Flemish Working Man

Finally, A Model...

2006-05-30T19:41:00.000-07:00

Isn't he just the perfect picture of peasanty rowdiness?

We bought him a new belt at the faire. He quite appreciates having a way to carry stuff, and was chastising me for not including pockets in his costume (since I have em in my flemish costume, i guess that's only fair...)

I'd say the menfolk look pretty goshdarn cute....

Mine and Beth's Hubbies!

Bleary Eyed, but Finished

2006-05-26T06:00:00.000-07:00

So, I stayed up til 1:30 last night making sure all was well for this weekends faire (we'll be on the road this evening).
I still haven't packed, but I have a centralized pile of costume things, and among them is the finished flemish man. Not even any handsewing left to do in the car on the ride down....

So, what I learned:
1) Pants suck. Or, the more optimistic version: I need more practice making pants.
2) My handsewing needs work. I ended up doing the doublet sleeve hems in handstitched linen thread. Which sounds perversely period (my new favorite term), except that I think in period they could sew much better than I (see below pic)
3) When making a doublet with skirting, leave a gap in the front for the loin pillow (if there is one). Cuz right now the codpiece doesn't "peek" like it should. Ah, nix that "no handsewing in the car" coment-- this might be something I fix then.
4) Buttonhole stitched eyelets are the shiznit. Oh yeah....
5) Next time, leave enough time to do the buttonholes by hand. the machine ones are nice, but not the same...
And, lastly......
6) Never, NEVER overstuff your ~~walrus~~ codpiece....

That's all for now. My model was not home when the outfit was finished (or when I went to bed at 1:30, so I have no pics of the finished product on him. This is the best I can do--at least you can see the fabric buttons:

Ties with Attitude!

2006-05-25T06:26:00.000-07:00

I went to the fabric store last night searching for the "perfect" ties for this costume. And, naturally, I ended up with perfectly synthetic ones. But they were thin and woven looking and RED. I remembered seeing red ties on a completely not-red outfit somewhere along the line (must fish out that picture to document...), and this just looks so cute:

And, why, yes! Those ARE hand-bound eyelets. I had an eyelet revelation after feeling quite stupid for not understanding them, and now I'm having lots of fun making them. Like Beth said, they're "perversely period." I get sick pleasure out of it...

Those are the beginnings of the jerkin in the dark green. I have since attached the skirting, and its waiting for the lining to be whipstiched in. I actually am really pleased with how the sleeve caps came out, not that you can see it well in this particular pic.

Left to do (tonight and in the car tomorrow, I guess):
Finish eyelets (11 left!)
Place codpiece
Buttons on the Jerkin (cheated--see below)
Buttonholes (time is running out, so i'm cheating and using the machine for this)
Hem the doublet sleeves
Attach closures for the pants
Pin the hat flaps up (they're floppy and driving me mad!)

My button cheat: Considering how little time I have to finish this costume (um, tonight, basically), I had to find a fast way to close the jerkin. Apparently, they have KITS for covering aluminum buttons in fabric. They've got horrible aluminum backs and are not period at all, but they give the right effect on the outside. The best part is that hubby was assigned to do them for me, so, i've got 13 fabric covered buttons and I didn't have to lift a finger! I figure I'll replace them when they start to fall apart and when I have more time.

No Pictures...

2006-05-23T05:22:00.000-07:00

...But, I did manage to get a fair bit of handsewing done yesterday. well, a fair bit for me, anyway, seeing as I generally avoid it....

Finished whipstitching the waistband into the pants, and finished whipstitching the doublet lining in.

I even made a pitiable attempt at a real eyelet, since all my previous eyelets have been thread covered grommets. It was.... not good. :) Anyone wanna suggest a good online tutorial?

Loin Pillow'd!!!

