My medieval May day outfit

It's sharing time

 Just something fun I did. 

 For a long time my friend has wanted me to go to the May day medieval festival. 

 This was the year we went however 

we only gave ourselves a tiny bit over a week to finish our costumes.

I don't know much about this time period so

 I spent some hours watching Cadfile and Robin hood episodes.

Glad I didn't live then...

I decided on a nicely quilted vest and double skirts 8 gore.

So there are three layers in my skirt and

wow does that make you look larger than you are!

Lets start with the Vest. 

I wanted the shoulder to be long so it made that cap they wore

I wanted the back to be longer than the front, kidney warmer style

I wanted to be able to lace up the front 

I took out my cardboard I made from my Vest

I am full busted and so had moved my shoulder dart to my bust side

It makes it easier for me to see if the bust area will fit

I traced this form onto pattern paper

I started drawing the planned changes

I drew out the shoulder by a lot

I added a fold in the front for the lace loops

I made the back longer drawing it

from the sides and working it longer in the back center.

You can see that box around the bust dart? I moved my 

dart to match all those layers underneath. 

Maybe you can see the quilting. Just click on the photo

It took a day to quilt each side.

I was teasing my friend about being her servant

so quilted this on my machine in gold threads.

If you know this time period you will know that only the

wealthy were allowed gold or silver or copper in their clothes. 

My way of having fun with the upper crust

I added 1" to each side and the bottom for quilting.  I didn't need it

I quilted the fabric onto a flannel back and used a walking foot

and the fabric didn't shift at all!

 The white camisole was purchased and I know the sleeves

are Renaissance.

The vest is a little bigger on me than I wanted. I should have removed that

3" the lacing added.  Before I wear it again I will take in the sides 

The outer skirt is linen 

The inner skirt is cotton

Camlann had suggested Spring ware in yellows or greens 

so I raided my sewing stash! 

Oh here is the web site for the fair 

http://www.camlann.org/

This 8 piece skirt was really fun to make

All you need is one pattern piece.  

I wanted to be sure the bulk of the fabric was below my waist 

It was bad enough to have it going over my hips! 

I used a straight skirt pattern

No flair...no A shape, just straight.

    FROM THIS

TO THIS

 The skirts each took 8 of these

If you'd like to learn how to make an 8-gore skirt and you

don't have one in your lutterloh patterns.

I'll write a whole posting on how.