This costume (and our Sheriff’s) was all about designing everything I ever wanted into a man’s Elizabethan costume (as well as putting the man in said costume) without going overboard.
The requirements were:
- that he be comfortable (or as comfortable as potentially 95+ degree weather can let someone fully costumed for a 16th century English day be)
- that he look great and accurately up to his station (middle class), but not above it
- that I not break his bank account
- that we did not make him wear “pumpkin pants” (pansied slops, which are worn over canions)
Tristana suggested linen for its breath-ability, look and durability. We settled on dupioni silk for the slashes as a way to notch up his look without the ostentation and inappropriateness of something like velvet. We chose the cobalt medium weight linen from Fabrics-store.com for it’s great period color (any blue that denim fades to is usually acceptable at a ren faire) and a tea green silk for – well, because the Rogues like those colors and our Lord Mayor looks very nice in them. We were plagued by a series of silk setbacks, substitutions and near panic-attacks, but finally substituted a sort of olive-green that went perfectly with the brass buttons we chose.
The process for this costume started with research in books of period costume, period paintings (particularly the ones Fabrics-store.com just posted on their blog), and sketching out different color combinations, designs and details. We finally settled on a design that kept things pretty simple with a yoked doublet, slashed chest and sleeves. The hat was to be of the silk until I came to the realization that the slubby texture in the weave of the fabric would require that it be placed on the hat in a scued fashion and, while that might look great on a modern hat, I didn’t like it for a period effect. The hat was changed to linen. A deconstruction of the hat will be forthcoming.
The next step was an initial mock-up constructed on a basic block pattern, followed by adjustments, another mock-up, slight changes and finally a clean pattern. Small adjustments were made on the lining and interlining and a mockup of the standing collar, skirting and epaulets were added. Then the fun began with the cutting out of the actual linen and silk.
The Lord Mayor’s Sleeves, one tacked and one just turned
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J. was the first person to introduce me to the phenomena that is the Renaissance Faire. She left the faire circuit a few years ago, but recently decided to come back to it.
By the Bodkin 