Father and son tunics from 2 metres of fabric

I won't lie. I feel pretty darn clever about this one.

I haven't made my husband any garb in yonks. He doesn't really seem to mind but it makes me feel bad that he misses out. So on our anniversary back in September we found ourselves in spotlight and we chose some really nice rust coloured linen. With his red hair it was going to look great. I got 2 metres and was planning on doing the fold-in-quarters-trace-a-t-shirt method of tunic making. The fabric was 60" wide so he was only ever going to get 3/4 length sleeves (which he didn't mind), but it also meant the bottom hem would be ridiculously huge if I used the full amount of fabric by turning the triangle around to make a gore.

So I started thinking, I wonder if I can make Jonathon (1 year old) a tunic out of this too? I grabbed a size 2 t-shirt (I want it to last!)  and tried to fit them both on the fabric without making Dan's tunic too short. In the end I fitted it in the gore section which meant the small tunic has additional front and back seams but there was absolutely ZERO fabric wasted!

T-shirt tunic making method. Fabric is folded in half one way, and then in half the other way so there are four layers of fabric. A t-shirt is folded in half and placed on the side with the single fold (the top will have two folds) and traced around

Pieces cut out

Flip the gore of the small tunic around. Zero wastage

I stood back and marveled at my own genius for a few minutes and joked to Dan that as Jonathon's tunics get bigger,  Dan's will need to get smaller!

Jonathon's got overlocked and sewn up straight away since I needed it wearable for a picnic the next day. It still needed to be hemmed and the neckline finished but he looked adorable.  And it should (read: BETTER!) last him at least a year.

Pieces overlocked

Gores pinned in place

Seams ironed flat

Keyhole neck marked. You can see the line at the bottom of the front piece marking where the heyhole neck ends. I cut the semicircle out and gently unpick the stitching back to this mark, then tie the threads off. If there was no front seam you would just cut a straight line down,

Neckhole cut and overlocked. Side seams sewn

"Finished" tunic. Still needs all the hems done and the underarm seams need to be clipped so they lie flat (you can see them bunching in this photo)

Yungsta wearing his new tunic to our medieval family picnic the next day.

So now for the daddy version.

Construction for this type of tunic is ridiculously simple. Literally sew up the sides, cut out the neckhole and finish the raw edges.

Dan chose this blue trim for his tunic so I had lots (not) of fun pinning that on the neckline. This is usually an odious task but it's so much worse with a really wide trim as you have to ease in the fullness around the the circular neck hole. I do it by making lots of little tucks all the way around and then have to sew them flat too. It takes much longer than it ought to in my opinion. Adding trim on nice straight seams though is nice and quick. And handy hint time - if you fold the seam allowance towards the outside of the garment rather than the inside and then pin and sew the trim over the top you enclose the raw edge. I find it feels much nicer against your skin too, particularly if you leave a gap of a few millimetres between the foldededge and the start of the trim as quite often trims can he quite hard and scratchy.

Pinning trim in place. Notice how the hem is folded towards the outside of the tunic and the raw edge is concealed underneath the trim once it is sewn down.

Pinning the trim around the neckline and adding tucks as I go. With a narrower trim it is sometimes possible to avoid tucks by using an iron to stretch one side of the trim out.

Neckline trim pinned in place. With a keyhole neckline you need to mitre the corners by folding the trim at a 45 degree angle

Pinning trim on the sleeves. Detail view of how hem allowance is concealed

Completed tunic with trim at neck, sleeves and hem

 Then I went back and hemmed Jonathon's tunic. I also added trim at the neckline of his too. I used the small piece of trim I had left over from my daughter's Tudor coat dress. There wasn't quite enough to do the entire neckline so there is a gap at the back. I don't really care. He will still look cute. And if/when I but some more of the trim to do the blue side of her coat dress I can use the extra to fill in the gap.

Grace modelling her brothers tunic. She is 3 and it still fits so he should get a fair bit of wear out of it.

Back view. You can see the edges of the trim finish just over the shoulders

So there you have it. Matching father and son tunics out of 2 metres of fabric with absolutely zero wastage!

Aren't they adorable?

p.s. The fabric was 60" wide. My husband is 191cm tall and a size M. The sleeves on his tunic are quite wide and could be narrowed to make the childs tunic longer if necessary. My son is a size 1 but his tunic is a 2-3. The 2 metre thing won't work for everyone...

Tudor coat dress for a toddler

My 3 year old daughter is such a girly girl. It's probably our own doing but gosh she looks cute in pink with her blond ringlets. So when I saw some bright pink wool on a half price clearance at spotlight I knew I had to make her something out of it. I have been wanting to make myself the fitted gown out of The Tudor Tailor since I first saw it but just haven't gotten around to it yet. So I thought what better way to try out the pattern than by making it in miniature? Less expensive if I totally stuff it up, right?

