Goldberry's dress - new and improved and FINISHED

After the disappointment of the darker green dress, the lighter (silvery-green) version went very smoothly.  I am quite happy with the overall look and the construction.

To start, I did a Google Image-search for cotehardies and 14th century fashion to determine silhouette, lacing styles, gore numbers/placement, and (most tricky) sleeve styles (since, once again, I had an idea of what I wanted to do and I wanted to see if it was even remotely historical - lo and behold, I found not one but several examples of sleeves that had the same 'look' - how it would be translated into a painting - as mine).  I used RomanticHistory's post about the construction of her cotehardie as a model for mine (except for the sleeves, since I wanted to do sleeves like on the darker green gown - not the super-narrow tippet-strips that are the most popular).  

So, without further ado, here is the final ensemble, the HSF information, and then (below the break) construction notes).

...yes, the curtain behind me to my closet has water lilies on it.  ...no, that was actually NOT intentional/deliberate to match the scene in the book of Goldberry surrounded by lilies (that just happens to be the curtain closing off my closet).

The darkest photo is most true to the fabric color.

The Challenge:  HSF#10: Literature.  Goldberry, from The Fellowship of the Ring, by J.R.R. Tolkein, as reimagined through a 14th century lens.
(Technically, due to the shapes used - purely rectangles and triangles - this also counts for the HSF#11: Squares, Rectangles & Triangles since at this rate if I want to make a 'princess'-inspired dress I will have to start on that now because I think it'll take a month.)

Fabric: poly-something that looks like a very thin fake silk, silver-green in color (like new white oak leaves); existing yellow linen hand-sewn long-sleeved shirt (1yd 54" wide fabric); existing ivory poly-something (same fabric as green) long shift (3 yd fabric)

Pattern: based on observations of historical artwork, combined with a basic pattern found on the internet, heavily influenced by RomanticHistory's construction of her linen cotehardie (except for the sleeves)

Year: later 14th century

Notions: thread to match the fabric, no trim; 24" of thin (5/8" width) ivory satin ribbon for lacing; 3yd modern gold floral ribbon for 'belt'; 1yd (three strands) golden florists' wire and thin red ribbom for circlet; (not really a notion, but... hand-carved white onyx goblet from Ten Thousand Villages - second favorite store ever, so have to put in a plug for them)

How historically accurate is it?  The look/silhouette is relatively accurate (though I'm not a fan of body-hugging clothes, so it's a tad looser than most of the paintings portrayed it), the fabric most certainly is not though it could pass for silk at a distance (both shift and overdress); linen shirt would be accurate.  Construction is accurate (hand sewn).  So, I'd give it a 40% with adding in accessories (circlet, ribbon strip 'belt', cup), shirt, and shift.

Hours to complete: 12-14 (that's hand-sewing for you)

First worn:  Only for photos; not yet for anything else.

Total cost:  Everything came from my stash (or else already made), so technically 'free' for this project.  I had bought the fabric for $2/yard a couple years ago (yay for red tag!), plus thread for $3 = $11.  With accessories... the gold ribbon was $4/yd, the wire was $5/roll, the ivory poly was $1/yd (best deal ever), the linen was $3/yd remnant, so add in $18 - $29 total for the entire ensemble.

Some more "in character" shots, and details of the final product, below.

The shirt and shift:

"Medieval" (non-accessorized" version:

Sleeves and skirt:

And a few more shots because this came out so well...:

And now, for the construction...



I was quite disappointed that the other green dress didn't work out - but the torso was a bit too long, the skirt a bit too short (I'll have to add a band of contrasting fabric to the bottom, and then line the sleeves with it), the hem a bit too narrow, and the front slit for lacing the torso wouldn't close completely closer to the top.  Grr.

But, as I was driving to work one morning I noticed that there were quite a few trees with new leaves of almost that exact light-yet-not-yellowy-or-bright-green color of the other, thinner fabric: white oaks.  So, I decided that I would now be going with an actual 'Goldberry' dress (the "new leaf" one) rather than an 'inspired' dress.

I had approximately 4 yards of the fabric, of a 51" width.  Since the fabric width was almost perfect length (perhaps an inch or so long) for the gown, I decided to cut four equal-width strips to make into the two front and two back panels (I took my widest measure plus three inches for seam allowance and a slightly looser fit, then divided by four).

After that, I cut the gores, 44" wide at the bottom (left photo, you can kinda see the pins; the fold of the fabric is at the bottom of the picture).  Because I cut the fabric on the fold, I had three full triangles and one set of two half-triangles.  I placed them all on top of each other, all folded in half, and cut a nice curve so that both the center and the edge would equally be 36" to the floor.

I then laid out the four strips and pinned (loosely, since that's a LOT of pinning) the gores flush with the bottom hem (figuring that I can always take in the top if the dress is really way too long).  I pinned the gores one by one, and left the top bodice portion unpinned until all were in place.  I pinned the two half-triangle gores (one each side) with the long end to what would be the front lacing seam, leaving the middle line unpinned so that the dress looked something like a robe.

(Pinned and folded, and pinned and back view on the dress form.)

I then (loosely again) pinned up the back (fully) and the sides (partway) and the shoulder seams, and tried it on to determine how wide the armscyes and how wide/deep the neckline should be.  I didn't take too long with this, since I would do a better fitting after the skirt was sewn.

Then, I sewed all of the gores in place, and pinned and sewed the front gore gap and a few inches of the front seam as well at its bottom.  I didn't sew the top corners of the gores to the panel edges, since I wanted to be sure that the fit was right before I did - and so it would also fit smoothly.

Yup, 220" hem.  That's a LOT of skirt!

After taking a final fitting, I sewed up the back and sides, and hemmed the skirt.  Because the fabric is so thin, rolled seams worked quite nicely.

I then measured the fabric I had left for width and length, and found that I had (literally) just enough width for a not-too-tight-sleeve-at-the-armscye, and just enough length so that it wouldn't touch the ground even if my arms were down.

(Two sleeve lengths on top of each other; the few small pieces of fabric left over.)

I then roll-hemmed three of the four edges (two long and one short).  I pinned the sleeve into the armscye starting with the sleeve rectangle's center at the bottom seam (so that the sleeve seam would be on top) and fit it smoothly into the armscye.  My usual method for fitting sleeves was to sew the sleeve completely first and then fit it (as a tube) into the hole of the armscye - which often led to frustration when it didn't quite fit.  This way, any extra fabric would be taken in at the top of the sleeve in the rolled-seam.  And hey, it worked (the seam going diagonally downwards is the seam on top of the sleeve).

Now, all that's left is the lacing holes.

Since the fabric is synthetic, I actually had to cut holes instead of sticking a pin through and widening a hole between the weave (using the finishing stitches in a 'sun rays' shape perpendicular to the edge of the hole to hold it open) - not a very good explanation, I'm sorry.  I then used the same method (with more stitches because it was cut) to secure the holes - all of two of them before I realized I was running out of time, and that sewing the button holes was making the holes very gappy (so I used a slightly wider ribbon for the lacing so it would fill in those gaps).  I used a spiral lacing placement at 1" intervals since that was period.

Add the ribbon for lacing, and it's all set!  I actually can get in and out of it without undoing the lacing (forgiving fabric, and there's enough "play" in the front lacing since I made the holes a good inch to either side of the hemmed opening).

So, at this point I'm not going to be making the yellow linen cotehardie (narrow sleeved) since my class will be starting this week, and if I want to have even a chance of getting the Civil War evening gown done (even without trim) by the deadline, I need to give myself a solid month.  Maybe midsummer I'll make the other cotehardie.