In the last year, year and a half, I’ve done basically no sewing except fixing a button, then fixing several the buttons on the Lord Mayor’s doublet, then adding more tacking to the slashes on his sleeves and doing little stag thorn stitches over that.

And then people got serious about Dickens Fair. We’re going for a weekend and we’ll be paying, so we can wear what we like, instead of 1840-60-ish. I’d like to make a Gothic period 1840s dress, but what if I never go again? On the other hand, I don’t want to wear a steampunk costume (as much as I’d enjoy pulling that one out again). My compromise is to be 1860-ish in a blouse and bolero I have, a hat I’ll alter from a blank and a skirt I’ll make. Hat and skirt. Simple, right?

Thus began the trip down the rabbit hole, researching, planning, generally going off on tangents and changing the plan. I researched:

  • How not to have to wear a hoopskirt
  • 1840s Gothic
  • How wrong are the sleeves on my bolero and do I care?
  • How to fix the heels on my expensive Victorian boots because apparently no one will do it locally and I can’t find replacement heels anywhere on the interwebs
  • Construction of fan bodices
  • Bust padding (because apparently everyone had to pad the space near the arm hole in 1830s bodies)
  • How to make corded petticoats
  • Sewn in padding in the bums of early Victorian skirts (it’s a thing)
  • How to hem from the floor up (where has this been all my life?)
  • How bodices and skirts were attached (or not, depending)
  • Full Victorian corsets with me in mind, as in not making one for someone else for once
  • Period bonnets hats
  • Fabric selection for 1860s skirts
  • Fabric choices and skirt widths for fashionista vs. working women
  • A whole slew of things related to fabric and patterns in the 1880s (unrelated, but fun – I’ll tell you later)
  • My sad lack of petticoats and the non-period skirt shape I was going to end up with
  • The Bumpad
  • Pockets and pocket slits
  • The “ugly puffer” via American Dutchess
  • Period flower prints for fabric and how not / close is the pattern on those old sheets I have in the stash?
  • Whether Beverly’s takes competitors coupons, because I was headed that way
  • Quilting, free motion quilting, because I cheaped out and couldn’t make myself buy prequilted fabric

And so, dear folks, after thinking I was only making a skirt and considering adding a flounce to an existing petticoat, the plan / to-make list is as follows:

  1. Removing the decorative gray trim from the bolero – done
  2. Opening the sides of the existing petticoat for pocket slits and to make the waist size more flexible – done, but not worth show and tell
  3. The bumpad – done, will post on it
  4. The quilted pocket – done, will post on it
  5. The ugly raisin quilted petticoat, a.k.a “son of the ugly puffer” – WIP
  6. The skirt – TBA
  7. The hat – TBA, blank arrived
  8. Victorian fingerless gloves (mine are all rather chunky knit/crochet) – WIP. First glove is ready to get it’s two seams (because I’m cheating)
  9. The spats – WIP. The base pattern is done. I can probably get away without them though the boots I plan to wear are fairly modern ankle boots. At least they are plain, have toe caps and a stacked heel.

Here’s the sad original plan, back when I thought I could get away with just making a skirt. I’d just sort of pinned the fabric up on the dummy. I’ll have to do a side by side comparison of the original plan vs. the complete costume once it’s all ready. The difference is huge.