From: Gretchen Miller Date: Thu, 2 Mar 1995 16:38:07 -0500 (EST) Subject: H-Costume Digest, Volume 243, 3/2/95 The Historic Costume List Digest, Volume 243, March 2, 1995 Send items for the list to h-costume@andrew.cmu.edu (or reply to this message). Send subscription/deletion requests and inquiries to h-costume-request@andrew.cmu.edu Enjoy! --------------------------------------------------------------- Topics: Examples of niello Autocad for pattern design ISO: Info on men's fashion during the War of the Roses Where to find round-toed women's shoes Fulling How the Victorians stored their clothes Antonia Fraser as researcher 1/2 priced Folkwear patterns in San Mateo, CA Copyright More sewing machine woe fixes History of the Bra Pantyhose history ----------------------- From: Chethur@aol.com Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 02:32:02 -0500 Subject: Re: NIELLO As part of the Catherine the Great Exhibition in Memphis in 1993 we had several examples of fine quality Niello. The technique was apparently well known in Russia in the 18th century. Has anyone seen the Great Khan exhibit in Nashville? It apparently leaves March 5, and I was going to try and get there. But I would like to know whether it is indeed worthwhile. Cheryl Thurber chethur@aol.com ----------------------- From: StefHelg@aol.com Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 06:46:27 -0500 Subject: Re: autocad for design In 1986-7, I worked with a project called Athena at 3M in St. Paul in the Software Engineering Research Center. Using artificial intelligence, and working with the sewing design people at the U. of Minn., St. Paul campus, about eight programers worked on AI rules for making patterns that would be tailored to fit. It wasn't just a matter of measurements. Each realtionship of measurements generated different tailoring and fitting rules (heart shaped bodies vs. straight, and so forth). I remember that Vogue and Land's End expressed some interest at one time. Based on measurements encoded on a card strip (like a bank card), the software generated a CAD drawing. I know a lot of time was spent getting the patents. The AI was so that as more data was entered the program could add rules to its knowledge base. After about a year and a half the project was dropped because of the limited market (but in the meantime everyone they could rope in was getting fitted pants patterns for the testing). Someone may have licensed the technology. Or 3M may still have it. You could check with them or the clothing design school at the U. of Minn. ----------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 00:17:01 +0000 From: Zachary Kessin Subject: War of the Roses To change the subject a bit I was wondering if anyone could give me a few good pointers to fashions around the time of the War of the Roses. (c1460-1485) I am in specific looking for mens clothing (I'm sewing for me). Thanks Zach (SCA Guiliam Wodehouse) ----------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Feb 95 10:48:16 EST From: Maryann Subject: Round toed shoes If anyone out there is interested in round toed shoes, find your local square dance shop. There you will find round toed shoes from flat mary jane styles to heels of various heights. They come in wide widths and make your feet feel as though they have died and gone to heaven. It mus be a square dance shop - not just a western wear. Historic dress is just one of my hobbies Maryann ----------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 09:04:00 +0800 (PST) From: nancy fernandez Subject: Victorian Closets Gentle Readers: Last night I went to a talk about Victorian homes and the people who lived there. The speaker argued that Victorians of every social class had closets too small to accommodate their clothing. I don't know where I got this from, but I thought that undies and casual clothing were hung from pegs in the closet but better clothes were folded and put away (somewhere). Does anyone have any references or family knowledge, ect. about Victorian clothes and closets? Thanks! Nancy Page Fernandez nfernandez@huey.csun.edu ----------------------- From: 2Lt Aryeh JS Nusbacher Subject: Re: H-Costume Digest, Volume 236, 2/24/95 Date: Sat, 25 Feb 95 15:06:03 EST > BTW, is Frasier considered a reliable researcher? She's also the author > of a very readable bio of Mary Queen of Scots. Antonia Fraser is not a credible academic writer. As an index of the esteem in which she is held in the academic community, the term "mendacious" was applied in particular to her book on Queen Mary by Fr. McConica now of All