Day 6 (8 days to go before Steam Century Mysteries)

Well nothing much to report today. A Spring cold cracked me up side the head big time. Then, as I was about to put the boning in I noticed things were not right and I had to rip out several seams because a piece had been sewn in upside down. That has been fixed and tomorrow the boning and busk will go in!

Day 5 (9 days until Steam City Mysteries)

What's fun about making a corset....nothing. Now wearing a well-fitting corset is another matter. I really don't have too much to report today. I spent most of my time serging, sewing seams, casing steel boning (and the busk) before calling it quits. At least by the end of the day, my project had the basic shape of a corset. Tomorrow's goal is to sew in all the boning/busk I cased today. I wonder how many needles I will break.

Day 4 (10 days before the Steam Century Mysteries)

Today was a mixed bag in the goals department.

1. Embellish the buttons for the jacket-I have enough of some items, and not enough of others. I took the Pewter buttons (as purchased on the left) and washed them in a bit of Ultramarine Ink to match a bit more with the jacket material and then picked up some embellishment items. I didn't have enough of one of the components to make the buttons match, but that will be fixed tomorrow (completed button on the right).

2. Have my test corset fit @ SCA Practice. Lisa did the fitting for my modified Victorian Corset Pattern from Past Patterns. It went well, with only a few pins here and there. I am very pleased with the results. And the best news is I don't have to cut apart the test piece for pattern pieces!!!


3. Re-cut the corset pattern. I'm taking a break from cutting to update my blog, but the pieces will be cut before heading to bed tonight.


4. Boning and busk layout. I took my steel supplies with me to practice but didn't have the chance to layout the boning (I have too much fun practicing with Rapiers!). This will also be finished up before I head to bed.

My goals for Good Friday are simple...not. Corset Sewing and drafting the Jacket Pattern from the 1889 Garment Patterns book or seeing if I can make some major drafting changes to Simplicity's Civil War Pattern 2887.

Day 3, Part 2 (11 days before Steam Century Mysteries)

After a Birthday Dinner with friends and watching Sherlock Holmes with the husband; I got to work by first sewing on the internal lacing of my bustle. I still don't think I have the correct tension, but I know the lacing needs to stretch a bit.

After tying up the bustle, I went to work sewing the back pleats of the underskirt and giving them a spin on the dress form. Much better!! The final fitting and the waistband will have to wait for the corset and the petticoats layers.



The goals for Thursday (Day 4) will be:
1. Embellishing the 12 large pewter buttons I bought at the Kalamazoo Living History Show
2. The corset fitting @ SCA Practice.
3. Re-cut the corset in the proper material
4. Boning and Busk layout is correct.

On a final note, here is a sample of the fabric for the jacket and over-skirt of my bustle dress. Shown in this photo are the right and wrong sides. I am not sure yet, which is which!

Day 3 part 1 (11 days before Steam Century Mysteries)

Well, the lure of the the sewing table called me back. I put Sherlock Holmes followed by League of Extraordinary Gentlemen into the Laptop and got to work.

First, I cut the gored panels for my underskirt. At first the fabric and I did not see eye-to-eye but things settled down when the cloth conceded that I was right and we were doing it my way. While cutting the fabric I decided that I would need to alter my design a bit with the addition of another fabric for the double-breasted jacket pattern I will be drafting out of Garment Patterns of 1889.

After taking a break from pattern matching my panels, I did a test lacing of my bustle, and boy does it now have Junk in the Trunk!! I pinned the lacing in place and I'm letting it sit on the dress form until tonight when the lacing rings get sewn in.

Then it was back to the skirt panels. The fabric was still giving me trouble. Woven into the plaid design were stripes of heavier thread, almost fine cording so once cut the fabric began to fray madly at those stripes. I sent all the panels through my serger, hoping the pattern would not be stretched out too much. It was a wise move since it actually made matching up the plaid a bit easier...though not perfect. I put in my pleating, dropped it over the bustle and realized that I had applied the back pleats to the front of the dress. I'm going to be pulling them out this afternoon. To the right is a picture of the incorrect pleating.... more later.

