In a message dated 4/3/2006 9:47:12 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
In the 19thC, the full fabric crinolines were often drafted with shaped pieces. By putting the piece with more bias to the one with less, the straighter piece pulls the hoop backwards, balancing it. ********************** Only in the mid 1860s to the end of the era before it goes into bustle. The effect of cutting a gore with the front edge on the straight and the back on some kind of bias is to push the fullness to the back because the straight will fall vertically and the bias will give way. [You see this construction, w/out hoops of course, in 1890s and 1900s fashion skirts as well....the effect pushing the fullness to the back] But it was also achieved with just a cage....by adding extra vertical tapes at strategic places in the back part of the cage crinoline. And cage or petticoat, these shaped hoops almost always used a pad at the back to keep them balanced. Remember the early hoops were used to relieve the wearer of the multitude of petticoats worn to get the dome shape of the 1830s, 40s and 50s. They were often small....a little more than a stride...and the hoops started at about knee level. Throw one or two petticoats over these and you have the same shape as just 5 or 6 petticoats. Looked at from above, the shape was basically a circle with the wearer in the center. Of course some small pad or wadding might be added to the petticoat or even the skirt to give the back more bulk. These early hoops were not meant to change the silhouette. But later, as the hoop comes into its own, it and its cut actually determine the silhouette and you get the hoop which sweeps to the back....looking from above, an egg shape with the small end at the back and the wearer in the center of the widest part. The dome shape gives way to a more triangular silhouette achieved by flat pleating the skirt to the waist, as opposed to gathers or cartridge pleats. I suppose you could use one of the earlier hoops as a farthingale and get away with it. But a real farthingale would not be of watch spring steel. Cane, rather, and not as flexible or light. And farthingales usually have hoops that start higher than knee level. And the farthingale look is triangular. In Janet Arnold there are flat pleated skirts in many of the Renaissance gowns. And some are gored, not just straight panels, to get that triangular silhouette. _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list [email protected] http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
