Might as well join the queue!
Until I lost my full-time tenured position in the English department
of a university that decided to "downsize" its faculty by forcing a
strike and then hiring permanent replacements (70 tenured faculty
lost their jobs in this, the ONLY venture into using that Taft-
Hartley provision against a college faculty), my only sewing was
clothing for myself and family--work outfits for myself, wedding
gowns for my sisters, other gift garments. I was also a self-styled
"queen of string"--knitting, crocheting, quilting, bobbin lace,
embroidery, a little weaving, tatting, all sporadically but all with
great satisfaction.
Turned into part-time faculty member at multiple universities (for
the budget and the being useful) and also a budding director in
community theater (for the self-respect and the soul). To use my
education (concentration in Elizabethan and Jacobean drama), I chose
to mount plays from those periods, and later from Restoration and
18th century as well. To COSTUME those plays on a miniscule
production budget, I became an amateur costumer on the fly. And what
fun that's been! It's also been a lot of fun for the other domestic
clothing-makers I've dragooned into service--they've loved the sewing
challenges and the chance to work with fancy fabrics and trims (thank
goodness for stores named things like Affordable Fabrics and Discount
Fabrics, plus a few compassionate purveyors of decorator fabrics!).
These costumes aimed for historical "line" and "look" but not
necessarily for authenticity--which, as I've noted in a number of
postings, is the prioritizing theatrical costuming has to do. I also
costumed an early-music ensemble, and made his-and-her costumes for a
partner and me to play King and Queen of Yore for a "medieval
banquet" fund-raiser at a church in Torrington, CT.
I've just landed a Visiting Assistant Professorship at one of the
universities where I've been teaching part-time, so for the next year
(or, if I'm lucky, two) I may find myself with a little more free
time than I had when carrying anywhere from 3 to 6 classes a semester
and also doing a couple of other part-time jobs, including editing a
newsletter for the Connecticut Conference of the American Association
of University Professors (I'll continue with that one). There's also
been a power shift at the community theater where I've done most of
my period directing (as one Associate Board member characterized it,
"the rats are steering the ship"), and I expect to be taking a break
from directing there. With this free time I think I will embark on
something more historically authentic for myself. With no particular
deadline, it should be a very enjoyable project, and my first real
opportunity to apply the lessons I'm constantly learning from the
wonderful people on this list.
Ruth Anne Baumgartner
scholar gypsy and amateur costumer
In a message dated 05/06/2007 03:10:39 GMT Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
2 months is an impressively short amount of time for such a
project!
I get the sense from messages I have read that most folks on this
list do
not make/study/write about historical clothing for a living. Is
this
true?
If so, what do you all do to fund your need to build historical
clothing?
I am an attorney by day but I am fascinated with all types of
historical
clothing from about the 15th century through the 19th. Someday I
will
focus
on one time period but I haven't yet.
Jennifer
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