Links I Like

Hello hello! Just popping in to add some info regarding Regency menswear that I've come across the last few months. Some of these links cover extant garments, some are historical reproductions. They're all useful to look at if you're thinking of making a gentlemen's outfit. I've organized the links by garment type, so there are a few repeats if a post covers multiple topics.

**If anyone would like me to remove the link to your site, please contact me and I will be glad to do so.

Here are the awesome blogs these resources are from, in no particular order. These blogs contain a lot more info than I've linked to here, so go poke around on them!
Jane Austen Today
Two Nerdy History Girls
Romantic History
A Tailor Made It
Drunk Tailor
Mackin-Art
Mme. du Jards Atelier
A Fashionable Stitch
Wearing History

Tailcoats

Top Collar Manipulation - 19th Century Coat

Step Vent

Shirts

18th C. Men's Shirt - including an explanation of why they were so long!

Regency Men's Shirt - Construction Photos

Regency Men's Breeches and Shirt - Finished

Regency Men's Shirt

Waistcoats

Polychrome Embroidered Waistcoats

19th Century Waistcoat - In Progress

19th Century Waistcoat - Finished

Waistcoat and Trousers

Breeches & Trousers

Pockets in Breeches?

Regency Men's Breeches and Shirt - Finished (repeat from above)

Waistcoat and Trousers (repeat from above)

Accessories

Neck Cloths, Stock Buckles, etc.

Buckles and Buttons

Buttons & Buttonholes

Buckles and Buttons (repeat from above)

Grindle Buttons - How-To

Deathshead Buttons - Video How-To

Covered Washer Buttons

Handworked Buttonholes - How To

Bound Buttonholes - How To

Jane Austen Evening 2011 - Menswear Recap

The men pulled out all the stops this year at the annual Jane Austen Evening! The ladies looked lovely, as always, but I thought the men really stepped it up. I've got a few pictures to share of the dapper men - but I missed quite a few, there were too many good-looking gents!

And first, what you've all been waiting for...drumroll please...

Chris in his suit! Here he's got on his tailcoat, waistcoat, shirt and cravat. You can see the little ventilation hole in the shirt that he insisted on leaving open lest he die from the heat. The 1930's pants were a big hit - lots of men were wearing modern pants, and he even got a few compliments on them.

 The annual meeting of the Tolerant Husbands Society. This Society is also open to any male friends or brothers that one might be able to bribe with cookies.

Look at the fabulous fit on this outfit! You have to be confident to wear it, that's for sure, and he was quite snazzy. I like the shirring at the sleeve cap. 

I snuck a back view - since he was gracious enough to pose for the front, I figured it was okay. :o) 

Another Chris! This gentleman sews his own clothes (maybe sometime I can get mixed up and bring him home instead of mine? Nah, we'd just fight over the ironing board or something). He's the mastermind behind this Royal Naval uniform that I've drooled over many times - I was so excited when I saw him walk by and had to go over to introduce myself!

I got a closeup of his neckcloth, very impressive! Chris said he used rice starch on his cravat, and Lauren realized that he used the Perfect Pleater for his shirt ruffles. I found his post on the rice starch on the Regency Society of America message boards, where he is a frequent poster, and I'm sure would be willing to answer any questions you might post. I'll probably pop over with a few of my own!

 Undoubtedly the cutest young gentleman at the Ball. Look at those stockings!

These next two outfits might be my favorites of the night, for sheer ingenuity. These men were accompanied by lovely ladies who deconstructed and repurposed thrifted suits, and turned them into incredible regency wear. What a great idea! you get all the fun of making cool collars etc, without having to make the icky welt pockets! (And they were quite well-done too - it wasn't until I was told *the secret* that I saw how they were remade!)

Another repurposed Regency suit, and the fine lady who made it. 

Showing where she pieced the tailcoat together - cut a little off the front, add it to the back, and voila!

And here ends my menswear recap...don't worry, I know I still owe you a review of the waistcoat I made, and probably a couple other things... :) If you want to see the tasty cookies from the event, pop over to V is for Vintage and say hi!

W is for Waistcoat

I wasn't joking when I said things were going to slow down around here, was I? :) I've been working away, finishing up all the little odds and ends like buttons, hems, etc., and finishing my gown. I've posted about my dress on my new all-purpose blog, V is for Vintage - so if you're interested, please check it out over there!

