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| I haven't posted in half a year. I smack myself. 
BUT, I have sewn! My lastest play-costume projects are complete costumes for King Richard III and the Duke of Buckingham, for Shakespeare's play King Richard III.
King Richard is played by Justin. The costume is based on the costume of Svante Sture, found in Janet Arnold's Patterns of Fashion, with a few modifications! I finished it (except for the buttons and buttonholes) a couple of days ago. My brother kindly agreed to let himself be pinned into it for a few photos, despite the fact that he felt like he was wearing a maternity gown in that big white shirt. Of course, it doesn't fit Marc quite right, because he's smaller than Justin, but I just needed something besides my little female dressform to hang it on for photos!
 
 
The fabric I used for the body of this costume is a tan-grey microsuede I found in the home dec section of Jo-Ann fabrics. I have no clue what it's made of, some sort of polyester or such, but it behaves amazingly well. So far I haven't been able to melt it, even though I've ironed the seams many times with my iron on it's second-highest setting! I love this fabric.
The red trim is strips of bias-cut silk, sewn into the seam and notched at uneven intervals. This is a technique used on the original Svante Sture doublet, and I love it. I've already got ideas for other costumes to use it on... Below are a couple of pictures of the shoulder wing, showing the silk trimming.
 
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| Look! I finally tried blackwork! I'm making an Elizabethan shirt, and I figured that blackwork on the collar and cuffs would look spiffy  . I found a pattern at the Blackwork Emboidery Archives called Quatrefoil (I think that means 'four flowers'). The Blackwork Embroidery site also has instructions on how to actually stitch the stitch, something that was a mystery to me. The stitch used for blackwork is most commonly the Holbein stitch, or double running stitch. Extremely easy to do, if you can count threads. I managed to lose count here and there, as you may be able to tell in the picture...
This is a picture of what I've done so far, which are two strips of embroidery for my shirt cuffs. It's a little sloppy and uneven, but I don't think that will particularly matter once they're turned into cuffs. | | |
| A new dress! This one is blue print cotton, with a cream linen underlining. I would write more, but am rather tired. So, pictures.
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| Adventures in Big Hair
Recently I have been wishing for a gown from 1780-90. BUT... I would never be able to stand wearing the dress without proper hair. Which, incidentally, is quite large. So, I decided to attempt the big hair.
1. I dampened (well, sort of over-dampened  ) my hair, and slathered gel into it. A lot of gel - but not so much that it would look wet after it dried.
2. Enlisting the help of my sister, I rolled my hair onto not-so-hot hot rollers  . Well, the first 4 weren't particularly hot...
 
3. After waiting, oh, two and a half hours (during which time I misted my hair with a water spray-bottle, and then blow-dried that), I couldn't wait any longer and had to see if it worked  . The immediate results were not particularly promising.
 
4. But after a bit of very random pinnning (this was really the easiest part - I just stuck clips and bobbypins into my hair wherever it poufed too much)...
5. I TRUIMPHED!!
And then, I stuck my fingers under the whole pile and tugged on it a bit, which made it stick up just a little bit more.
 
And that was my adventure for today  .
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| So, I FINALLY have pictures of (one of) the finished costumes . This is Tom's costume from A Comedy of Errors - he was one of the Antipholi.
(many) More pictures in the photoblog (which can also be found by clicking the "photos" link in the upper lefthand corner of the page).
In the photoblog, there is a listing of albums on the right side of the page - 'Tom's Antipholus Costume' will take you to an album of just pictures of this costume . | | |
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