Day 2 (12 Days until Steam Century Mysteries)

Well today was a good day. I've decided to use the Past Patterns number 213 for my corset. I'm a bit long in the torso so my first job after cutting out the pattern was to lengthen it a bit. After snipping and taping; I cut out the pattern, wondering why there were so many pieces...Well, I managed to cut all three of the cup styles (B, C and D). Dumb!!

Selecting the C cup I got to work and put the pieces together and gave the test corset a spin on the dress form. Not bad, but I will need a proper fitting on Thursday at SCA Practice. That's all for the day, since I have to see the dentist (did I mention I've already been to the Doctor's office today?), and then watch Sherlock Holmes and Justified tonight. Tomorrow I will start on the skirt. I will leave you with a preview of the fabric I think I'm going to use.

Day 1 (13 days until the Steam Century Mystery)

Well, I've finally begun work on my second Late Victorian outfit. I've been an American Civil War Reenactor for over 20 years and branched out 14 years ago to SCA and about 10 years ago to World War II.





I've always been interested in all things Victorian. As a grade-school student my mom and I read authors such as Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, Sir A.C. Doyle and others. The Steampunk Universe seems like a perfect place for my childhood imagination to come out and play. And my creative side gets a chance to design and make clothing I most likely would not get to show off at a historical event. Originally I started making Steampunk Style jewelry (some pieces are available in my eBay store and soon Etsy.com) and then realized I needed to be a bit more covered to attend Steampunk Style Events!

What is Steampunk you ask?
Steampunk is bringing together the elements of a Steam Powered world (the Late Victorian & Edwardian period of history) and mixing in Fantasy and Science Fiction. There is also an important element of Steampunk that seeks to take the modern and reinvent it in the Steam genre. Computers, I-phones and other modern conveniences take on new guises in the Steampunk world.

There are two distinct sources of Science-Fiction for the Steampunk genre. Please note that both lists are not all-inclusive and there is a wealth of books, shorts stories and more that are on the Internet and in bookstores.

First there is the SF that was written and published by those who lived during the LV&E era such as H.G. Wells, Lewis Carroll, Robert Louis Stephenson and Jules Verne. Second, there are the modern authors such as Michael Moorcock (Nomad in the Time Streams series), James Playlock (Homunculus), graphic artists such as Alan Moore (League of Extraordinary Gentlemen), Phil and Kaja Foglio (Girl Genius), and anime/manga artists such as Hayao Miyazaki (Castle in the Sky, Howl's Moving Castle) and Koichi Chigira (Last Exile).
As for fashions, the Steampunk world pulls from many sources, some reaching back to the Age of Pirates, others firmly grounded in the time of King Edward II and all points in between. My needle casts in the Late-Victorian period for my clothing.
My first attempt (the blue dress to the right) was done a few years ago and is a nice bustle dress, but a bit early for use with Steampunk. My Second attempt will be pulled from the pages of Ladies Magazines from 1889, and will have a small bustle. I don't have a proper bustle so I will be making that undergarment first.. This is a confidence builder for me as I have lots of outfits to get ready for vending @ Cyphan at the end of June.

I started today (at around 4:00 PM) with some printed cotton satineen that will serve as the fabric for both my bustle and corset. I researched through my own library (over 200 printed sources and nearly 80 gigabytes of digital references) until I found enough pictures to make a rough pattern for a bustle. Including a break for dinner I was finished by about 8 PM. Overall, I think my first attempt isn't too bad. I didn't have any spare steel hoop boning so I substituted 3/8 inch half round reed. I will have to put in a bit of lacing to shape the bustle more but I wanted to give the reed and the fabric a couple of days to get used to each other. Tomorrow, between visits to the Doctor and the Dentist, I will be cutting and shaping my corset pattern. Ick.