I'm trying to make a doublet, something like the short-waisted sort of squarish ones from the early to mid-16th century.. something like in the woodcuts of Landsknechts.
most look like they close on the left side with a flap that comes across from the right. are these sort of double breasted to that there'd be a flap on the inside too that ties over on the right side? Some website I saw said it was a large "U" shaped opening in the front with a panel of similar shape that closed over the opening. is that the right way to do it? one woodcut I was looking at looks as though it was certainly not done like that, so I'm wondering if after a while the U shaped panel turned into a flap across the front?
but what I'm really wondering about is sleeves. did these kinds of doublets ever have the type of sleeves that attach by laces? I like the idea of having those openings to let hot air vent out, and it'd be nice to be able to switch to slightly less puffed and slashed sleeves if I want to wear my plate splints
thanks
matt
doublet sleeves and a couple other ?'s
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woodwose
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sounds like something I'd be interested in seeing. I'm most interested in stuff from about the middle of the 16th century, Landesknecht or Swiss is what I'm going for.. but if other areas had doublets of the same type (like the same general shapes) but less flamboyant than that might be usefull as well. Tudor comes to mind, but I don't yet know enough about these things to be sure.
I've seen quite a lot of woodcuts of Landesknechts but sometimes all the puff and slash makes it hard to figure out some of the details I'm unsure about.
what I'm mostly wondering about is if the style of doublets I'm thinking of ever had the type of sleeves that lace on at the shoulder
any help will be greatly appreciated as I am almost ready to start on the sleeves, just a bit more work on the body of the doublet.
I've seen quite a lot of woodcuts of Landesknechts but sometimes all the puff and slash makes it hard to figure out some of the details I'm unsure about.
what I'm mostly wondering about is if the style of doublets I'm thinking of ever had the type of sleeves that lace on at the shoulder
any help will be greatly appreciated as I am almost ready to start on the sleeves, just a bit more work on the body of the doublet.
I don't think men’s doublets had lace on sleeves at all in this era. I have never looked hard for tie on sleeve examples but I don't recall there being an example of them in Janet Arnold's book on 16th century clothing, and she has examples from England, Germany, and Italy.
I really could not see the insane puff and slash sleeves working as tie on sleeves. Besides looking at paintings and woodcuts I have never seen an example that would indicate tie on sleeves.
Flonzy
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I really could not see the insane puff and slash sleeves working as tie on sleeves. Besides looking at paintings and woodcuts I have never seen an example that would indicate tie on sleeves.
Flonzy
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Cheap garb is as bad as plastic armor.
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Cassius the Rabbit
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Having made and worn a few of these maybe I can help. There are 3 layers to this look. A shirt is the first layer, most of my friend buy shirts from T`ger togs or make thier own now.
A doublet, that has a plackert sewn over the front of the chest and can button or tie down one or both sides of the front. This makes the square plate in the front that you are looking for and can be made from most materials like velvet, brocade, leather, canvas etc, and usually (but not always) had sleeves made on to them. The sleeves could be long or short also, it depends if you want to hide armor or not.
Lastly over the top of it all was the outer coat or Jerkin. This is the U shaped-front thing over the top of it all. They could be short like a doublet that was tied or had one button low on the stomach or they could be long like a dress called a Waffenroc (sp?). This is what JP is wearing in most of his fighting nowadays and more of us wore in the past in Northern Ansteorra. They usually had short sleeves and some of the short ones had collars even though i make them sleeveless and collarless for fighting in. We also make them double breasted now to keep the buttons from popping off. I could never keep both buttons on for a whole weekend because mine was not double breasted.
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Sir Alrek Kanin
or just plain 'ol Rabbit
A doublet, that has a plackert sewn over the front of the chest and can button or tie down one or both sides of the front. This makes the square plate in the front that you are looking for and can be made from most materials like velvet, brocade, leather, canvas etc, and usually (but not always) had sleeves made on to them. The sleeves could be long or short also, it depends if you want to hide armor or not.
Lastly over the top of it all was the outer coat or Jerkin. This is the U shaped-front thing over the top of it all. They could be short like a doublet that was tied or had one button low on the stomach or they could be long like a dress called a Waffenroc (sp?). This is what JP is wearing in most of his fighting nowadays and more of us wore in the past in Northern Ansteorra. They usually had short sleeves and some of the short ones had collars even though i make them sleeveless and collarless for fighting in. We also make them double breasted now to keep the buttons from popping off. I could never keep both buttons on for a whole weekend because mine was not double breasted.
