Your Name/Forum Alias: Silver Moonblaze
Your State: SA

Your Costume/Character:  16th Century Spanish

Your Comments: 16th Century Spanish gowns have everything I love in a fancy gown – big sleeves, gorgeous fabrics, frills and a lot of decoration and accessories.  One of my favourite portraits is the one I have below as the first source image I used; it’s by Felipe de Liano, of the Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia.

My gown consisted of a number of different pieces – chemise, corset, farthingale, doublet, skirt, sleeves, undersleeves and a ruff.

The farthingale was the first thing I made, since I needed to know the size and shape of it before drafting any of the over garments.  It’s a white cotton/linen blend.  This was far easier than I thought; I used the pattern in Alcega’s Tailor’s Pattern Book.  It’s basically just two rectangles and two triangles sewn together, with the boning channels sewn along the inside.  With a little maths and a graph pad, working out the diameter of and distance between each hoop was fairly simple and the first hoop is just within reach of my hands, so the skirt can be pulled up and moved when you have to negotiate stairs, sitting down, etc.  The bottom hoop is enclosed within the hem of the farthingale.

For the hoops themselves, I first used Roman blind batting – you can buy it in 3 or 5 metre lengths at Spotlight relatively cheaply.  The problem I later found with these was that being a flat rectangle, they tended to twist in their channels – the farthingale therefore never stayed in its ‘bell’ shape.  I then tried using the small black plastic tubing you get at a hardware store for home irrigation, they also come with connectors.  These worked perfectly – and are easy to cut, lightweight and cheap.

The chemise is the basic t tunic pattern, with no gathering.  It has gores in the skirt and under the arms for movement and a high neck, in the Spanish style. 

The corset was a challenge for me because I’d never made one before however, as with the rest of the patterning for this gown, I had a lot of help from El Presidente with drafting and fitting.  It’s based on the Effigy Corset (a Google search will show you examples of this style). I chose pink linen for the outer and white linen for the lining.  I boned the corset with cotton string, of about 4mm in thickness, with two in each channel.  The entire corset was bound in white binding, which turned out to be a nice contrast to the pink linen. 

Due to the soft boning and style of the corset, it’s very comfortable and isn’t too constricting (once I got used to wearing it, anyway!).  The corset is also front spiral laced, so it’s very easy to get on without any help. 

The next step was the doublet.  Along with the outer sleeves and skirt, I used black silk velvet.  I love the feel, look and drape of it, but I’m NEVER going to use silk velvet for this kind of project again, if I can help it.  It’s just not work my sanity.  It’s awful to sew, it kept moving out of place, and was, in all, a nightmare to work with.

The pattern was drafted using the draping method.  It has seams at the front, back and sides, and is front closing.  At the front, it dips down into a V shape, and the front is closed with hooks and eyes.  It has a high collar, under which the ruff sits.  

The undersleeves are tight fitting, with a curve in the pattern, for easier movement.  They attach directly into the doublet, and are made of a peach/pink and cream silk – which is the same silk used for the front panel of the skirt.

The oversleeves were challenging to figure out – it was impossible to find any examples of a pattern anywhere, so we had to do some experimenting.  In the end, I think they turned out perfectly.  They are basically a kite-ish shape when laid out flat – the sleeves aren’t actually sewn together, just tied with ribbon at the shoulder and wrist – the rest hangs open.  The sleeve is black silk velvet, with the pink/peach silk for lining.  It hangs almost to the floor at the back.

The skirt is flat; ie it has no gathering or pleats.  The front is open to show off the underskirt (in this case, I only had time for a panel).  It’s lined with cotton poplin to make it sturdier.

Since the fabric is very… well, black, I went for a gold trim, and trimmed the entire outer dress as much as I could, which I think made it stand out very nicely.

The ruff was a quick two hour job (yes, I was sewing right up until I had to leave for the event I was wearing this to…).  I found a wide (about 3 ½ inches), stiff ivory ribbon.  The ribbon was doubled over for extra stiffness, then I sewed lace to the outside edge.  I then did a sort of box pleat (on the ‘inside” edge), with several stacked on top of each other, then alternating the direction of each stack (sorry, that’s the best way I can explain it!) which gives the nice figure 8 pleats when you open it all out.  I then sewed the inside edge (where the pleats where) to a band, which fit around my neck.

I sewed each pleat together with a small pearl in between.  The ruff closes together with small hooks and eyes.

It was a big exercise and was very time consuming, but now that I have the basic patterns and knowledge of how these gowns are put together, I’m already planning my next one.