Souls, Oxford. Her fiction (published under the name Jean Plaidy) is very well-researched for fiction, but that makes her a novelist who does her homework, rather than an historian who writes novels. She is, however, married to Harold Pinter. Aryk Nusbacher ----------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 13:36:46 -0800 (PST) From: samhainsghost Subject: Re: wool treatment Um This is a really super weenie question I think, but doesn't wool shrink A LOT if you put it in the washer and then dry it on hot? --------------------------------------------------------- If Voltaire could look down on the world today, I believe he would say, " Don't you people have lives!?" Samhain@mail.pacificrim.net --------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------- From: close@lunch.engr.sgi.com (Diane Barlow Close) Subject: SF Bay Area: Half Price Folkwear! Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 13:44:12 -0800 (PST) The San Mateo New York Fabrics -- and that store ONLY -- is discontinuing Folkwear patterns. They can't meet the minimum requirements to place orders with Taunton, so they're not going to carry Folkwear Patterns anymore. All Folkwear patterns currently in stock, at that store only, are 50% off! They are located at 1948 El Camino Real in San Mateo and their phone number is (415) 345-4442. They will do mail order provided you'll pay shipping charges ('natch!). (They had one woman from Colorado phone them this morning and want some of their discounted patterns but didn't want to pay to have them sent out to her. Geesh! :-) In the "Met" series, they had ONE Gallenga Gown, ONE Travelling Suit, ONE equestrienne suit pattern, and ONE Russian suit pattern left as of noon Saturday, Feb. 25th. They had a good selection of other Folkwears, but no Gibson Girl blouse for those looking for that pattern (like me :-). In that vein: I am willing to trade a new, completely unopened, unused Turkish Coat pattern (Folkwear 106; retails for $16.95) for a Gibson Girl Blouse (Folkwear 205; retails for $12.95). Any traders? -- Diane Close close@lunch.engr.sgi.com I'm at lunch today. :-) ----------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Feb 95 14:12:15 PDT From: Gail DeCamp Subject: Re: Victorian Closets Greetings, all. When I was in Kansas City, I visited the Vaile Mansion (very large, 1870s I think.) The guide there said that people were taxed on the number of rooms in their houses, and closets counted as rooms. Therefore, they had only one small closet in each bedroom.....but the closets were two stories tall, and out-of-season clothing was hung (on hangers?) from large pegs on the second story. When needed, clothes were retrieved with a long hook (kind of like the ones the store clerk uses to get clothing down from a display). I also know from personal experience that many victorian houses in central california did not have closets. I have no idea where they stored things--armoires, perhaps? Gail DeCamp Speaking from, but not for, Network General decampg@smtplink.ngc.com ----------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 19:52:57 -0400 (EST) From: dbrowne Subject: Re: Fraizer Please get your authors straight, even historical fiction. Jean Plaidy is the pseudonym of Victoria Holt! --Kathy B. --Katrinn ----------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Feb 95 19:35:39 PST From: aterry@Teknowledge.COM (Allan Terry) Subject: Victorian closets; copyright I grew up in an 1861 house (in Pennsylvania, in the Pittsburgh area) that my parents bought from the last descendants (elderly spinster sisters) of the original family. The land was a grant to that family in Colonial times; the house we lived in had been built to replace the Colonial house after it burned down. (Incidentally, the farm was part of the Underground Railroad, and we found abolitionist newspapers in the attic.) The family were wealthy farmers at the time and the new house was intended to be very luxurious for their social class. It is a Victorian neclassical style with very large rooms, high ceilings, and a lot of faux marble and woodgrain painting. Every room except the attic rooms and the cellars gives onto one of several porches with an outside entrance (the upper-floor porches have stairs) which amazingly does not look fussy. Some other people in the area liked the house so much that they copied it with some alterations (or maybe the architect had a limited repertoire). When we bought the house it was unaltered from its original state (except for some 1920s plumbing and electricity which don't work too well) and had the