2006-05-22T06:52:00.000-07:00

Part I: The loin pillow
I convinced myself that the way to ease into this costume was to finally finish the codpiece. (Um, yeah, I did say "ease"...even though i've got only 4-5 nights left to finish this costume!!!) Manly costumes are not my cup of tea, apparently--just not as exciting as something I get to wear myself, therefore not as motivating. Especially when said man costumes have no embellishment and are made out of rather boring fabrics/colors....I hope I enjoy the thunderhosen more!

Anyway, after reading over Beth's creation of a codpiece, I started to think that the only thing the walrus/manatee needed were some subdue-ing stitches along the sides of the pouch.
I handstitched (yup, you heard it right--iIactually handstitched something!) along the sides, and I think this version is much more reasonable. I figure I'll try Beth's pattern for the thunderhosen's codpiece, but for this particular project I just wanted to finish what was already on hand, rather than start a new one. There's enough of starting new things later in this post....
With no further ado, the new, improved loin pillow. (yes, the pillow is offcenter, I've decided that's "period" cuz i didn't wanna fix it):

Manatee'd!!!

Gotcha!!!! ;) Okay, really:

Part II--the pants
So, with the codpiece functional it was time to move onto something else. You may remember that hubby's pants were rather ill-fitting. Everytime he sat down he bared a large bit of ye olde plumber's crack. I tried to fiddle with the existing pants to fix this--moved the crotch seam, thought about adding a larger waist band....but in the end, the only answer was new pants. Le sigh. Again.

I had *just* enough of the walrus colored fabric to eek out new pants. I actually sacrificed a pair of hubby's modern pants to figure out construction and what works on him. Convenient that I chose a pair to sacrifice that I absolutley HATE. He won't be wearing those again. Mwahahahaha!

Anyway, I finished them (minus the waistband) and then discovered a huge problem with the fabric....

Why, oh, why, did joann's write on this fabric???!! And why, oh, why, wasn't I made aware of it and at least given a discount?

Grrrrrr....
Anyway, at least the costuming gods were on my side with this (must've been the ugly pants sacrifice), cuz its in a place that I was planning to cut/taper anyway, like the last pants.

So, taper I did, and the writing is gone. they are hemmed, and the waistband is attached, but needs to be whipstitched down on the inside. A bit of handsewing I might pull out at lunch today.

In other news, i'm working on whipstitching the pale green doublet's lining down, and I finished its bottom hem last night.

What's left?:
Handstitching the pants band
Handstitching the doublet lining in
Hemming the doublet's sleeves
Constructing the jerkin--this is where most of my work lies
Many, many eyelets, and,
Hoping the hose I ordered come in time....

A Comedy of Errors

2006-04-18T07:35:00.000-07:00

Yes, my weekend was chock full of sewing evilness. I admit to not finding it all comical. The pants I altered to fit "better" ended up with too short a waist/crotch, and now I definitely have a flemish working man. Particularly if that work were, say, plumbing. I shan't show a pic here, cuz I figure hubby would prefer to NOT have certain cracks and crevices published on the intra-web. I am still considering what to do with the pants. I might have enough fabric to start over from scratch. Or, I could try some advice from Beth and see if i could just lower the crotch. I might try that first, at any rate, to conserve fabric.

The second (very amusing) and very....LARGE....mistake I made was on the codpiece. We have deemed it the walrus. Coo-coo-Ka-Choo.... Though, I think it actuallylooks more like a manatee.

cod front

cod side

Hubby says its too big. Too prominent. Considering the simplicity of the rest of the outfit, I'm inclined to agree. Apparently, Adam is afraid he will get heckled for this. And as I don't ever want to see him embarrassed (okay, maybe just a bit, but not THAT much), I will try to make this a little more subtle. I will try codpiece v2.0 with a scaled down version soon. The original pattern is from Margo Anderson's Elizabethan Man's Packet. There were two sizes in the pattern pack, and I actually chose the smaller. But not small enough, apparently.

