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.