miss_philomena: (Default)
As mentioned in my last post, ages ago now, I know, I made myself a new and (what I thought was) delightfully wide cage crinoline. After wandering into the TV message board, I discovered someone making 180" circumference hoops, and someone else making 210" (!!!) circ. hoops. Makes my 134" hoop seem much more respectable.

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Two of the hoops are 1/2" hooping steel from tutu dot com, the other six hoops are 1/4" spring steel from a cheap ebay bridal hoop. I'd initially planned to do it all with the 1/4" steel, but it didn't feel stable enough, so I added the two sturdier hoops, the third down, and the top one in the bag. I also put my smaller 18th century rump under the back, just to make sure it doesn't collapse or tip forward under the weight of heavier skirts, but the rump isn't quite the right shape. I'll have to make one that's a little bit fuller higher up. It's a round hoop, but one with just a little bit of back thrust, and I don't want to lose that.

My county's 4-H fair was the lat weekend in July, so this year I opted to enter my day gown from New Castle. I was marked down because apparently silk isn't a durable material. I also overheard the judge commenting after judging was finished that it wasn't an appropriate dress for a farmer's wife. I have no idea where she got the idea that it was made for that, because there was no mention of farms or wives on my entry form. All I can guess is that she assumed that's what it was meant for because the fair takes place at an historic farm. But hey, I still got best in division!

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I also had someone else (not the judge) not really believe me when I said yes, even back then day dresses could be and were made of silk, no it's not an evening dress. But it was surprising the number of people that were shocked that not only did I make the dress myself (I couldn't enter it for judging otherwise, sillies!), but that I made it to wear it, and had worn it, which is why there's a small stain on one of the sleeves from a fantastic pub lunch. Ehh, whatever. Maybe next year I'll enter one of my Gettysburg dresses.
miss_philomena: (Default)
I can never work on just one project at a time. It's a curse. But I did get a new hoop, TV142 1856 walking cage crinoline, mostly assembled. I made some changes to it, mainly making the hoop wider at the bottom. TV's patterns are set up that the bottom of the hoop is the same for every size, and only the top three hoop circumferences change for differing sizes. So I took put my calculator and mathed to keep that same proportionate increases from the medium size to the extra large size. It gave me a hoop about 130" at the hem instead of 110'. Just chilling in my living room it looks comically big, but I don't care! Once I finish sewing it, because right now the hoops are just pinned to the vertical tapes, I'll take some pictures. I'll be able to use it for everything but my fancy dress, because the striped skirt silk would only just fit over it, as in only a couple inches extra, and I don't want it tight over the hoop.

I've also been doing a lot of beaded knitting and crochet lately. I joined a knit-along for a pence jug purse through the Living History Knits and Crochet Facebook group, and we're currently in week two of five. This is such a small project and it knits up quickly, leaving me feeling impatient for more directions! Of course if I were just doing this on my own with no timing, it would linger, I'm sure.

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miss_philomena: (Default)
 Had a sewing day yesterday at [personal profile] robinsnest 's lovely home, and traced off patterns for Gettysburg! I traced off and sized up Robin's paletot pattern so I am ready to go on that. It's a fairly simple pattern too, only fronts, backs, and sleeves, so I anticipate it going together fairly quickly.

I also traced of TV's 1860s dress bodice pattern. I plan to use the same pattern as the base for both of my day dresses. For the figured silk check I plan to do an asymmetrical/faux-double breasted bodice, and will leave the the points at the waist alone. For the other day dress I haven't finalized what it'll look like, but I'll probably alter it into a single point at the front, and possibly more of a peplum look with a fuller back, rather than just the original points. We'll see.

TV's massively giant sleeves also strike again in this pattern. The instructions on the sleeve heads say to gather them in to fit the sleeve, which I definitely did not want for this. I want a smooth fitted sleeve head. The TV instructions for measuring what size sleeve I need would've had me cutting the largest size, which would've given me a massively gigantic sleeve. Instead I measured the armhole of the bodice and went with the sleeve size which would give me only about an inch and a half to ease in, which is much more reasonable, and also happened to be the smallest size for the sleeve pattern pieces.