Below, you can see the codpiece pattern, and in the same pic, the hat pattern I made up. The hat is actually the only bit of sewing I did this weekend that hubby likes. 1/3. At least I'm batting better than zero.

patterns

In all its goofy splendor, I give you that hat. I used the same red wool from my flemish sleeves (had just a bit leftover). I made it to hopefully look like this one. The seams are purely my own decision, so I can't vouch for period correctness at all, but I think it at least has the right effect, right down to the pseudo-brim, which was purely serendipitous.

hat side

And a few detail shots:

flaps down-- sorta like this.

hat back

That's all for now. More when I work on fixing the plumber crack pants... And downsize the walrus.

Dancey Pants

2006-03-22T21:05:00.000-08:00

Okay, so this is the hemline that i'm playing with for the pants. Advice/comments from the peanut gallery before I cut and sew?

pant "cuff"
The pants, like so many other things lately, are a bit ill fitting. You can see it here, how the crotch is quite low. I think I don't care. Cuz to care means to find new fabric. And I rather like this fabric. I also kinda think that the codpiece will distract from whatever is underneath it, so it probably doesn't matter. Hurray for codpieces! Also, here is hubby doing his best peasant dance. Look at those rosey cheeks. So. Perfect.

peasant dance

Tit for Tat Hat.

2006-03-22T09:05:00.000-08:00

Beth expounded on hats this morning. I feel I should reciprocate. Hubbys sketch (which he did for his own costume, so it must be what he wants, right?) shows a close fitting skull cap type thing. I thought, why not make this more "fashionable"? You know, purely depending on your definition of fashionable.

flap hat-bruegel peasant dance

Looking more closely at hat styles, I see that this particular skull cappy cap has earflaps. Oh, what fun....

flap hat-privatelyheldpbruegelyounger

Then, I found this one in a privately held p. breugel painting. Slightly different ear flaps, but very much the same. This one lacks the extension and what i think are ties of the previous one.

flaphatflip--privately held van cleve

Oh, look, we have "fashionable options" here. This rebel has flipped his flaps up! Oh my, the scandal.

So then, all I had to do was get hubby's approval. He looked at me and said "no way am i wearing ear flaps." So I confidently showed him Mr. Earflap Rebel, and now I'm allowed to make the hat! Huzzah! I think I might even make it red. They do seem to like their red hats. Whether it matches or not.

Still Not Perfect

2006-03-19T21:33:00.000-08:00

But that'll have to do. The sleeves are attached, and I'm done fussing with them. For now.

They do limit movement a bit, a by-product of my ignorance regarding armscythes. When he lifts his arms, the whole thing comes up. Which is annoying, but its actually what happens in the period paintings, too, so i'm torn. No pic of him lifting his arms, as my camera battery died. ;)

The next time I make one of these doublets, i'm doing an entirely different approach. In retrospect, i think that a modified (ie, for men) version of raveness's bruegal bodice would've been ideal. If hubby finds his current doublet too restricting, I still may make a new one using that approach.

doublet with sleeves and polar bear bands!

A Little Black....

2006-03-16T22:21:00.000-08:00

...Goes a very long way. My goal was to dye the linen for lining the army colored jerkin. I had "golden brown" dye, and figured that'd be a nice contrast. Then little miss brilliant (thats me) thought that adding a little black would make it delightfully dingy and peasant like. Indeed, it did. In fact, the black pretty much devoured the golden brown and I was left miraculously with a army greenish black brown. Behold:

The dark green wool with the newly dyed linen on top. Not quite as exciting as having a contrasting lining, but its a delightfully peasanty color, indeed. Should do nicely.

Then I made up my mind about setting the sleeves into the under-doublet. Oh boy, what a decision that was. I had no idea that working an armscythe was so difficult. I'm still working on it, cuz the toile's fit is a still a bit wonky:

Beth--the delightfully hideous print fabric was chosen especially for you.

The pale yellow is the lining for the under-doublet. Hubby has started calling it the "succotash doublet".