original 1860s furniture with some additions. We bought some of the furniture and the rest went with the McClelland sisters to their new home in a small town nearby. However, I knew their furniture well because we visited them every two weeks for years. At any rate, the house has very small, shallow closets in the four main rooms (two bedrooms and two parlors, but their functions can be switched easily) and no closets in any other room except china closets in the dining room. When we bought the house there were no poles in the closets, just a row of hooks at the back. The owners (who had not modernized their lifestyles to speak of) had several huge wardrobes, also with hooks, which they assumed were necessary to storing clothes. The four main rooms have small rooms in between the bedroom and the parlor on that side that act as passages to the outside porches. These rooms have a small window above the door to the porch but are otherwise lightless. I've always wondered whether they were used for dressing or putting wardrobes or otherwise storing clothes. However, it's too late to ask the McClellands. Actually I've been using this message as an excuse to reminisce--I think the place I grew up and the McClelland sisters were a major influence on me in childhood, probably the reason why I got a history degree and got interested in historic costume. However, _Crinolines and Crimping Irons: Victorian Clothes, How They Were Cleaned and Cared For_, by Christina Walkley and Vanda Foster, has a chapter on storage. Clothes were stored in wardrobes, closets, or boxes. The coat hanger was not used, just hooks, pegs, or nails. The 1838 _Workwoman's Guide_ by A Lady, a very well-written sewing manual available in facsimile from Opus Publications, has storage guidelines. One I remember is not to pin clothes to the bed curtains because this might tear the curtains. Before I go--a note on copyright. Diane Close's message is consistent with what I know. A lawyer recently told me anything from before 1920 is OK to reprint. For some works there is ambiguity about whether the copyright has expired, since it may not be obvious whether it was renewed. To resolve this, there are copyright (and patent) search firms. Two lawyers have told me using such a firm is cheaper than having a lawyer do a search and that such firms tend to be located in the Washington DC area. (I've never used one.) However if the patterns really are 1906 (the date on a pattern is often the patent date of a drafting system used to create it, not the pattern itself) it is OK to reprint them. Let me know if you do--I'd be interested in buying them. Fran Grimble ----------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Feb 1995 22:55:17 -0800 (PST) From: "Sarah E. Goodman" Subject: Re: Stupid sewing machine!!! > > The problem: when I try to sew the seam, the underside of the seam comes out as > > a raveled mess of thread loops. Yech. Usually, that means the tension is too > > Gail, This occasionally happens to me because I have a cranky old > machine, but check to make sure that your bobbin thread is still under the > tension "thingy" on the bobbin case. I mean the part that you "snap" the > thread into when threading the bobbin case. For some unknown reason mine > comes loose and I get the same kind of mess that you are describing. I have an old, but very solid, Neki, that gets cranky this way when it needs cleaning (which is reasonably often--it tends to fill up with little fizzy bits faster than any machine I know). The first couple of times I can usually fix it by lowering the feed dogs and blowing the fuzz away, but eventually this stops and I have to pull the hold bobbin holder bit and clean it off/out. ----------------------- Date: Sun, 26 Feb 1995 02:39:35 -0700 (MST) From: VANDERVORT VANDY Subject: Re: SF Bay Area: Half Price Folkwear! I am that Colorado woman...and they wanted $5.00 plus shipping and handling. I have no problems with shipping and handling but with the $5.00. And they at first said they would not do orders by phone. Then got another person on the line and she said would do it if I was willing to pay $5.00 plus. With the $5.00 plus what it might have been to ship it (the weight of 8 patterns), plus my phone bill, it to me, cut down that 1/2 price bargan. So I decided not to do it. Sorry that caused a problem! ********************************************************* Vandy Vandervort AKA... Vandy's Visions, Rocky Mountain Costumer's Guild Treasurer, Broomfield H.S. Art Teacher, owner of TASHI, Welsh Corgi Extraordinaire, and collector of