A couple nights ago I had Chris put on the whole outfit as a first "dress rehearsal". Remember how I was talking about trousers a couple months ago? They're about halfway finished, and we fit them, but he was feeling a little nervous about wearing them. It's a lot of costume to try out all at once, which I completely understand. We decided that instead of him wearing the new trousers, he'll wear some cream high-waisted 1930's style pants he already has - they're fly-front, and the legs are fairly wide, but so what. (kinda funny that he'll be more comfortable in those kooky pants instead of the other kooky pants, but that's how it is. :)

Now that I'm off the hook for his trousers (for now), I think I have time to slap together a waistcoat. It'll be mostly hidden under his coat and I'm just using random fabric from the stash, so I'm just cutting into it without fitting it first. Funny enough, the only appropriate fabric in my stash was the leftover cream wool from abovementioned 1930's pants, so he will be well-coordinated!

Like the shirt and trousers, I'm using the waistcoat pattern from Kannik's Korner. Once I get all three sewn up, I'll be curious to see how well they all fit together (do the top of the trousers meet the bottom of the waistcoat, etc.)

I'm making View C1. Because that's the most dashing.

During the "dress rehearsal", I had him put on a vest from his closet , and I marked where the front of the tailcoat hit. We both decided that his waistcoast shouldn't be too long (not more than an inch or two longer than the front of his tailcoat), and comparing the pattern to the vest, it will be shorter than the tailcoat. That's fine, so we're leaving it alone. Quick and dirty!

Don't forget to account for seam allowance
if you compare a pattern to a garment!

18th C. Menswear Patterns from LACMA

Reposting this link from the fabulous Two Nerdy History Girls Blog. LACMA has posted free annotated pdf files online of patterns from their new costume collection - similar to the patterns from Tidens Toej, but these have notes in ENGLISH!!

1790's Tailcoat pattern for FREE!

Included are patterns for a men's tailcoat, 2 waistcoats, and a banyan (just learned that term - thanks Lauren!). I'm trying really hard to be happy that they chose all menswear for this project... ;)

2010 New Year's Resolution

A trend among bloggers is doing a year-end review and rundown of their work for 2010. I'm not doing this, but it made me think about my 2010 New Year's resolution - my only resolution was to make a tailored jacket. Originally I had a completely different project in mind (a practice jacket where I didn't have to worry about it fitting someone!), but as the year wore on, I chose to make this tailcoat instead.

I still have a lot to learn about tailoring, and a lot of techniques to refine and practice, but now I have taped a roll line and tried padstitching - albeit by machine, but it worked out pretty well. I'm proud of how the jacket is looking, and proud that I'm meeting my deadline!

Shears! I mean, Cheers!!

Thanks for joining me on this journey - here's to having more fun in 2011!

Sleeves

More progress! I've done the sleeves and the sleeve lining, so we're getting close!

I basically flat-lined the sleeve instead of doing a traditional lining - I put it in to prevent the elbows bagging out during wearing than anything else. I did the inside of the cuff with my self wool, since Chris wants to turn the cuff back sometimes.

Sleeve & Lining, Inside View

The sleeve and the lining are sandwiched inside the cuff, and I finished that seam before attaching it to the jacket. I did have to handstitch the lining to the jacket though, and I want to show you a setup I like for handsewing:

Rather than holding the garment in my lap and crouching over it, I like to sit at the ironing board so the garment's weight isn't on me, and so it's closer to my eyes. I find it much more comfortable for long sewing sessions. Sorry I'm never in any pictures, but I do a lot of my sewing before Chris gets home, so there's no one else to take pictures!

And here it is, with his pirate shirt on underneath. Hopefully he won't be wearing low-rise Banana Republic chinos...that was a failed experiment. The sleeves are intentionally long to accomodate the turnback.

Now it's just the faux pocket flap, buttons, & buttonholes! (But boy do I hate buttonholes.)

Christmas Greetings and a New Blog!

I was poking around the internet looking for vintage Christmas images, and found this article on Wikipedia about the first Christmas card - it was created in 1843, and with the reformed Penny Post in London to help it along, the idea quickly gained popularity. Here's the image of the first Christmas Card:

Very Merry Indeed! (even the child in the center gets to join the festivities!)

In other news, I've decided to start a new blog - V is for Vintage - where I'll be posting about everything not relating to Regency Menswear. (I didn't want to have to stop blogging when I take a break from sewing for Chris!) I hope you'll join me over there.

Don't worry, I'll still be updating this blog, especially in the next few weeks!

