripped to approximately 26 inches (roughly 45 cm) by 18 inches (about 66 cm), and a strip of dark blue wool flannel about 80 inches (roughly 200 cm) long. 

Pattern:  Based upon Janet Stephens's video showing the ancient Greek "head wrap" style and my own measurements.  It's two rectangles--a short, squat linen rectangle and a long blue wool strip; not much of a pattern.

Year:  Approximately 450-400 BCE, based upon the identification given of the Greek images that appear in Ms. Stephens's video.

Notions:   100% blue silk Gutermann thread (for stitching the wool band to the linen), and some white Londonderry brand 60/3 linen thread (for hemming the linen wrap itself).

How historically accurate is it?   Only somewhat.  I handsewed the wrap, the fabric types used are period, and Ms. Stephens demonstrates in her video that this type of wrap results in an appearance that is a good match for images of women found in period art.  However, no such item has, to date, been found by archaeologists working in Greece so far as I am aware.    So about 50%-60% is an appropriate accuracy rating.

Hours to complete: About 10 minutes to locate the fabric, 5 to 10 minutes to cut it to shape, and about 2 1/2 hours to hem the linen and to sew the wool band to the linen.

First worn:  Only to establish that I *can* use it as a head wrap.  I need a bit more practice in putting it on before I bother my spouse to take photographs of me in it to post on this blog.

 

Total cost:  Effectively zero.  The fabric for the bog blouse I obtained for store credit, the flannel is from a piece I bought about 15 years ago, and the thread was originally bought for other projects.

Hopefully, I'll have enough time in a month sometime this year to make something that requires more challenge and more than an hour or two of work!  On the other hand, both the head wrap and last month's Iron Age skirt would make great one afternoon projects for anyone looking for such a thing.

HSM Challenge #2--A Blue Iron Age Skirt, Completed!

Remember the last project about which I said, "No battle plan survives contact with the enemy'?  Well, I had another "battle plan" moment when I tried to make my Vendel period apron dress.  

After I had hemmed all the edges of my fabric and sewed it into a tube, it became brutally clear that the amount of fabric I have was simply too narrow to make a properly draped peplos for me to wear--unless I pinned it on only one shoulder, and I know of no archaeological support for a one-shouldered overdress in 7th-8th century Norway. 

But I quickly discovered that the tube was perfectly sized to make a long drawstring skirt, of the type found on the woman found in the bog at Huldremose.  That seemed appropriate to me, particularly since it has recently been discovered that the Huldremose plaid skirt was actually a  blue plaid, and not the brown plaid that it appears to be today.  

The Huldremose skirt has holes carefully made a little below the top edge of the skirt and a thong threaded through them to serve as a drawstring, but my blue fabric is too thin to tolerate such treatment.  So I settled for shortening and evening out the top edge of the tube by cutting off about three or four inches or so, folding down the edge and sewing it down to make a drawstring channel.  Then, I cut down and sewed the cut-off fabric piece into a drawstring using the same sewing technique that is used to make apron dress straps (i.e., cut a strip of fabric a bit longer  and about three times wider than you want the string to be, fold the sides inward, and whipstitch the two folded edges together so that the raw ends are enclosed inside; push the ends into the narrow tube you've created and stitch each end closed). 

So for the second time this year, I've completed a challenge with an item that isn't what I intended to make for the challenge.  Still, I'm happy with the skirt; that color is too lovely for the fabric to have continued to go unused.

HSM Challenge #2--Colour Challenge Blue

Fabric:  A yard of 60+ inch wide vintage wool fabric in a period twill weave.

Pattern:  None needed; this skirt, like the Huldremose skirt, is a tube with a drawstring at the top.

Year:   Sometime between 160 BCE and 340 CE.

Notions:   100% silk Gutermann thread in a similar blue shade.

How historically accurate is it?   Only somewhat.  The weave is period, the basic tube shape is period, and the color is not too unlike what might have been obtained with woad in period by a patient and skilled dyer.  But the original skirt didn't have a drawstring channel, and I've never heard of a period garment that used either a drawstring channel or used a cut-and-sewn strap for a drawstring.  So maybe 50-60%.

Hours to complete: About 2 1/2 hours, though I didn't keep track of my sewing time very closely.

First worn:  Not yet. I haven't even tried the skirt on; I've been too tired to do much as I'm fighting off what appears to be a bad cold.  Photographs will be coming soon (unless I've *really* screwed up and the skirt is unwearable).

