Update from the Day Job:

Penny’s been working on this pair of hand-sewn stays for the past many weeks. Working off and on, and having to do some alterations on the fit, but she’s really been plugging away at them for a lot longer than she wanted to be, you know?

And now they’re done! Hooray!

And here’s Arianna, our autumn intern, who is off to a fantastic start. Here she’s working on the last bits of a new lightweight waistcoat for one of our new interpreters, Vicki, who will start on Saturday.

Arianna had just had a very successful second fitting, and now only has to sew on the wings, finish the sleeves, and do the buttons and buttonholes and it’ll be done!

I’m also making a waistcoat for Vicki, a wool one,  but have a lot more than that to do. I’m also almost done with a smock for Vicki, and have done an initial fitting of a wool waistcoat for Jenna, another new interpreter. Jenna’s actually already started on site, but will need this as quick as I can pull it together.

Then we’ve got one more new interpreter, Molly, who will be working with the Education Department presenting programs in local schools. The stock of clothing was so totally picked over by Jenna, Vicki, and everyone who came before that Molly needs quite a lot of sewing…tomorrow Penny will be remaking the waists of two petticoats so they’ll fit Molly properly, as well as altering the neck/shoulders of a second smock for Vicki.

We had a couple of questions about the stays or corsets that our interpreters wear.I’ll try to answer them, but if I miss something or raise more questions than I answer, let me know.

There are precious few extant examples of early 17th-century (or earlier) stays. The one we use most is in the collection of the Nationalmuseum, Munich. Janet Arnold drafted and published a pattern from them in her Patterns of Fashion 1560 - 1620 book. These stays were the grave clothes of Pfalzgrafin Dorothea Sabina von Neuburg. She died in 1598 at the age of twenty-two.

These stays were made of lightweight finely corded silk. Ms Arnold states that there would have been a linen lining and likely an interlining as well, but all that has disintegrated. If these stays were worn with a 2″ - 4″ gap when laced, as we have found ideal for proper support, then the Pfalzgrafin probably had about a 25″ waist.

Needless to say, these stays fit properly on only a few modern women. In order to fit everyone we have to make a lot of alterations.

I’ve only ever seen one other pair of period stays in person, the late 17th-century pair in the collection of the Pilgrim Hall Museum here in Plymouth. I’ve examined depictions in paintings (most in reproductions of paintings rather than in person), including the pink (probably silk) front-lacing ones worn by Elizabeth, Countess of Southampton in the c.1620 portrait. Incidentally, the Countess is also wearing an embroidered jacket, although the cut is very different from the one we’re making.

Then there’s the Queen Elizabeth I effigy pair, which some folks say are original to 1603, and some say are not. I don’t know one way or the other.

Carl Kohler describes a pair which (I think) he calls early 17th-century in his book History of Costume. Those ones are larger, and are front lacing. I’m not sure they’re early 17th-century, and I’ve never been able to track down what museum collection they’re in and so have never seen pictures of them, only the line drawing in his book.

All of which to say, I wish we knew a lot more about 17th-century stays. We’ve done a great deal of experimental archeology over about 20 years, figuring out by trial and error how to construct and fit stays to a wide variety of shapes and sizes and get them to look like the early 17th-century fashionable shape. I feel pretty good about our results most of the time, but I suspect early 17th-century women had more options than we have figured out.

And yes, the women interpreters can do up their back-lacing stays themselves. I guess it’s sort of like doing up a back zipper, you can do it yourself but it isn’t easy. We do make front-lacing stays, and front-and-back-lacing stays, but we’ve found that the Dorothea Sabina ones fit best on certain body types. The front-lacing ones work better on other shapes, and of course for nursing mothers.

The New England Lace Group invited me to speak about the jacket project at their monthly meeting in the library in Sturbridge, MA, yesterday. I had a lovely day, perfect day for a ride, thoroughly enjoyed meeting with them and of course loved talking about the jacket with people who get why I’m so excited about it. I even took a couple of pictures, but the camera is hiding. When it comes out I’ll share them with you.

