peteyfrogboy

I'm calling the boy's clothes finished. The first field test went exceptionally well.



I also finally got some pictures of vox8's Milanese loose gown I made back in 2006. She wore it this weekend with the chopines from 2007, and reported that they weren't too hard to walk in once she got used to them.

From 1570s Milanese Gown

Got the tunic and (possibly) a hood (sans buttons) done for the boy. Details are here.

While flipping through the Web Gallery of Art, I happened upon this statue by Donatello of a winged boy. Yes, it's clearly a mythological subject, but, although he's not wearing any other clothes, the boy has a wide, decorated belt holding up a pair of footless chausses. The chausses are pointed to the belt through a pair of punched holes. Very interesting.

As promised, the chausses in action:



The braies are awfully poofy, but I made them big enough to fit him for several years. He's been running around playing for quite a while now, and nothing has fallen off. His feet have even stayed in the stirrups. I call this a success.

The chausses are done:



I had originally intended to make these out of the same wool as my new hose, but I decided against it. For one thing, they didn't really need to be terribly stretchy. I also wanted to make them completely lined, so the wool would have been wasted anyway. I looked through my old fabric and found half a yard of the olive green linen from Andreva's petticoat, and some heavy white linen from an old chemise in the recycle pile.

The technique of sewing the lining in as a separate piece is one that I've never really had call to use, so I decided to give it a try. I turned the edges of both layers under, but didn't bother to tack them down, since the linen held a crease just fine with ironing alone. I pinned the two pieces together all the way around and whip stitched the two layers together. It was a little tedious, but made a very nice edge with no stitching visible on the outside. I then butted the seams together on the back and the bottom of the stirrup.

Hopefully these will fit properly. I may be able to get some pictures of them in use tomorrow.

More progress on the boy's clothes:



The sleeves on the shirt are rolled up and I'm not sure if I like the way the neckline is sitting, but everything fits (and should for a while). Next up are chausses, once I finish cutting out another set of hose for me out of the wool.

Speaking of my hose, I've got the first pair done:

So I've been chugging along on the boy's new clothes, making him cute little 14th century linen underthings with nice hand-finished seams. I picked some nice thread out of the box to do the hand sewing with, and after a while looked at the spool and said "Oh yeah, this is the silk thread. Eh, whatever." Just now, I realized that I'm making clothes for a *toddler*. I will probably have to bleach these someday, which means all my hand sewing might fall apart. *grumble grumble*