Lining the Tails

I was a good girl last week and worked on lining the tails - as tempted as I was to do the sleeves, I knew that doing the lining after the sleeves were attached would be a huge headache.

First, here's the image from the coat interior from Fashioning Fashion. It's the only real reference image I've managed to track down. I was relieved to see that the linings were pieced together and didn't match terribly well, and I think I managed to replicate that aspect quite well. ;)

So first up with the tails lining is making the pocket. This is the only functional pocket in the coat, so don't skip it. It doesn't have to be pretty, either, since it's on the inside, so don't let that intimidate you. I just did a standard welt pocket, and just made an educated guess as to the placement. Function, not form.

And here's the final inside view - it's a little awkward because I never figured out how the lining would work during the mockup phase, so I had to wing it. The first lining for the front tails was a little short and didn't go all the way up to the dart, but I thought that was awkward so I recut the lining for the front to extend up to the dart. Next time I'll raise the back tail vent a little higher so it's all at the same level. 

The side edge of the top body facing is just raw edge, joined to the inside body of the coat with a whipstitch. The melton wool doesn't really unravel, so a raw edge is fine, and the stitches are barely visible on the other side. I hope. 

The outside view is much prettier! I promise! :)

One of the things I'm really enjoying about writing this blog is how I can make notes about something, and then come back later to reference it. I'll definitely be coming back to this post next time to remind myself of what to improve!

Girly Stuff

I'm trying to keep most of this blog relating to menswear, but since most of you who read it are women, I figure you won't mind a little girly stuff. :)

Last weekend a girlfriend and I went shopping for fabric for our dresses, and we both scored! Fabric, trim, gloves, shawl, and purse (we both already have shoes). I haven't had such a productive shopping trip in a LONG time - having a second pair of eyes definitely helped. Love the LA garment district!


My loot displayed for our hubbys to admire...

Fitting the ACTUAL COAT!! :)

Hal & Betty - LA Balboa Dancers, 1939

This past week has been busy! Last weekend we drove up to San Francisco to visit my sister and do some dancing - and in some exciting news, yours truly is the 2010 North American Balboa Champion! Okay, Chris and me both, not just me. That sounds much more impressive than it really is...but then, that's usually the case with Titles. 

Enough with this mid-20th century junk, let's go further back in time.

I've gotten the tailcoat body assembled and the collar attached - looks pretty nice, if I do say so myself! I love love love sewing with this melton wool. It's smooth in the machine, presses beautifully, and is even a dream to cut. I hate cutting! I've adjusted the brightness on the pictures so that hopefully you can see the detail. The actual jacket is deep black, not splotchy. My tailoring book actually recommends using a dark fabric for your first tailoring project, so that mistakes are less likely to show. Good call!

As you can see, I went with modern construction techniques, machine sewing the inside and flipping it right side out. If I had known I was going to use that method from the beginning, I would have picked easier/less pointed collar shapes. The M collar point would be much easier to handstitch together on the outside edge - but I felt that I couldn't just do the collar and not do the rest.

I'm not thrilled with how wide the gap is between the collar point and the lapel - I think that on my mockups the points were closer together, almost touching. I think the difference might be partially because of the thickness of the fabric, and maybe something to do with the roll line/breakpoint placement? Anyway, the right and left sides are even, so that's fine. Something to worry about next time.

I used French Collar Canvas from B. Black, and boy is that stuff heavy-duty! I doubt I'll use it again, and instead opt for a medium weight hymo. But I don't have to worry about his collar drooping!

In the back, I took in a little at the shoulder seam at the armhole, because it was gapping away from the body. That's why the seams don't match at the outer edge. To compensate, I might set the sleeves in toward the center back a little further, but this was an Era of Small Backs, so that should look good.

I haven't touched the tails yet, but already the wool is draping in the back much more nicely than the muslin did. Love that wool melton!

Jacket Entrails...err...Innards

First of all, a big thank you to everyone who responded to my last entry - I'm going to take your advice and just focus on one project at a time from here on out. I don't think we'll have complete outfits in time for the ball in January, so we'll have to beg, borrow, and steal the missing pieces (or maybe just rent them ;)


Subject to change, I think I'll finish the jacket first, then do my dress, and then go back to the trousers etc. if there's time (which there won't be). That's kind of killing me, because the trousers are about halfway done, but it's really best to not risk distraction. Big Picture!