I've got the Past Patterns 1863 evening bodice for my ball gowns, and I split all the pieces apart, but I ran out of time yesterday to trace them. My goal for the week is to trace it off, and make a mock up of both the day and evening bodice, and then I can start altering them. I'm going to be down in D. C. next week, so when I get back I plan to start sewing. My July goal is to get the figured silk day dress done, and the paletot, and at least start on the icicle fancy dress. I bought a ton of clearanced tiny rhinestone buttons from Joanns that I plan to add into the organza poofs I'll trim the icicle dress with, to give it extra sparkle.
miss_philomena: (Default)
First, the Mid-Atlantic Air Museum's WWII weekend!

The usual suspects went, and like usual I will lazily link to their posts (Amanda, Alice, and will add Robin and Jess if they write something eventually). I actually arrived at the agreed upon time, everyone else rolled up an hour later. This is a huge and popular event, so parking was quite a distance away, and a school bur ride to get to the entrance!

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I was feeling quite spiffy if I do say so myself. And immensely glad I decided on my way out the door to bring my sweater just in case, because it turned out to be chilly! I don't think it got over 68F. Not usual for early June around here, jsyk. For my hair I did Victory Rolls in the front, perhaps a little smaller than they could've been, but I didn't have a lot of space to work in with my hat. The back I just rolled up.

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I'm honestly a bit meh about this dress. It was much cuter in my head than in actually sewing. I had more fun with accessories instead. I picked up my hat on eBay, and the sweater is a modern one, but I spruced it up with some antique button pins and an adorable vintage (probably 50s) chain with red, white, and blue rhinestones.

The event was definitely fun, and I'd love someday to actually drive out my 1936 coupe, but when it's an hour and a half each way, and I'd need to have the car on site for setup Thursday, and not be able to get it home until Sunday, that'd require being there the whole weekend. So maybe some year further down, but 99.9% not for next year. It's been sitting for a while and needs some work anyway. But how much fun would it be, to be able to drive around with people in costume in the rumble seat in the back?

There was a flea market there, and I bought a very cute pair of mid-length yellow cotton gloves. No idea what I'll wear them with, but they were too cute to pass on, and actually fit! And completely randomly, I also bought a Victorian black crepe mourning veil. It probably won't go to Gettyburg this year, because I don't have a mourning outfit planned, nor do I have fabric for it, so it'll have to wait.

My full flickr album is here.

On a different note, this week has been a headwear week!

Headwear Headwear Headwear
While I absolutely adore my gigantic and insane silk gauze cap, it's a bit impractical for regular wear. So Monday evening I cut and started a new cap using the Kannik's Korner 1740-1820 cap pattern, and finished it Tuesday afternoon. The pattern has been in my stash for ages, along with a yard of silk organza I purchased around the same time, to make said cap. I kept it fairly simple, with a single pleated split ruffle. My construction method is not the standard hem every piece separately and then whip it all together. Instead I used the method I was taught by Janae Whitacre of Williamsburg's Margaret Hunter Millinery Shop. This method is: turn down a small seam allowance, here a hair under 1/4", on the band piece. Lay it over the pleated ruffle, then baste the pieces together, done here in black. Then cover the raw edges with a 1/4" silk ribbon, stitching through all layers on both edges of the ribbon. Repeat for the caul. This creates a single layer cap with no raw edges, and it actually gets finished in a timely manner. I constructed my giant ruffle beast cap the same way.

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My other bit of headwear this week is a spoon bonnet! It's mostly finished, and was intended to wear tomorrow for a Victorian Picnic here in Philly, but we've switched from hoops to natural form so it'll have to wait for it's first outing. I'm going to put the crown lining in after lunch, as well as the ties and curtain. But I'm going to hold off on trimming it for now, and wait until I actually need it. [personal profile] mandie_rw made the buckram frame for me, and mulled it as well, so all I had to do was cover and decorate it. I used a shot blue and pink semi-slubby dupioni for the outside, and the same pink taffeta from my gown for the big-ass hat tea earlier this year. The ties are the pink silk as well, and I'll probably put white feathers and flowers of some color on the outside eventually.
miss_philomena: (Default)
I've already written this up elsewhere, so I'm just copying it over to here so I can keep track of my plans.

