Guess what time it is, kiddies?

That's right! I have made my decision on my Halloween costume, and the research has commenced. I was determined to have a gaping wound this year, and since I figured that my original idea, the gutshot cowboy, would prove sticky over the course of an evening, I decided a smaller, more localized trauma was in order. Bust magazine had good instructions a few years ago for slit throats, and the seeds of my costume were planted.

I was inspired by this story, which I think I probably read for the first time in one of those lame urban legend books that fall into your hands, usually via Scholastic book club orders, in the formative years of your youth. I remember that the young man in the story was a noble, maybe even a prince, and that the young woman insisted she was a commoner who carried herself like an aristocrat. Or maybe that is just a few too many Georgia Heyer books in junior high.... Anyway, I have been lusting after a mid/late-Victorian bustled evening gown (1873 is the magic year) for a really long time now. That in mind, I have made the decision to set my costume and thus the story in the Victorian era, and to give her a reason for her head to fall off: it was nearly severed from her body in a cruel and gruesome crime of passion.

I am so excited.

Here is what I think I'll need:
1)a new Victorian corset, maybe with a spoon busk if I can justify the expense
2) a bustle, either stiffened lace (a la the 1870's) or "hoopwire" (otherwise known as polyethylene tubing - I LOVE the hardware store)
3) a petticoat
4) corset cover
5) skirt and bodice
6) several yards - 2 1/2? 3? - of green velvet ribbon. I am leaning toward willow or loden.
7) hair extensions
8) neck wound prosthesis
9) latex, fake blood, miscellaneous wound makeup

I like the idea of using pink to underscore the green of the ribbon and emphasize the rosy glow of my slashed neck. I still have many yards of hot pink shantung that never became a holiday dress, so it may find new life. I have to think hard about matching it with the moss green. One solution may be making the base of the dress ivory or pale gold, and just accenting with the bolder colors.

I obviously am still in the planning stages, but I know that I will need patterns for the bustle and gown, and most probably the petticoat, too. That is where I plan to start. I have spring steel still from the MA corset, but no more tips. I will require a busk and about 300" of lacing for a Victorian corset, too. Oooooh, exciting. I'll try to be better about progress pics this time around!

Well, it's finished.

I am done, as you can see. These photos were taken at the beginning of the night, before I embarked on an ill-advised round of general debauchery that culminated in my complete inability to actually have anything to do with a living, breathing member of the male persuasion who expresses admiration for me in any form. To wit, even stripped down to my chemise and related underpinnings, even dancing my fool head off, even when being flirted with overtly and outrageously, I still could not work up the gumption to actually act on any sort of impulse that might actually get me any sort of action. In other words, I choked up on the bat, and bunted.

I had to remove most of the costume, after the contest, which I did not win,

45 hours of work notwithstanding. I really wanted to dance to the band, the Dusty 45's because they were swinging like tomorrow's just a word, and it was not happening with eight yards of satin appended to my shoulders. So off it came, and I danced around in my chemise, looking scandalous and making sultry-type eyes at Billy Joe, the lead guy and flaming trumpeter extraordinaire. This behavior unfortunately did not see its logical conclusion, i.e., when the ball ended. Instead I had to drag it out until very, very late Monday night (or early, early Tuesday morning if you must) when I ran away from the boy who was singing Ring of Fire and smiling in my direction. Damn principals for intruding and reminding me of his conspicuously absent wedding ring.

Now is the let-down. Inevitably, this project has come to its conclusion, and now there is really no reason for me to continue this blog. I suppose I might have a few more pictures from tonight, but that, as they say, is that. Now what? is the question. All of my musings, and what it ultimately comes down to is the best damn birthday a girl could ask for, barring a few stolen kisses with a rock and roll boy, and a very heavy, antiquated set of clothing whose real purpose was to stave off its creatrix's impending winter depression. I suppose I will have to invent something new to help me hold back the darkness, or succumb and spend the rest of the winter indulging myself in what L. calls the Braffian doleful stare and trying to block out the memory of a pair of tight blue jeans topped with a truly magnificent smile. Or I could just give in and make a late Victorian bustle-back evening gown, a picture of which I might add later. Suggestions from my adoring fanbase? Comments? Applause or derision? C'mon, people, would it kill you to say a thing or two?