Total cost:  Effectively zero.  The fabric cost me less than $10 USD nearly 5 years ago, and I've had the silk thread for a long time from other projects.

EDIT:  (2/27/2015)  Huldremose is an early Iron Age find, a fact I keep forgetting, for some reason.  Since it's the inspiration for this costume item, I've corrected the title to reflect that fact.

EDIT:  (3/13/2015)   Corrected description of how I made my drawstring by deleting the word "four" and replacing it with the word "three", in boldface, in the description above.

A Collection of "One Afternoon Tutorials"

This afternoon, my friend The Dreamstress exclaimed, in frustration, "why does no one but me post tutorials for items that can be made in an afternoon!” We all know the answer; many people post costuming tutorials, but they are usually labeled by what kind of item they make or by the period of history for which they are appropriate, and not by how quickly they can be made.  If you are more interested in how quickly a particular item can be made than you are in the particular period to which it might belong, Google is unlikely to be your friend.

Since I'm not going to manage to make my himation for the Dreamstress's Historical Sew Fortnightly Challenge #23 "Generosity and Gratitude," by November 18 (tomorrow), I figure I can at least continue sewing tonight, and spend some time this afternoon collecting tutorials for quick historical costuming projects. This post should show up on Google if one searches for "One Afternoon Tutorials" and may make it easier for costumers in the future to search for some interesting quickie projects.

Let's start with The Dreamstress's own short project tutorials. There are quite a number of them:
1.  Turning an ordinary straw hat into an 18th century bergére.

2.  Converting a straw or paper fedora into a 1920s style cloche.
3.  Making a 1930s "Deco Echo" blouse.
4.  Making a drawstring petticoat to go over a crinoline.
5.  Using cord-gathering techniques to turn a drawstring skirt into a proper period (17th-19th century) skirt.
6.  Dyeing leather goods to make them look more period.
7.  Antiquing cheap metal buttons to make them look period.

From Jen Thompson of Festive Attyre (she has a few more tutorials on her blog, but I'm sticking to the "one afternoon project" type of thing here) we have these:
8.   How to turn a modern brimmed straw hat into an 1910s hat.
9.   Wrapping a 1790s style turban and achieving the hairstyle that goes with it.

There are some wonderful tutorials from the Renaissance Tailor (who calls them "Demonstrations"):
10.  How to make a 16th century partlet.
11.  How to make a 17th century Cavalier collar.
12.  Making cloth and thread buttons.
13.  Making a Tudor style flat cap.

14. Making a Mongol, Rus, or Viking style hat. (Carolyn Priest-Dorman shares a simple, similar pattern, without a lot of instructions, about how to make a specifically Viking style of hat here).

From Dawn's Costume Pages, we have:
15.  How to make a sash, which would be useful for "pirate" costume, 17th century, and 1920s styles, among others.

Lauren Reeser of American Duchess (who calls them "How-tos") has quite a few tutorials, I've just picked a few specimens from her blog:
16.   Making a simple 1920s slip.
17.   Tying a Regency-style turban.
18.   Making 18th century style ribbon cockades.

From Paul Andersen of the New Varangian Guard in Australia, we have:
19.  Quick Ancient Greek Costume that's a step or two above the "bedsheet and safety pin" level.

Kass McGann of Reconstructing History has at least two very interesting short projects:
20.   A 20-Minute Vionnet evening dress from the late 1910s.
21.   And what Kass says is an even quicker Vionnet dress from the late 1920s.

22.   Finally, check out How to Make Your Own Period Aiguillettes, which is one of the "Historical Resources" that I list on my sidebar.

In light of how long it's taken me to put this collection together, I'd say that the best way to find a "one afternoon tutorial" is to Google for "historical" (or the name of the period of your preference) and "tutorials" and "how-tos",  and read through the ones that look interesting to you to see whether the instructions describe something you would be capable of doing in an afternoon.

Have fun hunting! If you find an interesting tutorial for a short project, please feel free to add a comment about it.

EDIT:  (11/20/2013) In general, tutorials about how to make accessories--hats, scarves, sashes, collars--are very likely to be "one afternoon tutorials".

EDIT:  (6/10/2017)  The Vionnet links to Kass McGann's Reconstructing History site no longer work because of a site reorganization.  I will fix them if/when I find the content again.

EDIT:   (3/3/2018)  Fixed the Vionnet links via the Wayback Machine!  Also fixed the link to Dawn's tutorial on sash-making.