I began this "Unfinished Object" in the spring of 2012, while I was still in high school and just being introduced to the Edwardian period. I wanted to try out the
Costumer's Manifesto free
c. 1905 Shirtwaist pattern. In the dawn of my historical sewing, I printed the pattern and scaled it up with a whole lot of guesstimating...I remember taking the measurements listed around some of the pattern pieces and using ratios and some kind of made-up algebra to determine the missing measurements. I could've spared myself the brain damage by just buying some french curves.
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| You can see some of my crazy math on the left. |
This was my first experience in making pintucks. I used a really convoluted method wherein I measured half the distance of the pintuck from its middle point, drew lines, and then matched them up. I believe I found this method online, but it produced squiggly, sloppy pintucks and was difficult. I put the project away after I burned a few fingers on my iron trying to smooth out these little devils--I just needed to literally cool down a bit and see how others made pintucks.
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| Bodice front. Seven pintucks on each side of the center fold. |
I picked this up again as soon as my semester ended just to have some noncommittal, easy sewing. I painstakingly ripped out each pintuck, and sewed new ones by simply folding the fabric, pressing, and sewing. It is a
much simpler process and produces a more uniform set of pintucks.
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| After / Before |
The shirtwaist is made of the same cotton lawn as my
Italian Renaissance Camicia, salvaged from an old sheet.
I couldn't find insertion lace that I liked until the summer of 2012 when I was vacationing in Portugal. At a large outdoor market in Oliveirinha, Aveiro, I found a vendor selling all sorts of beautiful, cotton machine-crocheted lace that looked so far from that shiny, stiff stuff at Joann's. I
miraculously found a perfect lace insertion--for only 40 cents a meter!! I bought the whole stock the vendor had (a little over 4 meters).
Have you ever found the perfect lace or trim in an unusual or unexpected place?