Don't you judge me!

I know, two weeks is unacceptably long between posts. But in my defense, I have actually been working on my costume rather than gadding about online. I have managed to do lots of stuff - cut the crap out of a pair of shoes, cut the crap out of my finger, cut the crap out of a yard of my not terribly expensive but scarce fabric, and actually complete the jupe and a muslin for fitting purposes of the lining for the contouche (see, I said I was going to call it this). Of course, there were several moments when I realized that I am in WAY over my head here, such as when I realized that the sleeves in no way resemble modern sleeves. Of course, I also figured out from doing some judicious (read: panicked) research that the pattern I chose is notorious for ill-fitting sleeves, and that the redraft I did is nothing more or less than anyone else has done. They are snug on me, I won't lie, but I will probably fudge them rather than fix them properly, because I am starting to feel the press of time. Instead, I chose to spend six hours this weekend rebinding the corset, because when I tried on the lining muslin, it would not lie flat over that evil phlegm of Satan disguising itself as faux-suede trim. In the process, I also trimmed down the unnecessarily bulky shoulder straps, and miraculously, this seemed to make the corset fit better. If you care at all, which you probably don't, I am still getting a tiny gap at the back of the armscye, and I can't for the life of me figure out what to do about that. Whatever.

I am just going to pretend that I meant to do it. You will notice that although there is little I can do to actually appear slender, the shape I manage to achieve is very like the ideal 18th century silhouette. Thank Dieu.

I have ordered some gigantic ostrich plumes for my wig, and I am going to start working on the embroidery for the stomacher tomorrow, if I can figure out what I did with the sketch I made.

This is on an entirely different subject, but I discovered the name of my mystery crush and immediately disqualified him. Not because of his name, which is disturbingly like the last name of my ex-husband, and not because he's (ahem) eight years younger than me. No. It's because he is a JV. That's Jesuit Volunteer for those not in the know, and I have to say I have nothing against them. Except they are very Catholic and they go on retreats together. And most of them are vegtetarian. Not that I have anything against vegetarians. But I don't really want to date one. It's the same way that I love tiny purse-dogs, but I would never subject myself to the calumny of owning one. He is lovely though, and funny. I will have to content myself to prodding fun at him, and smirking in satisfaction when he can't follow my train of thought.

Shoes next time, my lovelies!

I'm only a few days behind my self-imposed deadline

But I'm not really done. True, the underpinnings are wearable, but they aren't really finished. The chemise is unhemmed and the sleeves do not have the engageantes, I still want desperately to change the trim on that ridiculous excuse for a pair of stays, and the pocket hoops need a different closure or they won't last the night. But it is sufficient for me to begin the part that people will actually be able to see, and none too soon. Halloween is right around the corner, although I am sure there are lots of you out there who think that a few days or even a week or two is lots of time to think about what to be and how to accomplish that. Well, fie on you. I'm not inviting you to my fabulous Halloween party, which I'm not even holding this year. Or have ever held, for that matter, but I think about it a lot, and how intensely marvelous it would be. I have a whole list of ideas to make it great. Or I would if I were the sort of person who makes lists. The point is that I have four or five times as much work ahead as I have already done, and that means no more slacking. Just working.

The picture you see to your left is B-Fed, who has taken a few minutes out of her busy schedule promoting her new album(Nap this, B**ch) to endorse my brilliant mothering skillz. You will notice, please, the tiny baby wife-beater, the low-slung jeans, the bare feet, and the insouciant expression, all courtesy of yours very truly, although the Look I'm not really sure I should take credit for. Rebellion is the natural consequence of neglect, which is what I feel I'm doing when I spend three hours holed up in the sewing room, ripping the same seam over and over again because the damn chemise is just rectangles, you can't tell top from bottom, and I'm too lazy to actually mark things with tiny notches the way you're supposed to. I know that this blog isn't about me, it's about Her Majesty, La Reine de France, but L. pointed out to me on the phone that I am the only blogging parent on the face of the planet who hasn't posted a virtual wallet foldout, and so this is my obligatory nod to my babes. I will hunt up a suitably intriguing photo of Cap'n Jack for next time, if I get around to it. And if I feel like it.
And by this time next week, the jupe must be finished and I think the toile for the robe finished. I think I should start calling the robe the contouche, tho, because that was the contemporary term for it. There is a little evidence that robe a la francaise was actually a French term of English origin. Damn Brits.