Fitted Gown featured in The Tudor Tailor book

Now going back to before Rowany Festival this year when I was in a garb making craze trying to churn stuff out for my kids, I found out the hard way that toddlers aren't just smaller sized adults. Their little bodies are totally differently shaped and proportioned and they have huge heads. After spending two hours trying to scale down a florentine bodice pattern and wondering what I was doing wrong I sought help from the mighty interwebs and the best advice I found was "grab a t-shirt that fits and trace around it". At first I thought it sounded a bit lazy but it really did make things so much easier.

This time around I was wiser and so I actually grabbed her favourite jacket and basically used the same pattern but removed the hood and made it longer. And added a few extra inches on each side so it lasts a bit longer (hopefully anyway).

I only bought two metres of the fabric (it was still $20/m) so I was pretty limited when it came to the sleeves. Instead of the cute puffed and paned sleeves she ended up with plain 3/4 length ones. The collar was also pieced together by necessity but I don't feel too bad about that since I know they did that in period anyway.

Pink Wool

Back

Front

After I cut out all the pink wool and started sewing it up I realised I had forgotten to overlock all the pieces. I'm a bit OCD about fraying raw edges. I also refuse to spend hours felling the seams on a toddler's dress which will be lucky to be worn thrice. So I decided to line the whole thing with some navy blue cotton I had leftover from long ago. 

Navy blue cotton broadcloth

It looks super cute against the pink. I had a bit of a mishap trying to work out how to sew the sleeves of the outer fabric and lining together. Not sure how I managed it but there was nowhere for your hand to come out when it was the right way out but there was when it was the wrong way. I'm still a bit confused about the whole thing. In the end I turned it around the right way, tucked the raw ends in and used a blind hem to sew them together. I did the same thing on the bottom hem too. This way I ended up with a reversible coat dress!

Pink side out

Blue side out

And don't forget the trim! I bought this trim at rowany festival earlier this year from Anwyn at Sign of the Lambtree with the intention of using it on some sort of kids garb. I think the colours work together really well. Again I only bought 2m (instead of my standard 10) so I didn't have enough to put it on the blue side but hopefully I can get more. She also made me an offer where if I email her a picture of the trim I purchased on a piece of garb for her to display on her website I get a discount next time which is pretty awesome!

Close up of trim pinned in place

I'm not very happy with how the collar turned out. It doesn't sit nicely and it's definitely something I'll fiddle with next time. I think the neckline is too close to the shoulders rather than being fitted around the neck. Grace doesn't mind though. 

Collar

I still haven't decided on a type of fastening. Mostly she just wears it open or we can use a nappy pin. I need to find something that will still enable it to be reversible. It's coming into summer here though so I'm not sure how often it will even get worn between now and next year's rowany festival.

Etsy Shop Opened!!!

Things have been pretty quiet here as I've been slaving away on a commissioned dress.

Yellow linen cotehardie

Anyway it's finally finished and for the last few days I've been getting organised to open an etsy store. I know personally that finding decent garb online can be incredibly difficult, and when you do find something the international shipping rates are insane. So good news if you're located in Australia because you can now get quality handmade authentic medieval and renaissance costumes from my new Etsy store!

So far I have listed what you see above - viking male and female outfits, a cloak, chemise and cotehardie. There will be more coming soon so add me to your favourite shops and keep checking. Otherwise send me a message if you want something I haven't listed yet

:)

Late period chemise

About a month ago I made a deal with a friend. She gave me a whole pile of leather in exchange for me sewing her a flemish outfit. Win win if you ask me.

So yesterday I made the chemise. From start to finish it took me about 8 hours including drawing up the pattern. I still have to finish the neckline but I need her to try it on first as I don't have a dress form or anything. If I tried to finish it now chances are her boobs could end up falling out of it or it might choke her. So I'm waiting.

I based the pattern off this one here.

Flemish chemise pattern by Vanessa Agnes Nessayem

I hadn't used this pattern before but I'm quite pleased with how it turned out. Last time I made a chemise that wasn't a big poofy Italian style one it turned out a bit retarded. The arms were too short and tight and the shape was just all wrong. To be fair I wasn't very experienced in pattern drafting back then so I probably made heaps of mistakes. But I think I did allright this time around.

I wanted this chemise to be pretty versatile as my friend doesn't have a lot of garb. She could wear this with any later period style I think. I also wanted the sleeves to be able to be rolled up so I changed the sleeve pattern to be a straight and gathered into a cuff. That way they are nice a fitted when she wants to wear sleeves, but can be rolled up out of the way if need be. It's also only knee length. I made a floor length chemise once and I hated it.

So this is the pattern I drafted for Morgaine's measurements.

