Category: 15th century

Blue Satin Cioppa: Beginning

IMG_1210I wanted to have something new for our upcoming investiture, so I decided to make a new cioppa. I got a decent deal on some blue silk satin, and I have black velvet for trim and white satin for lining in my stash already. The body of the cioppa is pretty much the same as the Pesellino cioppa, except with the normal 6 pleats per section rather than 3. After wearing the other cioppa for a while I will also omit stay tapes below the waist (at least in front), as they make things lay funny when sitting. This cioppa is primarily intended for wearing in court, so looking right when sitting is important. I am also making it with short sleeves, which are uncommon but do pop up from time to time in period images. As much as I like my giant sleeves, I don’t want to have to deal with them in a court setting. If I really don’t like the short sleeves, I should have enough fabric left over to make some larger ones.

Pesellino Cioppa: Pleating

The yoke of the cioppa was taken straight from my farsetto pattern, expanded a bit to account for layers worn underneath and little ease to get in and out of it. Looking at the source image, I decided that the pleated section would start just under the armscye, which made things nice and simple. I guesstimated how big I wanted the final hem to be, did some math based on the number of pleats I wanted, and came up with 4″ wide finished pleats at the bottom. Since they needed to be round, I planned for them to start at 6″ wide, with the extra taken up in the tucks and the curvature. I did some similar guesswork on the width of the pleats at the top, which came out to 3″ for each of the 24 pleats. This is the same ratio I’ve used in the past, so that was reassuring. Despite the lack of precision in the design phase, everything ended up lining up exactly where I needed it to go.

If none of that pleating stuff makes sense, there’s an explanation of what I’m talking about in this handout.

Here’s a picture of one of the panels:

IMG_0841Here the edges are basted together (they will be run through the serger after the pleats are sewn), the pleats are marked out, and one of the tucks has been basted. The basting stitches along the line of the tuck keep the layers together so I don’t miss one when I sew it. The top and bottom edges have also been turned under and finished already. Once all the panels are complete, they are sewn together at the edges and stay tapes are installed:

IMG_0842

 

Pesellino Cioppa: Beginning

I’ve been wanting to make a new cioppa for years now. The first one I made was an experiment using an unfortunately orange cotton print and some kind of nasty fake fur. The second was made of heavy grey upholstery velvet with bag sleeves (more on those later) that fell victim to the displeasure of a cat. The third was made of white satin and is still in service, though the pleats are unattractively flat and creased.

I was finally inspired to start working on a new cioppa by the works of Francesco Pesellino, particularly the Story of Griselda. I had found need of a way to fasten the center front of my previous cioppe, but with no obvious closure visible (and only a hint of a center front seam at all), I had used hooks and eyes. In this image, however, there are clearly cioppe with buttons! I decided to focus on the figure in the center of the image (the grey cioppa with white trim), which can also be seen from the front in the full version of the painting. The pleats start quite low on the chest, and they are relatively wide compared to other examples.

The main way I intend to deviate from the Griselda cioppa is the sleeves. There are a number of different types of bag sleeve, including one on the far left of another Pesellino painting, but I have always been enamored of a certain pair of sleeves from a tomb in Antwerp. They’re a good bit later and not Italian, but I don’t think they’re unreasonably outside of the realm of possibility.

I’ve started on the body of the cioppa already. The primary fabric is a charcoal grey wool suiting, interlined with cotton flannel and lined with red linen. The guards are synthetic burgundy velveteen. The heavy wool I used to use for lining my pleats is sadly all gone, so I am attempting to use burlap to serve the same purpose. Time will tell if this was a good idea or not.

Pre-Pennsic Sewing

The wife and kids are off visiting grandparents for the week, so I’ve had a very quiet weekend of house cleaning, cooking, and sewing. There were a couple of gaps in my wardrobe that I needed to fill, primarily a new pair of brache (made from some heavier linen that hopefully will stand up to wear a bit better) and another pair of chausses out of a nice soft brown wool. I’m going to try using the chausses as netherstockings for my 16c suits as well, so we’ll see how that goes.

Smooth Move

After all the trimming, filing, and drilling, the buttons still had some rough spots and edges, and I didn’t want to spend a million years trying to find them all and polish them. Instead, I tied the buttons up into four bunches with hemp cord, stuck them in a sock, and ran the whole thing through the dryer. They came out shiny and smooth, with all the detail on the button faces still intact. Lacking a dedicated tumbler, this seems to be the next best thing.

Also, a picture of the large buttons:

Doing The Work Up Front

I’ve been finishing a big pile of buttons, and I’ve decided that I need to make some serious design changes next time I make them.

  1. While the fabricated shanks seem to be historically plausible, they’re a giant pain to do. I think I’ll make another mold back with integral button loops. It’ll be fiddly to make, but worth it for all the finishing time it’ll save.
  2. I need to make the buttons thicker so they can have wider edges. Finishing the thin edges is annoying. Making things too thin is nothing new for me; I really need to stop it.

Buttons!

I promised to give a set of pewter buttons to the winner of the 15th century category of my Sharp Dressed Man contest, but I hadn’t ever gotten around to figuring out how to make them. I looked at some extant buttons, and it looks like many of them have flattened shanks with drilled holes rather than shanks cast as loops. This meant that I could use the same mold for integral rivet belt mounts and buttons. I made a button face mold out of a little scrap of soapstone, and gave it a shot. One of the mold cavities didn’t quite line up with the shank right, but the other one hit dead center. I mashed the shank flat with vise grips, drilled the hole, et voila!

Field Tests

I mourn for all the years I wasted not wearing wool hose. These were by far the best hose I’ve ever worn. They fit so well that I hardly ever thought about them, were only hot when I was sitting in the blazing sun, and looked great. Aside from the inevitable wrinkles at the ankles, there was no bagging or sagging anywhere, even after a long day of wear. I think I’ll cut the next pair a bit higher in the crotch, but that’s about all I can think of. I put a doubled linen facing at the waist (and accidentally in the crotch curve, but that’s another story), which made a nice sturdy place to put in the eyelets.

As for the brache, they seemed to perform well, aside from a couple of seams blowing out. I think they may be a touch small, so the next pair will get an extra couple inches in each leg. Otherwise, no complaints.

Dreamstone was a lovely event, composed primarily of hanging out with friends and occasionally dropping in for field-side classes. The weather was beautiful.

New Projects

This past weekend I showed Philippa how to do pewter casting, and she made a whole pile of bling for her Eleanora de Toledo gown. I’m looking forward to seeing how the rough castings turn out once they’re all assembled.

All of my old brache (linen drawers) have been wearing out, so I decided I needed to make some more. I’d been using a pattern with two tubular legs and a strip that went all the way through the middle from front to back. It works well enough, but tends to wear through at the top of the inner thigh. This time I switched to a square gusset in the crotch, and so far it seems comfortable enough, with less bulk at the waist. This weekend will be the test to see how it works in real life. I have high hopes.

I also finally started a pair of wool hose. I have some tropical weight worsted wool suiting that I bought at least a year ago from fabric.com. It’s very light and drapey, and I’ve been putting off using it for far too long. I cut out the legs (on the bias, of course) using my trusty old hose pattern, sewed up the back seam, and pinned them on to an old doublet. I am ashamed at how long it’s taken me to try this, as they look, feel, and fit wonderfully. We’ll see if that remains true once I get the feet and lacing holes in, but I suspect these will be my favorite hose. One step closer to a decent pair of full hose…