Remembrance Day is in November, and unlike the usual suspects, I haven't gone to this before, so I have no wardrobe to pull from. That means I need to make almost everything!

So I'm writing up this post to a) keep track of what I'm doing, and b) make sure I don't weasel out of doing anything. As of right now I've got underwear for Gettysburg, and that's it. I have corset, chemise, pantaloons, hoops, shoes, and one spoon bonnet. I'm gonna put the list of what I need behind a cut. All the sewing!

Read more... )

woohoo!

May. 3rd, 2017 10:19 am
miss_philomena: (Default)
Okay, so I'm super far behind, but now that I've successfully imported all of my lj posts here I'm gonna start working on the list.

Things I Need to Write Up:
New Castle, Dec '16
Regency Tea, Jan '17
Victorian Skating, Feb '17
Suffragette, Feb '17
Big Ass Hat, April '17

I am, of course, going to skip over all of that and jump to my current project, which needs to be finished for Sunday.

Pink and Blue Pet en L'air

Back in November at Burnley and Trowbridge's hat making workshop I picked up two and a bit yards of this lovely pink and blue crossbarred silk with vague plans to make some sort of jacket with it eventually. Well, 3/4ths of the usual suspects are going to a tea demonstration this Sunday, after having made most of a dress in a day for [personal profile] robinsnest there this past Saturday. Apparently it's to be silk day, and I decided I wanted something new, so into the stash I went!

I opted for a pet en l'air, as they're fun and light and a fairly quick make, though I've had to redo a few things when I decided I wasn't happy with how it looked. But for having started Sunday evening and only putting in 3-4 not very dedicated sewing hours in the last two days, it's close to done. Today's plan is to finish trimming the sleeves, and then set them along the bottom so I only need to put my stays on once to finalize the shoulder straps and set the top of the sleeve. Then it's only the shoulder pieces to cover, and a hem! (And a good pressing)

Pink and Blue Pet en L'air Pink and Blue Pet en L'air Pink and Blue Pet en L'air
Back pleats pinned into place // back panel completely attached to lining // front pleats pinned into place

For the weekend I plan to wear it over my plain white taffeta petticoat and my baby pocket hoops, made for my 1740s mantua a few years back. I'm not looking for a super hippy shape in this, just a little extra oomph. There might be pictures over the next couple days, if not, finished pictures after Sunday!
miss_philomena: (strawberries and cream window)
Partially anyway. I started this dress back in late May for a picnic that got rained out, so it went on the UFO pile. A small group of us are hitting up a tea house this weekend, and I don't feel like wearing my red cotton gown. So I decided, rather than just fix/recut the left sleeve on my windowpane green silk gown, which was my first idea, that I'd pull this out and finish it.

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The bodice was already mostly assembled, I just needed to sew the side seams and sew up and set the sleeves. Right now it's currently in the War & Peace asymmetrical style, as you can see. The sleeves are three parts- the short puffed sleeve, a fitted short lining, and a long fitted sleeve that's just basted in.

I pinned the front with about a 4" overlap, but I'm thinking I'm either going to have it just meet in the front, or only a very small 1" overlap, and fill it in with either a chemisette or fichu. Looking at the picture I feel like the high overlap looks too closed off. I want it more like this gown, I think. I also plan to do a dogleg closure like that gown as well, and have a round skirt. I don't have enough fabric to put three panels in the skirt like usual, so what I plan to do instead is gore the front so I can get a fuller hem, and use a full panel for the back.

