The Armour Archive

Tailoress

Christian, you can't go wrong with these. I have two of Muriel's chairs and *love* them.

Tailoress

Sure, Rana, give it a whirl, and tell me how it goes.

Better yet, take pictures. We love our pictures here on the Archive.

Of course, if you're going to do this, you also need a fitted dress with giant, drapy bell cuffs on it too. Only proper, really.

Tailoress

Nice work, Adrielle.

Tailoress

OK, please forgive my rudimentary diagrams. Far from perfect.

[img]http://www.cottesimple.com/armourarchive/1410_French_headdress_diagrams.png[/img]

[img]http://www.cottesimple.com/armourarchive/1410_French_headdress_diagrams_2.png[/img]

Tailoress

Woot! This helps a lot! Hmmm... I wish I could see what the guy had on his legs a bit better. I guess I could simply assume he had maybe slightly thicker linen or something chausses pointed to the arming cote or perhaps to the braies. On top of that would be maille chausses... Would this seem alrig...

Tailoress

I want a gambeson that has the proper range of motion, the proper fit, the proper feel and the proper function... and those tiny triangles shouldn't be seen under the breastplate. In this case I cut the sleeves without the little triangles. I don't understand what you mean by "tiny triangles s...

Tailoress

Tasha, could I bother you for a quickie explaination (or just a source picture/link/book) of the structure of your veil and the under-structure? Initially I thought the veil was simply draped over the buns, but now I see it extends past and frames them. Its a flattering effect. Version 1.0 involved...

Tailoress

The gown in the Upsalla cathedral was cut as wide as it could be, resulting in long lines of bias-to-bias seams. Only at the bottom of the skirt, where width ran out, did the maker consent to make a turn and head straight for the floor and add gores (if they can even be called gores, that far down t...

Tailoress

Blackoak, you're just trying to butter me up so I buy you a beer at Gulf. (Just kidding. Thank you.) Crimthann, thanks for the compliment. If I look good, it's because it's so much fun to make the effort to do so. I wish there weren't this strange assumption of mutual exclusivity between "fun&q...

Tailoress

I make an effort with my modern hair. Here's my default fake hair arrangement for 1380 France or England: http://www.cottesimple.com/armourarchive/cropped_marcele_pennsic2009.png My real-life hair looks like this: http://www.cottesimple.com/armourarchive/cropped_tasha_dec2009.png Obviously if I let ...

Tailoress

Richard de Scolay wrote: From what I've read, cyclas is the term used for surcoats that are short in front and long in back.

Hm. My guess was that it was a reference to the long armholes that descend down almost to waist level, much like the female version of the "cyclas". I.e. a proto-sideless surcotte.

Tailoress

The Romance of Alexander shows several types of tabard/surcoat. Stitched sides, laced sides, single tie sides and open sides. The ones with open sides are pretty darn close to "the dreaded SCA fabric sandwich board". I'll grant you there could be historical cousins, but I doubt the averag...

Tailoress

WRT "tabard" and "surcotte" The words, whether correct or incorrect, are used interchangeably. This may be an interkingdom anthropology issue, but that is not the case where I'm from. Tabards (in the East) are long rectangles with a hole cut in them for the head and held together...

Tailoress

I forgot to mention A Visual History of Costume (Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries) by Margaret Scott. This has a decent array of figural art spanning the whole 14thc century, which helps you get a feel for how the broader clothing trends progressed. It might also help you figure out which part of ...

Tailoress

OK, I stirred the chili, put my son to bed, and now I can annotate. Dress in Medieval France by Joan Evans Invaluable, respected source giving good textual references for various clothing styles and the terms used, at least as done in France. Some interesting and useful figural art is included in th...

Tailoress

Since a lot of the biggest and best resources are already named, I'll branch out a bit and recommend other, less central tomes that come in great handy for better understanding the dress of the 14thc, especially the latter half. Consider these "number 5 through whatever". Dress in Medieval...