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Sir Alrek Kanin
or just plain 'ol Rabbit
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woodwose
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thanks all, and now for more questions 
I read in Osprey's Landsknecht Soldier book that their doublets had "some amount of padding" to keep out the cold and offer some protection from sword cuts..
so for a padded layer/lining, I used a padded moving blanket with linen sewn onto each side of it, a heavy felted wool on the outside. I made it double breasted because some of the woodcuts looked like they could have been made that way (a costuming friend and I were trying to figure out if the flap over the front in some pictures had an identical flap on the inside to make it double breasted, or if it just joined on the left side with a little overlap).
it seams rather thick and bulky in the front with those two layers of padding there.. should I cut the inner flap off so it has only a little overlap, or think slashing the outer layer of the front would make it feel less bulky? maybe that's just something I'll have to play with to figure it out, since it's hard to tell what I'm talking about without trying it on.
my other question.. the one I'm more curious about, is how the sleeves were made.
it looks like the outer layer is made in tapered strips that are sewn together into a cone? and some of the slashes are where the seams are just opened up?
will the bulk of the inner linen layers of sleeve material get the slashed parts to puff open like that? will it also help to make the sleeve a few inches longer than my arm, so it'd be buttoned at my wrist and the extra length would ride up to the more flexable slashed parts? I'm thinking that this extra length floating around in the slashed parts might eliminate the need for gussets unter the arms.
I'm still unsure if I want to have the sleeves tie on or sewn on. I've seen one picture (drawing from the diary of Paul Dolstien, I think) from about 1500 which had sleeves that were laced on, and a painting from the later 1500's of a battle or something (looked through the same pile of books later and could not find it again) and one guy out of the bunch had things that looked like laces on the shoulder of his doublet. some of their hosen laced together at the top of the leg and had rather elaborate slashing above and below that area, and I've seen some doublets in woodcuts that have different slashed patterns on each arm.. but maybe it was just that, and not mismatched sleeves laced on.
I read in Osprey's Landsknecht Soldier book that their doublets had "some amount of padding" to keep out the cold and offer some protection from sword cuts..
so for a padded layer/lining, I used a padded moving blanket with linen sewn onto each side of it, a heavy felted wool on the outside. I made it double breasted because some of the woodcuts looked like they could have been made that way (a costuming friend and I were trying to figure out if the flap over the front in some pictures had an identical flap on the inside to make it double breasted, or if it just joined on the left side with a little overlap).
it seams rather thick and bulky in the front with those two layers of padding there.. should I cut the inner flap off so it has only a little overlap, or think slashing the outer layer of the front would make it feel less bulky? maybe that's just something I'll have to play with to figure it out, since it's hard to tell what I'm talking about without trying it on.
my other question.. the one I'm more curious about, is how the sleeves were made.
it looks like the outer layer is made in tapered strips that are sewn together into a cone? and some of the slashes are where the seams are just opened up?
will the bulk of the inner linen layers of sleeve material get the slashed parts to puff open like that? will it also help to make the sleeve a few inches longer than my arm, so it'd be buttoned at my wrist and the extra length would ride up to the more flexable slashed parts? I'm thinking that this extra length floating around in the slashed parts might eliminate the need for gussets unter the arms.
I'm still unsure if I want to have the sleeves tie on or sewn on. I've seen one picture (drawing from the diary of Paul Dolstien, I think) from about 1500 which had sleeves that were laced on, and a painting from the later 1500's of a battle or something (looked through the same pile of books later and could not find it again) and one guy out of the bunch had things that looked like laces on the shoulder of his doublet. some of their hosen laced together at the top of the leg and had rather elaborate slashing above and below that area, and I've seen some doublets in woodcuts that have different slashed patterns on each arm.. but maybe it was just that, and not mismatched sleeves laced on.
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Gwen
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Flonzy, look through Arnold again because there are several men's outfits that have lace on sleeves.
The reason you might have missed it is because they don't look anything like the tie on sleeves 'a la Zefirelli's Romeo and Juliet that one sees at RenFaires and other places. The look with the decorative laces and big puffs of shirt was confined to a short period and mostly to Venice at the end of the 15th C. and into the beginning of the 16th C.
Most of the time laced on sleeves were done very discretely with an eyelet strip sewn into the armhole of the garment and a corresponding strip sewn onto the top of the sleeve. When they are spiral laced together the fit is virtually invisible.
As with everything there are always exceptions to the rule but generally, this is how it was done, especially in men's garments.
Gwen
The reason you might have missed it is because they don't look anything like the tie on sleeves 'a la Zefirelli's Romeo and Juliet that one sees at RenFaires and other places. The look with the decorative laces and big puffs of shirt was confined to a short period and mostly to Venice at the end of the 15th C. and into the beginning of the 16th C.
Most of the time laced on sleeves were done very discretely with an eyelet strip sewn into the armhole of the garment and a corresponding strip sewn onto the top of the sleeve. When they are spiral laced together the fit is virtually invisible.
As with everything there are always exceptions to the rule but generally, this is how it was done, especially in men's garments.
Gwen