Flemish chemise pattern

So if you are the the exact same size as my friend (whose measurements I included above just in case someone is) then you're in luck! I've drafted you a free chemise pattern! If not I'm sorry. Get your calculator out. Or you can plug your measurements into Drea Leed's smock generator but that's what I tried to use last time and came out with something strange. I find it helps to understand how to draft a pattern so that you can make the necessary adjustments for yourself that a generator or a commercial pattern won't do. My body shape in particular doesn't like "choose the bigger measurement - bust or hips - and make that the width of your body piece" because my shoulders aren't as broad as the rest of me and if I follow a pattern like that my sleeves end up attaching half way down my arms. But with this pattern I can make my shoulder to shoulder measurement the width of the body piece, and add the extra room in for the bust/hips using the gores. So yeah I'll be using this one from now on.

I finally got to benefit from my large aldi sewing table too. It made rolling out fabric and drawing pattern pieces so much easier. And I love how medieval patterns have so little fabric wastage. All up I used about 2 metres of linen.

Pattern pieces cut out, and tiny pile of scraps

I didn't actually take many photos of the construction as it is pretty similar to a standard t-tunic. Join the two body pieces at the top. Sew the sleeves to the body. Add the gores. Cut the head hole.

That's something I always struggled with when I started my costuming journey. How big to make the head hole. And how to get it the right shape. Many times I cut a head hole way to big or too small or off centre. I've made every mistake in the book. But I eventually found a way that works. It's just big enough for my head and more importantly puts me head in the right spot. When I've got it on I trace the neckline shape I want in the mirror. And incidentally it is ten times easier to mark out the head hole before you sew up the side seams.

Head hole shape

Sew the side seams. Gather the sleeves up. Attach the cuff. 

I included photos of this as it can be fiddly folding everything the right way so it sits nicely.

Start by machine sewing the gathered sleeve onto on side of the cuff but don't sew the 1.5cm seam allowance at each end.

Machine sew the gathered sleeve to the cuff,
leaving 1.5cm at each end open.

Fold the raw edge of the sleeve over twice and pin

Fold the cuff SA over and pin.

Do it to both sides

Fold up the bottom edge of the cuff 1.5 cm and iron flat

Refold the SA on the ends of the cuff

Fold the cuff in half so that the ironed edge meets up with the row of stitching,
and the corners match up perfectly

Pin in place

Before you hand sew that together, work out what type of cuff fastening you want. I chose buttons and luceted button loops.

Pewter fleur de lis buttons

So I needed to stop and lucet the button loops. It didn't take too long as they are only about 3cm long each. I used linen thread so they were nice and thin. I also left nice long ends on my luceting so I could use the ends to sew them in place. I don't know if you've ever tried to sew through a luceted cord but let me tell you your fingers will hate you for it.

Unfold the end of the cuff and sew your button loops in

Refold and pin

Whipstich edges and along the cuff

Sew the buttons on

Finished Sleeve Cuff

Hem the bottom. And at some point when I see her next, finish the neckline.

So this is what it looks like at the moment

Front

Back

It might be a few weeks before I see her again to mark and finish the neckline. I'll update with finished photos when it's done. I'm even thinking of setting up an etsy store to sell them and other things later down the track too. So stay tuned ;)

How to build a tablet weaving loom in only 7 years!

Yes you read that right. 7 years. Not 7 minutes, or even 7 hours.

I started these looms when I first learnt how to tablet weave, which was in 2007. And yes its now 2014. But they are finished!

They are really basic. It was just one length of pine cut into 6 pieces. I didn't even cut it myself, got someone else to do it (this was my pre-power-tools-do-selfer days). I did varnish it myself way back when. My first (and quite possibly last) foray into oil based products. Clean up was a pain in the bum I tell you. And then thats where it got left. Random little varnished pieces of wood that moved house three times before being contructed.

The end bits are glued and screwed, and had a hole drilled in them for the threaded rod. The guy at bunnings (I love those guys) gave me a really nifty tip for how to screw it in. You put two nuts on the rod and tighten them against each other. Then you use a spanner on only the top nut and screw it in like a bolt with a spanner. So lets just pretend that was my brilliant idea :) I will be using the same technique for the tension peg on my inkle loom when I ever get around to it.

Carly's Tablet Weaving Loom

My tablet weaving loom, almost finished
You can see the nuts on the right where I haven't taken them off after screwing in the rod

I broke the hacksaw blade on the last cut. So frustrating. And then when I tried to screw it in something bizarre happened and it just kept chewing up the timber and spinning around without going any deeper until the hole was too big. So I just drilled a new hole. Yes it's annoying and my OCD nature is screaming at me that the peg is not in the centre but not so much that I really cared about trying to fix it even if I was able.

Looms Finished

So the larger one with the dodgy extra hole is for me and the smaller one for my friend Carly (who better be reading this :P). It has been promised as her christmas and birthday present for the last seven years. I'll have to actually get her a present from now on.