Tailoress

He looks great! Sorry to hear there were fit issues after all. If you want to drop me a line and let me know your professional opinion in all the technical, gory details, I would certainly welcome the feedback.

Tailoress

but the vast bulk of people who try to make coats of plates with fabric foundations on these boards, who use rivets, punch holes in the cloth to do so. I have been reading about their various attempts for 13 years, and it is always best to point out right at the beginning that holes aren't punched ...

Tailoress

But the force is likely to be slight most of the time, and again I don't see it as impossible. Yeah, that's pretty much my point... especially if chained to a lighter object like a dagger. The force of a small chain hanging, by itself, isn't that great, especially if the surcotte is closed with str...

Tailoress

You need to look real hard at the bottom plate then, becuase draping is occuring through the areas where rivets would be holding plates, which does not occur. I see what you're talking about, but if you go with the narrower plate concept attached at top and bottom by one rivet in each place, origin...

Tailoress

Bleddyn De Caldicot wrote: Still the weapon chains cause the problem since they would be riveted to two plates if this is the case.

Do you mean the circular plate on the front and then whatever plate is beneath it? Would that be a problem somehow, with the fabric between them? Just trying to follow...

Tailoress

After making an armoured surcotte of similar design recently I am inclined to go with bairdec's very first interpretation, but with the plates abutting each other, not overlapping. This is the general style of how I arranged the plates on an armoured surcotte I made with PiRho here on the archive an...

Tailoress

Saritor wrote:
Jestyr wrote:And now we are all laced with that attractive mental image. Thanks for sharing.

Sharing means caring? (And decreased mental anguish for La Tasha.)

You understand me so well.

Tailoress

Jestyr wrote: And now we are all laced with that attractive mental image. Thanks for sharing.

Aww, you're welcome!

Tailoress

For the love of all that is Right and Good on this planet, please do not ever wear a jock strap and cup on the outside of whatever else you're wearing. Around these parts there's an unbelievably lazy and unattractive tendency to wear such things OVER pants. When my eyes somehow are forced to see suc...

Tailoress

Tailoress

Hi Drogo, If you're worried about weight, wouldn't you rather it be distributed across your upper body than pulling your lower body (the c-belt option)? I have a sway back so perhaps my opinion is biased, but wearing a c-belt practically crippled me, because it pressed into the curve of my back, pul...

Tailoress

As for the dresses, it isn't so much fear of making them, it is that I already have a list the size of my arm. "Fear" was too vague a word for me to use. I know of your awesome sewing skillz, so I should have said "fear of the time it would take". By itself, "fear" pro...

Tailoress

'course, that would probably then mean I would have to make her a dress... hmm... maybe not such a good plan If you're worried about the dresses, don't pick the hennin style I picked in my first photo. The two dresses I'm wearing in that one photo were nothing compared to the effort it took to figu...

Tailoress

My late 15thc English lady impression from about 1480:

I also have an early 15thc French lady impression from about 1410:

Tailoress

I've beat my head against this representation before, having gone over to Europe and taken an in-person look, and it's recorded here: m Hah! After reading the comments on that thread, I feel vindicated in posing the questions I did. The same questions have already been posed in that thread by folks...

Tailoress

the dashing young Adamo on the left. You both are dashing! You need to get off that island more and over to the heathen mainlands to show more Easties how to get properly dressed for combat. This is a fantastic thread. The move towards more mail is exciting to see. The only thing I don't like about...

Tailoress

Just seems weird to me that he'd go to the effort of portraying individual mail links but wouldn't chisel in a few MORE-distinct stitch lines...

Tailoress

I'm also not sure why a quilted defense would be so short? Is that seen anywhere else in this time frame's figural portrayals? If it's really rigid, the shortness makes sense (for body movement) but for something textile and padded...? Just trying to gather data and learn something here.

Tailoress

I don't see what's wrong with it being a padded vest. It was very popular to wear padded garments over your armour around this time. They were just usually long sleeved. If we're going with the argument that the artist was carving something very realistically, that's where the padded vest idea gets...