Today's plan is to set the second set of sleeves, sew the waistband to the bodice, and cut and sew the skirt pieces. Tomorrow will be attaching the skirt and putting in closures. But right now it's time for an early lunch!
miss_philomena: (strawberries and cream window)
What better to use for an 1860s dress than very bright lemon yellow faile? It's a cotton/rayon blend, and a little shiny, but I really don't care. I'll be visible for a mile. It'll be awesome and hilarious. I might even glow in the dark. I'm not sure yet. I've got a whole bunch of vintage navy petersham ribbon to trim it with, but I don't think that'll tone it down all that much. I'm frankenpatterning two Simplicity patterns for this bodice. I'm using the body of 3791 and the sleeves (and skirt) from 7212. I plan to make the bodice two separate layers instead of just a front overlap, and have a vest and removable jacket. I'm still trying to decide if I want the vest in a different fabric. I have ivory silk satin, but it looks too dull with the yellow, and I don't have enough white silk, unless I can find the piece that went missing. 3791 also has gigantic coat sleeves, so I'm going to use the sleeves from 7212 instead. I don't have a lot of fabric, and I'm hoping to cut an evening bodice eventually too. I'm using the 7212 skirt as well because it's straight panels rather than gores, which means less waste.

mini mom update )
miss_philomena: (strawberries and cream window)
"Let there be sleeves."

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The tops are just pinned at the moment. I somehow magically managed to, without actually measuring at any point, make sleeves that fit perfectly into the armhole without any ease or pleating needed. Go me?

PS I love stripes.
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miss_philomena: (strawberries and cream window)
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I swear I wasn't trying to line the stripes up on the side back seams. It just happened.

part three

Feb. 17th, 2014 09:03 pm
miss_philomena: (black and gold)
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 Bodice mockup! I dug out some really random Joann's red tag cotton I have several yards of for reasons unknown, and cut pieces on whichever grainline they fit, which is why the sleeves aren't cut cross. The bodice fits perfectly! I tied my petticoats a little loose by accident, which is why there's a little bit of gaping at the waistline.

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The sleeves, on the other hand, are a little too tight, and managed to be too long as well. To double check the length I just opened part of the seam to get the sleeve on, which is why it looks baggy here. The point of the dart wound up sitting well below my elbow. So I will redraft the sleeve with about 3/4" of an inch extra in width, and about two inches shorter above the elbow. The sleeve cap and below the elbow are fine, so I'll just make the angle down to the elbow a little less extreme.

Next I'm going to do the petticoat and gown skirts before bouncing back up to the bodice. The pleats will be the last step. The Denmark piemontaise appears to show the pleats are sewn at the shoulder. One of the piemontaises in the Imatex collection, on the other hand, clearly shows hooks and eyes where the pleats attach at the shoulder. I'm actually leaning more towards this kind of construction, because when I'm not wearing the robe, as will be the case 99.9% of the time, being able to detach the pleats from the shoulder will keep them from pulling the skirt and lower bodice up while being stored. And lends more weight to my belief that the pleats are sewn to the skirt below the waist. Why else would the top need to be detachable like this, if it was only a cape-like piece? Also, if you look at the outer pleats in the second picture, you can see where the edge rolls in, where to me it appears to connect back to the skirt below the waist.

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Click on these for very lovely hi-res shots, with the hooks and eyes clearly visible at the top of the pleats!
miss_philomena: (mantua cuff)
As much as I really wanted to dive headfirst into all my sewing, I was good and did what really needed doing: new stays. My yellow stays, as wonderfully comfy as they are, are too big. I can lace them fully shut, and still pinch a good inch and a half out of the front while wearing them. So for my new pair (which accidentally matched HSF#3) all I did was lay down my current pair, trace the shape, then take off some width from the front and back, then add in new seam lines. Easy stuff. I didn't shorten the waist because I like where my other pair sit, and I'm somewhat short-waisted already. I patterned these to work for either 1780s with a center front gusset, the way I sewed this pair, or to work for 1790s stuff with bust gussets, based on the 1790 linen corset in Jill Salen's "Corsets".