Alrighty, kiddies, that's the update. If anyone find a suitable cicisbeo to accompany me, my dance card is remarkably free of entries. Send 'em my way.

Becoming Anne Bonney

The corset made its official debut at the Pirate Jamboree on Saturday. I know most of you reading this were there and therefore ogled it in all its (and my) glory, but for the two or three of you who are passing thru or reading this and never commenting, here it is. Of course, La Fab was interested only in was what UNDER the corset, and so all the shots are of the front. The back was unremarkable, except that I only awled half the eyelets and left them unfinished because of time (I was too busy making the treasure chest cake.) I decided to awl them rather than cut them because of the rather tempetuous nature of the rayon brocade I chose as the fancy outer fabric. It likes to fray a lot, and I worried about it fraying under either the metal eyelets or under the hand-binding ( I have yet to decide which I want to do). Since an awl just pushes the thread aside, you tend to have less issues with weakening and with fraying as well.

I used the world's crappiest faux-suede as a binding for the seams, as I have seen several examples of period stays that are bound with fine skin of some sort, either kid or deer. Unfortunately, the synthetic stuff I used had NO stretch at all, not even on the bias, and it was thicker than I wanted and deceptively tough, too. I started hand-binding for neatness, but eight inches into it, I gave up. Six layers of fairly tough material was too much for my meager hand sewing skills. I resorted to the machine. It did not turn out so well. It was bunchy and uneven and just. plain. wrong. It looks fine in these images, but it was so stiff on the armholes ( the cap, not the scye) that it made it stand out from my body and deformed the line I was trying to achieve. You can also see in the pictures that I managed to sew the top line completely crooked. Luckily, it's so close to the Twins that no one will ever be looking at that. The chemise I am wearing is actually a nightdown that I hacked off at knee length and tucked wily-nilly into my gauchos. I plan on doing a very simple chemise in a sheer cotton (no can do flax linen) at some later point, and provided I can find some lace that seems fine enough.

First I need to concentrate on making the paniers and the toile of the robe a la francaise. After actually feeling the weight of the fabric I plan on using, I think my original plan of going with 1/4 " boning spring steel is not going to work out. The hoops will collapse under the strain. So I need to find something stronger, and hopefully inexpensive. I want to maybe try to see if I can finagle some lumber strapping from the local timber yard, or maybe they can give me pointers. Ahh, hardware stores. A costumer's best friend. If that fails, we'll go with the pattern recommendation of doubling featherweight flexible boning, but with the understanding that they will have to be replaced sooner rather than later. One night's dancing is all they are likely to take. Like I'm planning on making several robes that will require paniers that can withstand more than six or eight hours of dancing. Sheesh.

As the papaya satin was prohibitively expensive - at $9/yard - I have reluctantly made the finally decision to not have the peachy confection of a gown I was pursuing. I will let you know about the colors next time, soonish I hope.

BTW, Blogger doesn't like the pirate pictures as they are. It steadfastly refuses to load them. Go figure. I will try to mess a bit and see if I can make them ore blogger-friendly, so you can actually see what I'm talking about.

Toodles!

Eh.

This whole week has been spent cutting boning for the stupid corset. I am working feverishly to finish it before La Fab's Jamboree in three days. The most trying part has been cutting the spiral steel, of which I needed thirty pieces. I ended up cutting like thirty five because I kept screwing up. All the corset making sites are so breezy about it - merely clip the wires on either side of the boning and pull it apart gently. Pardon my Francaise, but bullshit. This stuff is made out of steel, and I think it must be some kind of tempered steel, and it requires not just clipping but wrenching, twisting, cursing, scratching, more cursing, and bleeding. You would think the burly-lookin' shears I got for this purpose would do the job, but no. The wire laughed at it, and managed to dent the jaws, as well. After many bitter tears, I managed to get all the pieces cut this afternoon, finally. I am giving my hands a break before tipping the last half dozen. I did not cut them in the manner explained in the instructions, which was to cut each one to fit the channel you've just sewn. Screw that. Too much switching. I finally started cutting the bones one section of the corset at a time, and inserting them all at once. I am also not basting closed the ends once the bones are in, but the corduroy is holding them in okay. It only took me about six bones to figure out the most efficient and secure method of attaching the tips to the spiral bones, too. Oh well, live and learn, right? I am planning on making another, and next time I think I'll find it a breeze. It will probably be an Alaska Day costume, just because AK Day gives an opportunity to actually sport all of that fun mid-Victorian costume. I do enjoy the late Vic. era stuff, too, the square necks and bustles and bare arms... Hmmm... I begin to see a long line of lovely costumes ahead of me.

