The Red Dress

After my first little hand sewing project, a short shoulder cloak with a small hood, I realized that hand sewing really isn't the end of the world. I had previously bought some fabric and trim to start a late period Spanish gown, and decided I would try and hand sew the entire outfit. The dress is inspired by one of Anne of Austria's gowns, when she reigned as Queen of Spain. The portrait it is based on was painted by Alonso Sanchez-Coello in 1571.

The Spanish doublet style front, and false sleeves are a look I find very flattering, and as I wasn't able to get any extra yardage of fabric I opted for that cut, as the sleeves are very conservative in terms of how much fabric they use. I selected a very pretty burgundy and sage green beaded trim, with gold embroidered trim edging the beaded trim to give a similar look to that in the portrait. I am very much looking forward to seeing the progress on this beast as it comes together!

After drafting the pattern with much assistance from my Laurel, and much erasing as I am apparently not great at measuring, I was ready to get started. We figured that with careful cutting I would have enough fabric to cartridge pleat the skirt onto the bodice, and decided on a pattern for trim application.

I started working on the trim application a few days ago, and I'd say have about 15 hours of sewing into this dress so far. I decided on a chevron pattern as the trim is costly, and this is my first attempt. Here is the front of the bodice:

It was a trick getting the edges to line up, and deciding what angle and how much space in between for the chevrons. Because they extend to the seam line on the side of the bodice, I'll have to sew coordinating ones along the back too. Below is the main trim before the gold is added.

And another after sewing on the two pieces of gold thread. Both trims were hand stitched on using a whip stitch, evenly spaced along the edges of the main trim, and down both sides of the gold trim catching the thread in each loop. Very time consuming, but has been a good process so far. I'm using just a basic sewing needle, and Coats & Clark All Purpose cotton thread, stiffened with beeswax. There appears to be a tiny bit of puckering along the trim lines but I'm hoping that will clear up as soon as it's ironed.

So far I have the right side of the doublet completed, and the thick trim on the left side. Hoping to get both front sides finished tonight but we'll see how that goes.

Total sewing time to date: About 15 hours