Dragons! vandervo@spot.Colorado.EDU On Sat, 25 Feb 1995, Diane Barlow Close wrote: About ordering from New Yor Fabrics > > They are located at 1948 El Camino Real in San Mateo and their phone > number is (415) 345-4442. They will do mail order provided you'll pay > shipping charges ('natch!). (They had one woman from Colorado phone them > this morning and want some of their discounted patterns but didn't want to > pay to have them sent out to her. Geesh! :-) > > ----------------------- Date: Sun, 26 Feb 1995 18:19:26 +0800 From: writan@iinet.com.au (Writan Consulting) Subject: Assorted comments Just a few thoughts on things - Fulling - I'm not surprised that woollen fabric has changed. Manufacturers for most of this century have produced cloth that is intended to be drycleaned. Many of the finishes we take for granted wouldn't last past the first wash - and you have to remember, some of those garments got boiled in the copper, to remove bacteria & vermin - other things we don't worry about any more. Who wants nits living in their tweed jacket! Bras - Howard Hughes invented the *cantilever* bra. Bras previously were like little triangles (a bit like a '70's bikini top) - in fact I remember reading an article (god knows where, I'm afraid) about some socialite (?) who fashioned possibly the first one this century out of a couple of hankies. I also remember in my highschool history class, looking at a picture (Roman? Greek?) of a woman wearing something remarkably similar. There is an Australian movie about the early days of the Berlei company, and how it came up with the measurements for its underpinnings. It's not a doco, but it is true. The costuming looks great, and it's a good story. I think it's about 10 years old. They used some footage they found when the factory was moved or something. Berlei was started in Australia by a man called Burleigh - he 'frenchified' it for marketing purposes. Old patterns - yes!! me too!! I'd love to buy copies, especially the kids stuff - the heirloom sewing market would lap them up. I've got a lot of 30's - 50's patterns, but they are very fragile. Pantyhose - Mary Quant is usually credited with inventing pantyhose. Didn't have much choice, with the (lack of) length of some of her dresses. Smart lady. And men & women both wearing hose in the past - they weren't 10 denier, and laddered if you breathed on them! Yes, I wear thick ones in winter, but this is Perth (average temp in summer near to 100F), and I've got to cover up my fishbelly white legs somehow (I'm a redhead), without dying in the heat. Just my 5c worth (they got rid of 2c coints here), /anne... ----------------------- Date: Sun, 26 Feb 95 09:08:24 EST From: deirdre@cybernetics.net (Charlene S- Noto) Subject: Re: H-Costume Digest, Volume 236, 2/24/95 At 03:06 PM 2/25/95 EST, 2Lt Aryeh JS Nusbacher wrote: > >> BTW, is Frasier considered a reliable researcher? She's also the author >> of a very readable bio of Mary Queen of Scots. > >Antonia Fraser is not a credible academic writer. > >As an index of the esteem in which she is held in the academic community, >the term "mendacious" was applied in particular to her book on Queen >Mary by Fr. McConica now of All Souls, Oxford. > >Her fiction (published under the name Jean Plaidy) is very well-researched >for fiction, but that makes her a novelist who does her homework, rather >than an historian who writes novels. Not trying to argue the point on academics, but I always thought that Jean Plaidy was Victoria Holt, not Antonia Fraser. > >She is, however, married to Harold Pinter. > >Aryk Nusbacher > > =============================================================== Charlene Noto Internet:deirdre@cybernetics.net CIS: 75374,3154 SCA: Deirdre of Boolteens, Barony of Sacred Stone Vert, On a Chevron Or, Three Butterflies Sable, In Chief Erminois =============================================================== ----------------------- Date: Sun, 26 Feb 1995 10:15:07 -0600 (CST) From: Cynthia Lucille Rosser Subject: Re: Nielo On Tue, 21 Feb 1995, Sarah E. Goodman wrote: > It's a decorative jewelery technique. Don't know how it's done but it looks > like the object is dipped in gold and the designs scratched away to the > underlying material (usually iron, I think). You see it now mostly in > Spanish "folky" jewelery and on fancy sword/knife hilts. > Actually the thin gold wire is inlaid into the iron, it is a very involved process. Sorry that I'm not including any source books, but I left them at home & the computer lab I get E-Mail on is several blocks away. I'll put them in my next posting. ----------------------- Date: