Skip to main content

Easy Veil Hems

 Hello Beautiful Humans!

Thank you for your patience this week with my technical difficulties. I promise it will be worth it because I was able to make some more edits to my video to make it more fun. This is a project I am making to go with a new medieval dress that one of my friends is making, and I thought a few of you might be interested in how I stitch these tiny hems on silk veils. My secret with the fabric is particularly flimsy is starch. Starch is a material that is available in Europe by the 16th century and is used to set riffs, and hide glue was also being used to stiffen buckram for interlining garments and hats. I'm going to call the idea of starching difficult fabric for sewing historically plausible, even if they would have been cooking starch rather than using a convenient spray bottle. the Elizabethan Costume Group on Facebook has lots of great information in its archives on starches and buckram if you want a deeper dive. This video was not sponsored by Target or Flawless Starch, they just happened to be the place and brand I found. Please follow instructions you are given on any starch you use and test it on a fabric scrap if you are not familiar with it. Roberta Orsi Landini discusses the specific types of artificer making dressing accessories in her books about Eleonora di Toledo and Cosimo I de Medici, Moda a Firenze 1540-1580. I highly recommend both volumes if you are looking for more historical background on who was making veils in renaissance Florence. For more information on medieval rolled hems in archeological finds I would recommend Textiles and Clothing 1150 to 1450 from The Museum of London. Thank you for watching and I hope I was able to help you hand sew your chiffon, and hand sew hems for your next veil. Tag me on Instagram if you would like me to show off your new hems or projects inspired by my videos.

Bisou Bisou, Maridith

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Pockets in the 16th Century?

So if you are new to my blog, Hello! I took July off to focus on work and realities of covid life. Thanks for hanging in there.  This week we are doing to cover 16th Soccocia and their role toward the origin of pockets. People need a place to carry and keep their small items as they walk around. In the middle ages you might have a pilgrim satchel or a belt pouch. Some women in the middle ages had the brilliant idea to stop wearing their money purses outside of their over gowns and instead would wear them between their kirtle/sottona layer and over gowns. This arrangement still gave you access to the purse, but made it harder for thieves to cut your purse strings and run.  Fast forward to the 16th century and we find the heirs to this practice in socaccia. We have some visual evidence of these in mid to late 16th century art out of Italy. This is a detail of Alessandro Allori's,  Woman at her toilet, ca 1575-78. Currently in Florence, Church of Santa Maria Novella, Gaddi Chapel.  J

Two Tone Lucet Cording

  Hello Beautiful Humans! Today I have a brief tutorial for you on how I made the lucet lacings for my most recent renaissance dress. It is a craft that is hard to document in the 16th century, where I do most of my work, but I love how quickly this technique works up into fairly strong cording. This two tone technique is much stronger than a typical single strand lucet braid because of the extra cord running through the entire cord. I also love the possibilities for coordinating your laces to your outfits. My laces were made much longer than I needed them for this dress. Looking back I could have cut my lacing in half and been fine, but now I have all this extra if I should ever need it. Long laces also mean I can pre-lace myself into this dress with a spiral lace and then tighten it until I feel comfortable. For this particular style of lucet I used a hardwood lucet fork I purchased from an 18th century reenactor, a skein of DMC 6-strand embroidery floss, and a ball of size 10 cr

Voided Velvet Sleeves from a Thrift Store Scarf

  Detachable sleeves are one of my favorite things to make for renaissance dresses, and always seem to be the last thing I think to make when I'm planning my outfits. These sleeves are made from thrift store fabric to mimic one possible way that "cut work sleeves" were made in the period. There are several theories, and my research has made me think that they all may have been in use at different points in time for different specific motifs. To make these sleeves I used a voided velvet scarf I found at my local thrift store and remnants of rayon velvet, silk shantung, and linen. Techniques I cover in the video include basting, hemming stitches, and how to easily sew with velvet. I completed the project using a mix of hand sewing and a modern sewing machine. I love wearing these Italian renaissance dresses at reenactment events or when I attend events for the Society of Creative Anachronism. Groups like this have helped me learn more about how period techniques and mate