When Tricia was taking these pictures, Rebecca was dressing herself in these clothes for the first time. Before this she had only tried them all on, with help, especially with the stays. This time she laced herself in. Once she got into the petticoats I cast a critical eye upon her things and decided to tighten the stays a little. Of course that meant adjusting the waists of the petticoats too. Here Rebecca is hooking them back up after my fussing.

Next Rebecca needs a jacket - in the 1627 English Village called a waistcoat. We have a few probate inventories from early Plymouth Colony - 1629 to 1633. A couple of them mention women’s clothing, and they seem to call the upper body garment “a waistcoat.” It can be hard to match up historic garments with the name they were given in the period, but these inventories list the waistcoat together with a petticoat, which is how they were worn in the period. If it listed a waistcoat with a gown and/or petticoat I would wonder if the waistcoat was sleeveless, but in this case, and with a complete absence of any other named garment that could be the long-sleeved upper body garment, I feel pretty confident that they were calling this item a waistcoat. So anyway.

Rebecca chose to wear a lightweight wool waistcoat this day, because it was pretty cold and rainy. Here she’s buttoning and I’m holding her girdle with suspended knife and knitted pocket. We were hurrying, because Tricia was photographing and she had to leave pretty soon to pick up her son from the English Colonial summer camp.

Here’s a detail of the knife and pocket. There are plenty of 17th-century images of people wearing a belt or girdle with a pouch or pocket and/or a knife hanging off it. Generally, those wearing knives seem to be men and/or working away from the home. Our interpreters, both men and women (and the oldest two boy and girl volunteer children, and don’t think there wasn’t a protest from the younger, knife-less ones), wear a knife on their belt. They each need a knife to do their work, and even though a housewife would likely not have kept her knife on her person as she worked around her hearth and garden, we don’t want to leave them lying around. Both because they might “walk” away and because we don’t want anyone to get hurt trying it out if they should happen to find it in a cupboard.

There is, of course, historical evidence for women having knives hanging from their girdle; those seem to be more for either eating or other delicate tasks, rather than the sturdy work-type knife we’re using.

When last we left Rebecca, she had on her smock, stays, bumroll, shoes, stockings, garters, one petticoat and had had her hair done.

Next is another petticoat. They go on easiest over the head. We put the fastenings in front; I know some others put the closure on the side. I can think of one painting (at least), dated 1569, that shows a woman undoing her stays, looks like she’s either going to nurse a baby or just has. Her petticoat opens in front, along with her stays.

Once you put it on, you have to give it a little flap to make sure it isn’t bunched up in back. In early 17th-century England, little girls (and maybe big girls, too, who knows?) played a game called “making cheeses.” Basically, you twirl around really fast so your petticoat flares out, then quickly drop to the ground. The girl whose petticoat makes the biggest circle on the ground wins. This may sound simple, and maybe you’re thinking that kids today wouldn’t be amused by something so basic, but believe it or not it was one of the favorite pastimes of the little girl volunteers this summer. And some of the big girl staff, too.

Linda H came all the way from Pennsylvania to work on the jacket this weekend. Here’s a picture of Linda pointing out one of the motifs she worked, a butterfly.

Linda brought some of her needlework for show and tell, which was today. Here’s a picture of some of her stitching, which will be part of a beautiful needlework accessories book.

Linda was inadvertently part of a very rude awakening I had today. Wendy was showing her some of the frames, and pointing out what remains to be done. I had thought that the plain worms were stitched in ceylon stitch, like this. Ceylon stitch period. Stop. Done.

So Wendy was saying, “and then the worms get this funny wrapping thing.” And I said, “The Fancy Worms.” And Wendy said, “No, the plain worms.” And she started telling Linda how the wrapping is done. And I said “The Fancy Worms. The plain worms are done.” And Wendy said, “NO. The Plain Worms.” “WHAT?” So apparently the plain worms are NOT DONE. They need wrapping, like this. And I am getting used to that idea.

A couple of updates - Robbin explained in the comments that Laura didn’t have a name tag yesterday so we gave her a spare. Her grandmother’s name is Irene so she picked that one.

I ran into the interpreter whose stays Lacey altered over the last couple of days, and she was all appreciation. Her stays fit so much better and she is much more comfortable. The only problem now is her waistcoat is too big! We can fix that - over her next weekend.