Well its nearing the end of the month and progress is slow but that happens when you can't work on gowns at your job. However, I did get the lovely Tudor necklaces done with the supplies I gushed about in my last post. They turned out stunning and can't wait to wear them with a new gown or one of my treasured Tudor creations. I worked hard and finished them a week ago and they are more beautiful than I envisioned.
There has been some developments on my prospective Helen Snakenborg Elizabethan gown. I got the fabric and trim in the mail last week. Extremely ecstatic to see the perfect shade of peach staring back at me from the envelope I received in the mail. Its not silk like I hoped to find, but $80 a yard is just too rich for me when it comes to fabrics. Its 100% polyester but I am happy with it for the price and color.
Instead of being unhappy with the makeup of the material I focused on the right shade of perfect peach. Since the images I found online varied from shades of brilliant peach to soft light peach, I browsed more satin than I want to mention comparing my image to the photo of the materials online. Justin and I just recently procured a new flat screen monitor and its lovely to see the colors jump right off the page. Its really helped alot with this gown research because I can see much more clearly the details of the painting when I zoom in on a image.
I purchased "a look like lace" to match the velvet and gold embroidery on the original gown, it just so dead on its uncanny. This lace like trim works out wonderfully for the effect I am trying to achieve with this gown. I mentioned about using the silk charmeuse my sister bought me in my last post, which I do intend on using it for the lovely embroidered shirt originally used for the portrait. Though I wasn't sure about the floral embroidery that I would have to stitch to make the roses on the shirt. So I had to look into this more intently.
This week I gathered information on the proper technique from my local embroidery guild meeting. I showed my progress to the shire guild mistress and good friend, Lady Jaqueline De Moliere. She is thrilled with all the work I have done to get the fabrics and trim just right, we had lots to talk about. I told her about the embroidery for the shirt and making it from crewel techniques which she agreed either would work depending on my execution of the embroidery. I was unsure of the proper steps for this, which she told me back them they normally embroidered the fabric first with the outline of the garment traced out. So this is what my intent is so I hope to embroider a test square of the pattern to figure out stitches and begin this within the week, fingers crossed.
I do have an a book Exploring Elizabethan Embroidery in the mail to me but I am not sure how long it will take to get here from Great Britain, though it is already in the mail. So far so good. Lots to think about and work on so I will leave it at this for now, more updates as the come.
Oh my heart just one gown at a time, lol.
Maureen
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