Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 23:28:24 +1100 From: "Elizabeth Walpole" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [h-cost] What can I do with this fabric? To: "'Historical Costume'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Hi everyone, I've been trying to cull some stuff from my fabric stash and I've hit a fabric that I love and would like to keep but I can't think of a use for it. It's a silk/cotton blend voile (it basically looks and behaves like cotton voile I think it's about 20% silk) in violet. From memory it's 130cm (52") wide and I have about 8-10 metres (I can't remember exactly how much but I remember I bought the remainder of the roll and I thought it would be enough for a decent gown). Anyway, my original plan was a Victorian (probably 1850s-60s) sheer dress but I so far I haven't seen evidence for a solid colours (not counting white) in sheer cotton dresses of that period. So what would you do with this? I'm open to just about any pre 1900 suggestions but I don't want to have to stretch the historic accuracy too much and I'd prefer to use the whole piece in one project (little fiddly projects are the reason I've never been tempted to try quilting). There is the dress described in 'Costume in detail 1730-1930' as being a Purple-black satin with matching gauze overdress, dating from the 1830's, and Currently in the Snowshill collection. That's quite a lovely dress (imnsho). There's also (and this is from memory as it's been a while since I looked at a Copy) a mention in 'The Cut of Women's Clothes' about a short trend in the 1660's For women to wear 'sheers' over their gowns (it was memorable for the quote from Charles II saying that he would be quite happy for the ladies to wear nothing Else). I've never seen any other evidence for this, particularly pictorial evidence, And I've always been quite curious as to whether it was true or not, and what such A thing might look like, given that the style of the time was quite rigid and structured. Claire _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list [email protected] http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