Here's my progress with tailoring the undercollar and front body. As I said before, I'm opting to machine stitch as much as possible. I'm (more or less) following the machine tailoring instructions from Tailoring: The Classic Guide to Sewing the Perfect Jacket, which has options for hand tailoring, machine tailoring, and fusible tailoring on every step. I'm having to improvise a little because the shape of my pattern is a little different from what the book demonstrates.

Undercollar - you can see my
padstitching lines, all drawn out
before I decided to machine it!

Hymo for Front Body -
With Shoulder Patch & Waist Dart

Zig-Zag joined Jacket Front
and Hymo at edges -
Taped Line is machined until
a couple inches from CF,
then the exposed section
is handfinished

We're heading out of town this weekend for a dance event, but hopefully I'll have a nice collar to show off next week. I'm working on getting the collar roll right - that whole "turn of the cloth" thing. It's so fiddly!

Sewing on a Schedule

Several years ago, I decided to stop making clothes for specific events - at that point I was pretty much only sewing 30's & 40's clothes for swing dancing, and it didn't really matter if I wore one blouse or another - if I didn't finish it this week, I could wear it next week. I found that if I didn't try to finish by a certain date, I slowed down and the quality of what I made was exponentially better.

While my sewing's gotten much better, I've also become slower than I should be - strangely, I started enjoying the creation process so much that reaching the end of a project wasn't my primary goal. This project is forcing me to pay more attention to the calendar, but I'm worried that I'll rush and become sloppy and cut corners, especially since so much of this is new for me. (yes, I have been called a perfectionist once or twice...)

This was already weighing on me, and then we just decided to put our house up for sale next week. (We've been wanting to relocate to be closer to Chris's job for a while, and we decided to stop putting it off and try to make it happen.) One more ball to juggle!

In order to keep on schedule, I've decided to eliminate as much handsewing as possible, even if the machine stitching shows (buttonholes, etc). I'm just not fast enough at it yet, and it's been one more new skill to learn that's been slowing me down. I also might not finish his complete outfit by January 22, but I want to have at least a couple pieces for Chris, and hopefully a new dress for myself.

Any tips for dealing with these large costume projects? Lists? Elves? Valium? :)

Cute kitty picture to lighten things up! :)

Bling

Formal Dress Suit - German, 1805

One of the pieces I was taken with at the LACMA exhibit was this formal dress suit with detachable buttons. Instead of being stitched on, the buttons are attached to the coat and waistcoat through eyelets - this way the same set of buttons could be used for multiple suits. So clever!

Case with 2 sizes of buttons

Detail of Eyelet Holes

Here are some men's shoe buckles from 1770-1790. Not very Beau Brummell-y, but well within the accepted timeframe for the Jane Austen Evening!

Fashioning Fashion At LACMA

Men's Timeline

Women's Timeline

Last weekend a friend and I went to see the exhibit Fashioning Fashion: European Dress in Detail, 1700-1915 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. They acquired an extensive private collection a few years ago, and this is the first time these pieces have been on display. We took a gallery tour of the exhibit, and the docent promised that more exhibits are being planned for the collection. I hope so!


Here's a few shots of the exhibit - I was surprised at how it was designed to look so temporary, with every piece in its own "packing crate", but I enjoyed that most items weren't behind glass. The lighting was low and photography was only allowed without a flash, so most of the pictures are a little wonky. But that's typical for my blog! ;)

We were surprised
to see several garments
that didn't match
plaids or stripes!

If you can't make it to the exhibit, check out the gallery catalog - it's got wonderful detail images, and even more info on the items than the exhibit had. The quality of the photography is equal to the V&A Fashion in Detail series, although the V&A books have more photos and Fashioning Fashion has more commentary. Plus the catalog has an inside view photo of an 1825 tailcoat - the construction is slightly different from mine, because it has a waist seam, but I'm thrilled to have a reference image finally!

This waistcoat is
long-sleeved - see it poking
out under the jacket cuff?

I snagged a 1/2 price museum membership on Groupon a couple weeks ago, so I'm planning to go back a couple more times before the exhibit closes in March. Who's in for a trip? :)

Final Tailcoat Mockup

One cuff jauntily turned back

Here she is, finally! The final tailcoat mockup. For this mockup, instead of muslin I used a mid-weight washed canvas for the body and sleeves, which is closer to my final fabric.

I'm fairly happy with how it's turning out - the body has a pretty good fit, I got the front and back tails to be the same length finally, and I'm even a little surprised with how nice the collar looks. The final coat feels within reach!

We took the pictures after Chris got home late after work, so there's no head and just a modern shirt. ;)