For this pair I wanted that 1780s "prow" front shape, and put a long gusset in the middle. On the side shot you can see the forward curve of the stays. Making these was quite an adventure, as I used, quite literally, every single kind of boning I had in my house in these stays. The problem of working a) on a deadline, and b) while snowed in repeatedly. The center front and center back bones are 1/2" German plastic whalebone. The rest of it is a mix of 1/4" steel bones, cable ties, and for the longest channels where I didn't have anything else, the same cane I used in my other stays. I hadn't turned down the edges before trying them on, just to make sure everything would work and fit right, but after taking them off I've done the top edge. I'll get to the bottom at some point. I don't think I'll bind or line them before the dinner unless I have extra time at the end.

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I also made myself a new rump yesterday to go under everything. I went by the article [livejournal.com profile] demode wrote for Foundations Revealed, about late 18th century skirt supports. It gives me both hip oomph as well as rear shape, so I'm happy with it.

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(my mirror looks so dirty! Eek!)

The reason I'm going for the rounder look with this, rather than just using pocket hoops as the Denmark piemontaise appears to show, is because I really like the shape of this francaise in the Met's collection, and because having the back shape makes the pleats stand out even further, being further away from the body.

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I'm trying to decide if I should press the pleats down to where they'll attach to the skirts. All of the existing piemontaises show flat pleats, but is that how they were originally made, or is that from storage? I'm not sure.

And to round out this post, yesterday I also draped the bodice pattern, based on the Denmark PDF. Either later today or tomorrow I will cut out a full bodice and sleeve in scrap to make sure it fits, then onto the silk!
miss_philomena: (strawberries and cream window)
And so I start my next big project, with 18 days on the clock, to see if it can be done for the Française Dinner on March 1st. A gown I've been planning to make for years. Five and a half years, to be specific. I first made a post(private) about this gown in October of 2008, and it's finally happening.

Robe à la Piémontaise

(Yes, that was indeed worthy of sparkly text. Just because.)

According to "Dress in France in the Eighteenth Century" by Madeleine Delpierre,

The robe à la piémontaise, made fashionable at the time of the marriage of Princess Clotilde of France, sister of Louis XVI, to the Prince of Piedmont, was a variation on the robe à la française: the loose, flowing pleats at the back were added later to form a kind of cape attached behind. [source]

This indicates that the back pleats were attached only at the shoulder and left completely loose the rest of the way down. I'm working primarily from the extant robe à la piémontaise held in the collections of the National Museum in Denmark, which includes a pattern taken from their robe. Their pattern clearly shows where the back pleats rejoin the skirt, and there is a noted and marked seam in the skirt. See look, I drew on the diagram as proof. And to add to that, from the few others I've seen photographs of, if the back hem is visible, there doesn't seem to be a break in the hem in any of them that would indicate there is a separate piece where the pleat 'cape' overlaps the skirt back. More picture analysis and doodles to possibly come at a future date?

But anyway, my goal is to do as faithful a recreation of that dress as possible. I pinned a width of the silk (that will actually be the petticoat when I get to sewing) into the pleat configuration to get an idea of the look, just because, and here it is.

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(Very wrinkly silk: what happens when it accidentally winds up under a large piece of brocade. Good thing I know how to operate an iron. )

The Danish robe is very simple. with trim only along the center front of the bodice, and because my fabric is so bold on it's own, I don't intend to trim it more than that. The only thing I'm a bit unsure of is the sleeve cuffs. Should it have ruffles? I feel like there should be something there, even if it's a narrow lace frill. But that will be decided when I get closer to the end point, I think.

For now I need to focus on the under bits. The 1780s is more of a rounder silhouette than earlier, without the hoops, and more emphasis to the rear, which will make the gap between back and pleats stand out more, so I think I'll make a rump for this, one that adds some width to my hips as well, instead of the solely rear-heavy one I made for my linen round gown last year.

Stay tuned for more robe à la piémontaise progress! Since this is such a rare style, I intend to document as much of my process as possible.

miss_philomena: (bib front)
With my dress 99% done, and only a buttonhole left to be made, I started on my pelisse today. I'm basing it on the striped redingote in the KCI collection. The bodice is all assembled now, and I need to dig out some scrap silk to line the sleeves so I can put those in tonight, then probably tomorrow I'll put the skirts on.