The "Wrong" Shirt

2006-03-16T09:27:00.000-08:00

Hubby had an atrociously wrong "scottish" shirt from a simplicity pattern I once used on him. Its got flared bell sleeves and gathered shoulder seams and sleeve tops that are poofily gathered into the shoulder. All sorts of frivilous gathering and unnecesary sleeve fabric that left him getting stuck to many a doorknob. We won't mention how its one of the first things I'd sewn after not sewing for a decade and that parts of it were actually sewn on INSIDE OUT. No, mum's definitely the word on that....

Its cotton muslin, so its certainly not the correct cloth for the period, but I thought this shirt deserved a makeover rather than complete abandonment. I de-gathered all the hideousness and then made the collar a plain wide circle, as so many of the flemish shirts seem to be. Oh, and I made those pesky sleeves quite a bit narrower at the wrist--I think i cropped out about a foot from each. I think it looks "close" to what the flemish men wear, and I'm glad to have rescued the bad shirt. Now I just wish it were linen. :)

The face says it all, really.

reworked shirt

I also cut out bits for the doublet and started to assemble. Here's the outside layer in action. I have the lining cut out, but haven't bothered to assemble it yet. I realized after the fact that i did this backwards....probably better to do the lining first. Cuz I noticed that the top of the collar is overlapping oddly, and i need to make an adjustment.

doublet outer layer

I think a quick snip along this line should do it:

doublet fitting

Doublet'd!

2006-03-14T22:28:00.000-08:00

Worked on a pattern for hubby's doublets today. I started with a commercial pattern, and made alterations from there. You can see that the original (left side) gave him some weird underarm wrinklage, but i think i trimmed it down so it fits pretty well. I decide that while I was at it, i'd go ahead and mock up half as a flemish and half as a doublet, which is why he looks like Victor/Victoria.

pattern back

pattern front

I must take this opportunity to congratulate myself on using a much less-hideous-than-normal mock-up fabric. Here's the final pattern:

pattern

I'm quite torn on whether to attach full time sleeves to this (more like the period art) or have them be detachable. If ever its too hot for sleeves, he could concievably wear the jerkin alone...but the jerkin is wool.....
Then there is the pesky fact that I have no idea how to properly fit a real sleeve into an armscythe. Hrm.

A useful link

2006-03-13T12:39:00.000-08:00

Found this today. Had I searched earlier, it might've saved me some research! Dawn put together quite a nice guide on male peasant wear.

Examining the Flemish Man

2006-03-11T11:55:00.000-08:00

As always, the first phase is research. I did my best to pull images that show men with women in similar attire to my own flemish garb. There seem to be quite a few options for me to choose from--definitely a good thing.

Below are the results of my analysis:

For the pants, there are 3-4 styles that I could find:

Option 1:
There are many examples of close-fitting hosen pants/tights with codpieces--I think its actually the most common style. My guess is that these are cut on the bias and sewn to be rather close fitting. Both of the men in the below portrait wear this style. My husband would be none-too-pleased if I made him these, so they were easily eliminated from my list.

bruegel1610

Option 2:
There are full length loose-fitting pants in various fullnesses, closer to modern styles. I quite like these, but think they might be less heat-freindly. My husband gets hot easily and our faires are during the hellish summer months....

aertsen(1) and bol 1550-1600 (2)

Option 3:
Shorter styles of pants, closer to venetian breeches. I liked this option--it should theoretically be cooler, and its closer in style to future projects that I am "warming up" for. Both of the men in the below picture have shorter style pants (to the knee or slightly longer) with hosen to the knee. I particularly liked the side slit look on the pants of the man on the right. This seems to differentiate this flemish style from the typical venetian breeches. I plan to use this style to make my outfit more distinguishable as flemish. (Notice that the same fellow is an example of a sleeveless jerkin being worn without the doublet layer).

bruegel1603

uytaewaelkitchen

This painting also illustrates a shorter pants with hosen--you can see that his hosen have fallen and he is wearing short venetian-style breeches.