Sun, 26 Feb 1995 10:19:01 -0600 (CST) From: Cynthia Lucille Rosser Subject: Re: Pregnancy: a thought experiment On Tue, 21 Feb 1995, cynthia wrote: > > >If women's habits of dress and behaviour change then such things > >become more readily available because we demand such things. > >If we're working and playing in sports, then the belt and pad > >become an embarassing encumberance, and so on. > > >babs > > Lady Antonia Frasier points out in her book _Women's Lot in the > Seventeen Century_ that women spent much of their lives pregnant or > recovering from pregnancy or miscarriage (deliberate or natural). > If this is the case, then it appears that women's everyday fashion, > except for that of the child & the crone are deliberately > constructed to accomodate or ignore (as high fashion does) > pregnancy. > > BTW, is Frasier considered a reliable researcher? She's also the > author of a very readable bio of Mary Queen of Scots. > > --cin > Unfortunately, she is considered a well-reserchered, but popular author. She usually does not footnote and ignores some primary sources that disagree with her thesis. She is not considered a serious historian. ----------------------- Date: Sun, 26 Feb 1995 10:28:14 -0600 (CST) From: Cynthia Lucille Rosser Subject: Re: Politically correct underwear On Thu, 23 Feb 1995, Sarah Randles wrote: > Once the > >bra became a seperate item, it too became an object of attack on > >gender-political grounds when in the 1960s it became a symbol to > >burn them (I suspect few were actually burned, unlike draft cards, > >but it did become iconic to discuss them in terms of them being > >burned as a protest act). > > Somewhat off on a tangent, I know, but I always felt that the feminists of > the 60s got it wrong by burning bras - I feel that my bras are something > that make my life more, rather than less comfortabe, being at least > averagely busted. What they should have been burning (or re-cycling, to be > environmentally conscious) is their nylon pantihose. The expectation that > these are part of appropriate office dress, if you wear skirts, is a > significant oppression, in my view. They are neither practical, economic > comfortable, nor healthy. When did these things (as oppose to stockings, > which are marginally better) become 'normal' wear? Let's hear it for cotton > passion-killers! > > Sarah > ************************************************************************** > > Sarah Randles S.Randles@uts.edu.au > Research Office Telephone: (02)330 1252 > University of Technology, Sydney Fax: (02)330 1252 > There are no know incidence of bra-burning in the '60s it is probably an urban legend. Naomi Wolf mentioned it as anti-femenist media propaganda in her latest book "Fire with Fire". ----------------------- From: close@lunch.engr.sgi.com (Diane Barlow Close) Subject: Re: SF Bay Area: Half Price Folkwear! Date: Sun, 26 Feb 1995 08:45:45 -0800 (PST) > I am that Colorado woman...and they wanted $5.00 plus shipping and > handling. ... [snip] ... With the $5.00 plus what it might have > been to ship it (the weight of 8 patterns), plus my phone bill, it > to me, cut down that 1/2 price bargan. So I decided not to do it. Ah! That's a much more reasonable explanation than what they were trying to tell me. They either got confused and didn't understand why you were no longer interested in having the patterns, or are simply disorganized. Knowing that store, I'd place equal bets on both! ;-) Thanks for letting us know about the additional "handling" charge! -- Diane Close close@lunch.engr.sgi.com I'm at lunch today. :-) ----------------------- Date: Sun, 26 Feb 1995 08:54:04 -0800 (PST) From: Kerstin Nelson Subject: Re: Politically correct underwear On Sun, 26 Feb 1995, Cynthia Lucille Rosser wrote: > There are no know incidence of bra-burning in the '60s it is probably an > urban legend. Naomi Wolf mentioned it as anti-femenist media propaganda > in her latest book "Fire with Fire". > I was in college during this period and remember seeing pictures of a few bras in flames on the front page of the SF Chronicle. I also saw a couple of what purported to be bras burned at UCLA in 1966. I was pretty far back in the crowd but they looked like bras to me. About pantyhose -- I can remember buying my first pair in 1962 (junior year in college) and thinking that they were a miracle -- no more garter belts. I confess that I still feel that way 8). Today I opt for long skirts and wear knee-hi's and am much happier. My $.02 Kerstin Nelson khn42@rain.org ----------------------- End of Volume 243 -----------------------