My hands hurt too much to take pics. I'll get completed ones at the party.

So... Here we are again.

There has been some muttering on some fronts that I do not update this blog quickly enough. Don't bother wondering who you are; there are only like three of you out there. I am trying, but for heavens sake, I have a lot to do - I have sewing, and research, and Oreo cookies to eat, and novels about Marie Antoinette to read (she went by her Austrian name of Antonia, BTW), and stell boning to be frightened of cutting ... The list goes on and on. But here you are, you ravening masses, you. Some proof that the project progresses. I am ready to start the seaming that will hold in place the boning that will hold in place, um, me. But it is a liitle intimidating. I have read a review of this pattern that wqarns of the top edge rolling once boned, so I am thinking again of modifying the pattern a bit to suit my purposes. But my determination to have it finished by the Pirate Party is complete; I will stand for nothing else.

On another note, I purchased a copy of Dangerous Liaisons to use as costume research, and now I cannot stop watching it. So many things about it: first, that the costuming is indeed dlicious, and enviable; second, Malkovich was actually strangely sexy; third, the very meaness of it is what appeals. Don't we always wound the ones we love? Can't boredom drive us to terrible heights?

See what happens when ladies aren't allow to slump in chairs? They have to almost recline! The most interesting thing, though, is that it makes me wish that I had chosen something other than peach for the color of the gown - the cafe au lait taffeta with rust trimmings that Mme. Merteuil wears is divine, even if it is a day dress. There is the peacock satin evening gown, though, with the shell pink trimmings, and the rosy thing with the acid green petticoat, that also appeal. It makes the monochrome palette I chose seem insipid, almost. Anyhow, now I am investigating the inkling of an aquamarine overgown with peachy-pink petticoat and robings, even though I said no ice blue. It's hard not to get caught up in the minutae, especially when that is what the Rococo aesthetic was all about.

But before I persue that, which is after all a long ways off, I have steel to cut and tip.. I hope the yellow of the tipping fluid doesn't show. I can't imagine how it will, through the opaque satin and even opaquer (new word!) cotton twilled corduroy.

I just fixed the Rococo link, if anyone is interested.

It's about damn time!

I have now basted and marked the pieces of the corset, as you can see. They really don't look like much yet, but believe you me, it's gonna be something. You might also be able to tell that my koi are swimming upside down. That other piece of material is what I wished I could find by the bolt to make the whole thing out of. It is, in fact, a remnant I bought on eBay for $4, approx. It will become a trim of some kind, perhaps a deep flounce or ruffle on the hem of the petticoat. I also ordered some pale peach scalloped lace for the sleeve flounces.

I am having some difficulties imaging precisely how this cutting boning to size thing is going to work. The tipping fluid I bought takes four hours til it's touchable, and 24 hours to cure. I might just have to measure against the pattern. Whatever. It will all work out.

Now that I am immersed in the particulars of construction, I have less time to concern myself with the philosophical questions that have engaged me since I began this project. Most intriguing: still, why? I have actually begun to feel a bit obsessed with this. I am reading biographies of Marie Antoinette and her portraitist, I got books on pattern drapery from the period and the details of extant costume, I think about if I should make drawers and a chemise or just get by with modern bits... It's really reached ridiculous proportions. I am even planning another costume after this one - first a mid-Victorian corset in red and white striped taffeta, and then a lawn day dress from the Regency period in England - you know, a Lizzie Bennett sort of a thing. Maybe Mr Darcy will magically appear, looking aloof and stern, and sweep me off my feet so that I will never have to take another stitch with my needle to support myself. Ok, I don't support myself now with it, but you know what I mean. What will I do with them all once they are finished? I dunno. Rent them out for amateur theatricals, maybe. I can't think of anything that would be more appropriate than that. I'm open to suggestions.