On to the torso:
It seems to be most common that there is a close fitting long-sleeved doublet, shortwaisted and often tied to the breeches, with a jerkin (sleevless or short-sleeved) worn over top.

The doublet layer:
As far as I could tell, this underneath layer rarely had buttons, but rather is more likely to fasten via hidden mechanisms--I plan to use hookneyes. You can see the closure on the red doublet below:

aertsen3

Also of note is that this style does not necesarily have the higher neck of other styles of the same time period (though some other portraits show higher necks).

The outer torso--jerkin:
Over the long sleeved doublet, there is a shorter sleeved (or sleeveless, as in the aertsen above) jerkin. When sleeved, this can have several different sorts of sleeves--caps, poufy, longer short sleeves. The below portrait has a good variety on display:

aertsen2

I believe that the sleeveless looser fit examples (as in the aertsen) are more apt for the lowest class, with the styles getting more structured (more tightly fitten, including sleeves) as you increase in wealth (hubby will fall somewere in the middle). There are also examples in the art of men wearing the vest-style jerkins directly over the shirt without the doublet layer, or the doublet layer alone. Great options for a hot day!

The Codpiece:
Yup, that's right. Lucky husband gets a codpiece! At first, I thought that perhaps they only used codpieces with the close fitting hosen style of pants, but the below portrait shows the flemish venetians accented with codpieces. Ooooh, I'm so abnormally excited to make this part. Mwahahahaha.

valkenborch1585

(Notice that this is also a good example of the short-waisted, long-sleeved doublet being worn without the jerkin--man on the left).

Also, take a look at this beauty--showing the points used to tie the codpiece to the hosen, as well as the points tying the doublet/jerkin to the hose.

bruegel1567

The Hats:
There are so many hats to choose from--many in the pics above, but I like this scene for the hat variety. There is a simple skull cap type, a brimmed (or so it seems) muffin style hat, and a brimmed tall hat. Other portraits show straw hats of various styles, as well. Hubby likes the skull cap one the best, I think. Fine by me, cuz that one look sthe easiest to make. ;)

1600s

The Concept:
So, where does this research leave me? With a concept, of course!!!!

Jerkin and Doublet:
Hubby liked the short-sleeved option best for the over-jerkin. I think that I will have buttons on the outer jacket (a higher class option, judging from the portraits), but the inner layer will close with hook'n'eyes. The doublet (light green) will tie to the hosen. I think that for it to be historically accurate it would have to have permanently attached sleeves, but I'll likely take liberties with this and make them removable--temperature regulation is important for our hot summer faires.

Pants/Hose:
The pants will be to the knee or slightly longer with hosen to the knee, and a codpiece tied on with points. I made sure to incorporate the sleeve and pant splits at the bottoms as in the portraits

I really like the sketch. Hopefully the product will get close to it! Hehe.

I Don't Want to be Single....

2006-03-10T21:44:00.000-08:00

I have taken a long break from costuming, but the next several weeks promise me some free time that I can think of no better way to spend....

Having finished my own flemish garb, I've been thinking about how nice it would be to have my hubby decked out in attire to coordinate with my own.

I admit to having hidden motives with this project of mine--I have never done menswear before, and I realized that I was in way over my head for the higher class gentlemen's garb that I had planned. This is my starter project. Among other things, I will familiarize myself with drafting patterns to my hubby's unique shape, and learn how pants and doublets work--I've never made pants!!!! Also--CODPIECE!!! Yay!

I already have some lovely homespun-feeling fabrics in my stash, and I think they will make a perfectly drab working class outfit. Below are the fabrics--a pale grey-olive cotton-linen blend (same one that's in my flemish, actually), an army green wool and a drab heather grey fiber unknown....

fabrics

Inspiration art and concept sketch to follow....