The Industrious Lady

  Antique 1860s Satin or Silk Moire Ball Gown Bodice Well you can't say our ancestors were not resourceful. This dress is homemade but very intelligently though not exactly kosher sewing methods used. There is fake lacing on what I think is the back, we can see from the inside that the boning and just little extra space is on the side with the hook and eyes. She didn't even fake it all the way up, just far enough so from the outside it looks like it is to the top but really it only goes to right under the edge of the bertha. Being on the model backwards might also explain why the bertha appears to be hanging so strange in the photos. We also see that the hook and eye side is longer. Another reason I think this is homemade is that we can also so the stitches on the outside. Not pretty tiny professional stitches, but huge basting stitches... on the outside of the bodice... on silk.... in a non matching thread. The maker did try, and with such rich fabric its hard to believe that ...

  Ca. 1850's Antique Civil War Era Day Dress From the Seller Ca 1850's Civil War era day dress Brown mohair with sloping shoulders Wide pagoda sleeves with attached white batiste under sleeves Trimmed with black silk velvet buttons and piping Note damage and fraying to hemline and bodice Silk collar included Crinoline not included From the Industrious Lady A lovely display mid 19th century dresses, the buttons are a lovely addition to the ensemble. And how nice to see a dress that has not yet been parted with its undersleeves. Under sleeves that have survived are rare due to their fabric being reused for other projects, under sleeves still left inside their original dresses are even rarer. Without looking its hard to say for certain, but fancier undersleeves were sometimes basted to their dresses, especially undersleeves made of more decorative material and whose purpose was more fashion than protecting the fabric in the sleeve above from body oils. How terribly sad that the he...

Recovering a Modern Parasol So next to velvet, moire is my favorite fabric. And this lovely stuff showed up  at a local thrift store and just had to come home with me. Now this would be considered more of a bengaline than a moire but for sake of post turkey coma and commonly used terminology, any fabric with a "wood grain" pattern hot rolled into the fabric is normally called moire by the modern humans and thus will be dubbed in this article. So I cut a hole in my fabric for the top spoke, stuck it on the middle spoke, and pinched the excess fabric and draped it. Drew a chalk line with tailor's chalk and stuck it through the machine. Through sheer luck, I was able to get the seam lines to basically match up with the ribs so it looked pretty good. I then pinned the raw edges up underneath to do a raw hem. Probably should have ironed this. Part of any good creative process is staring at you creation for a good 2 hours trying to decide what to fix and what imperfections you ...

Mid 1870's Trained Petticoat  So what is a girl to do when she needs both a balayeuse and a petticoat for a mid 1870's ensemble? Why the handy dandy trained petticoat! There is a great source on facebook called 19th century sewing patterns, and has over a thousand patterns and fashion plates from just the early bustle and early natural form years. Yesterday's thimble has a great post about balayeuse that you can read about here  http://yesterdaysthimble.com/tutorials/balayeuse/ So this sweet little number is the best of both worlds of protecting the hem of my dress safe from dirt, especially that expensive silk that my heart yearned for for months. But, we have a problem... I am very, very, very American. Suckled on the teat of the standard system since I could hold a tape... on the original pattern is in centimeters. But have no fear, standard to metric conversion calculator is here.  Boom, there ya go. One converted drawing and somewhat kinda the right shapes. There wer...

 1860s CIVIL WAR era Victorian Greek key trim silk BODICE jacket top 1800s antique vintage 1850s From the Seller Wonderful VICTORIAN blue striped silk bodice with applied ribbon trim in a Greek key pattern. Hand stitched buttons and light boning. Beaded tassels at the shoulders. Drop shoulder and period tailoring. A mixture of machine and hand stitching. MEASURES : bust= 36 length= 17.5 Very good condition. Sturdy without shattering or underarm yellowing ! Repairs at the cuff and a stain on the sleeve.  From the Industrious Lady Hello waist tape! and if you notice, there is machine stitching along the inside seams. We see this more towards the late 1860's, although sewing shops in the early 1860's commonly had sewing machines. One option women during the early sewing machine era would do is have the dressmaker do the major cutting and sewing with her much more industrious and faster machine, then take the garment home and finish it by hand. This way the owner could cut costs. ...