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And because that's not all I did, have a couple bonnet pictures under the cut )
miss_philomena: (Default)

Because the francaise dinner is only two weeks away and I really do need something better than a chemise gown to wear. >_>

I actually bought this fabric to make this mantua two years ago, but I kept putting off because hey, cutting into expensive silk brocade is a bit scary. Plus to get the mantua length right I wouldn't have enough for a matching petticoat, but after looking at a LOT of 1680s and 1690s plates and etchings, most of them didn't have a matching petticoat.

So today I finally started working on it. I'm mostly following the diagram in The Cut of Women's Clothes for the late 17th century mantua in the Met (it's labelled as 1700 in the book, the Met has it a little earlier). The diagram shows it with a stomacher and belt, which is how I have it draped at the moment, but I might change that. I do know I'm going to do shorter sleeves than what the diagram shows.

Tomorrow I'm going to baste the side body seams together so I can try it on and check the fit and lay of it, and see if I want to have a closed or open front. The only reason I hesitate to do a close front is I'm much wider than the original, and I'm not sure it'd be flattering on me. We'll see~~

I basted the center back seam to make it easier to do the rest of the tucks. The pins are just to keep the fabric underneath from wiggling around before I topstitch it, and the center neckline needs to be trimmed down still.

a couple more pics )

miss_philomena: (strawberries and cream window)

I got Lynn McMasters' 1912 small hats pattern today, and of course I had to start working on that right away~ I'm making view A, the black and white hat in these pictures, though not in the same colors. I've got a lovely dark burgundy-ish cotton velvet that I'm making the whole hat of, and for the moment I've got some ivory lace pinned onto the brim for trim, but I'm not sure I like it. What do you think, flist? The one thing I am liking is how the pointed lace is reminiscent of a tiara.

I've also got a full muslin done of my ball gown for next week, and tomorrow I'll cut the real fabric and start sewing it. It shouldn't take too long to whip it up, I'm thinking the most time-consuming part will be adding all the lace trim.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPad.

miss_philomena: (Default)
I spent somewhere between six and seven hours stuffing bones into my stays today, and I'm still not done. Of course it's my own fault for deciding to make a fully boned pair that has 12 pieces. :x But I took a picture of what's done so far!

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I'm going to do the eyelets before I bone the center back pieces, so those haven't been touched yet, and I have most of the left side back panel to bone still as well, but I was tired and my hands were getting pretty sore at that point. I'm using 1/4" cane for my boning, except for the channels on either side of the eyelets, which will be steel bones. And I might put a busk in as well, but I might wait until I wear them to decide.
miss_philomena: (pierrot side)
So the stays workshop in Williamsburg this past weekend was awesome. I had fun and I feel like I learned a lot. AND I've got the start of a lovely pair of 1780s stays, and I feel more confidant about drafting up some earlier stays as well. Knowing how they should fit and where they should be was always my biggest stumbling block, after all. I definitely intend to take more workshops with B&T in the future. I also plan to use the same pattern, once I finish the blue stays I started in the workshop, for the yellow silk stays I bought fabric for years ago.

Other news: Apparently the Met's website and Chrome don't get along? Or is that just me? I have no problem browsing the Met in Safari, but in Chrome I get the 'down for maintenance' thing all the time. But anyway. I've already picked out what I'd like to make for the Titanic exhibit at the Franklin Institute in January, though I probably won't start working on it until December. I still like having a plan, though, and this way I can keep an eye out for fabric. This adorable little dress is what I have in mind. I'm trying to decide if I want to keep it black or go with a different, but still dark, color. It'd probably be easiest to find black taffeta and chiffon/gauze that aren't too far off from each other, and I have tons of black velvet ribbon that I can do the edging with. I also have four or five yards of some amazingly gorgeous azure blue silk velvet that I'd like to make a cocoon coat with, and black won't clash with that. But I've got time to make final decisions on that as well~

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Isn't it cute?
miss_philomena: (Default)
The yellow bustle is (almost) wearable! I might be pinning myself into it tomorrow, because the thought of making all those buttonholes right now is not a fun one. >_> But otherwise, it's good to go~

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