Month: December 2012

Laurel Badge

I knew that I would need some Laurel bling to wear at 12th Night (bad form to be stealthy out of kingdom), but I didn’t have anything that I really thought would go with the new suit. I’m going to make a new hat that will need something interesting on it, so I decided to make a badge for the hat. For what I wanted it was going to be easier to make a positive master and sand cast it than carve a mold. Besides, I really didn’t need the ability to make more than a few of these. I rolled out a disc of sculpey and stamped the leaves into it with a tool carved from a bit of plastic sprue. I sketched out the rook in the middle with the tip of an x-acto knife and then baked it. Once it was baked, I trimmed the edges down to a nice sharp bevel and carved the rest of the rook out. The finished master went into the sand and I poured up a copy, using a nail to make a couple of prongs on the back side of the mold. I bent the prongs into loops that I will use to sew it on to the hat. Some old model paint did an admirable job of faux enamel for the recessed bits. It’s not really based on anything particularly historical, but I’ll give myself a pass today.

Veronese Suit: Pouch

The jerkin is just about done, but I took a little break to make myself a pouch. I’ve been wanting one of these ever since I saw Purses in Pieces. I didn’t want to carry around my big pilgrim’s scrip, and I didn’t really have a decent belt pouch. Everything here came from my stash. The outside is leather recycled from a friend’s couch reupholstering project, and the inside is pigskin left over from bookbinding. I have no idea where the buckle came from. The side seams were done on the machine, and the center seam was sewn with a strip of the pigskin. It took me a while to figure out how to get all the holes lined up through all the layers, but then I realized I could clamp it down with some scrap wood. It only took a few hours to put the whole thing together. Of course this is a relatively simple example with no pouchlets, but it should do.

Veronese Suit: Doublet

The doublet is finished! I may have been able to make it less heavily constructed, but I didn’t want to risk having it be super wrinkly.

Veronese Suit: Codpiece

I’ve finally got enough pictures to make this post, so here goes. This is pretty much the same codpiece pattern I used for my last pair of joined hose, aka the “birdnester” codpiece. It took a couple tries to get it in the place I wanted it, but I think it turned out pretty well.

Rondeau: “I hold your hand”

I hold your hand and ask your name,
A simple spark to light the flame
That burns within and shines without
Till soon enough I have no doubt:
My life will never be the same.

I bare my soul – I have no shame –
I bet it all to play the game.
And while we dance and laugh and shout
I hold your hand.

As each year passed, the next one came;
It’s nature’s way, no one to blame.
The flowered field gives way to drought,
So day by day the sands run out.
When Time arrives to stake his claim
I hold your hand.

Written December 13, 2012.

Rondeau: “Remember me”

Remember me when I am gone,
And shades before my eyes are drawn.
Tell people that you knew me when;
That I taught you what you taught them,
So by my works I can live on.

Your face, lit by the rays of dawn,
Is in my heart, though you’ve moved on.
You stir, and wake, and smile, and then
Remember me.

A soldier born, I’m fortune’s pawn,
By fickle fate forever drawn
To fight and fall and rise again
So my name might be known to men
And every knave or paragon
Remember me!

Written December 12, 2012.

Veronese Suit: Hose and Imbusto

So obviously I decided to point the hose to an imbusto instead of to the doublet. I think this is going to be a good decision in the end, as I already have some other styles I want to make, and that means I can experiment without having to make a whole mess of eyelets for each one.

So, on to the hose:

The hose are made from some nice stretchy wool with a kind of weird but inoffensive weave that I got for cheap on the interwebs somewhere. I’ve made 15c hose with it before and it worked fine. As usual, the hardest part of this was actually cutting the legs of the hose, but one I started it was no big deal. I used the same pattern I’d worked out from the blue linen hose for my last iteration of the Flemish peasant suit, with a little extra all around to play with. I ended up cutting off the height I’d added to the waistband, but better to have it available than not, I suppose.

The waistband and center front were reinforced with three layers of medium weight linen, and the waist was bound with a strip of the wool. I went for 7 pairs of eyelets on each leg, and I think I can get by with two pairs to close the center front.

The imbusto was originally an experiment for a 15c Burgundian suit that I never finished, which is just as well because I was doing it wrong. I went through a bunch of song and dance trying to get it to fit right and put the waist at the right level. I put a gusset in the back, then took that out and put in a full height panel, took it in at the shoulders to raise the waist, took off the skirt and sacrificed the original eyelets, added length back at the shoulders, and put in a whole new set of eyelets at the bottom. It still needs some finishing work, but I wanted to make sure the darn thing actually fit:

 

 

Obviously, I haven’t installed the codpiece yet, but I swear this is the most comfortable pair of hose I’ve ever made. I really need to rework the pattern to move the back seams, but as far as comfort and movement, the combination of pattern and material make me very happy. I may put a little dart in the top of the imbusto to bring the shoulders in if it really bothers me.