From: Gretchen Miller Date: Tue, 11 Apr 1995 12:22:51 -0400 (EDT) Subject: H-Costume Digest, Volume 275, 4/11/95 The Historic Costume List Digest, Volume 275, April 11, 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: On treating mildew Advice needed on Pinocchio's nose CD-ROM costs On wearing real period garments Some excellent books on Vikings Book prices and the weak dollar 1960s wigs/hair pieces Medieval dye recipes (Old German) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 3 Apr 95 17:06:58 PDT From: susanf@EERC.Berkeley.Edu (Susan Fatemi) Subject: Re: H-Costume Digest, Volume 269, 4/3/95 RE: mildew I hope this isn't too late, but can I ask the people who had mildew what type of fabrics/fibres it was on? I've only had this happen once. it was a 1950's rayon "mrs. Cleaver" dress. I had stored it IN A PLASTIC CLEANERS BAG. Plastic is a big no o no if you don't want mildew. the best prevention for mildew is good ventilation / air circulation and moderated temps. In the winter, textiles should be stored in the heated house, not an unheated basement, storeroom, etc. Take your things out once in awhile and check them. If the garments are washable, wash them. If they aren't, ask your dry cleaners (about removing mildew). The chemicals should kill them. You can spread white things in the sun to dry too. Rayon is the *most* susceptible fabric to mildew (I read that somewhere) I've seen Japanese prints of women spreading *books* out to air, so it isn't just costumes that have problems. Sorry, I don't know any products that absorb moisture except silica gel and it wouldn't really work in a closet. susan fatemi susanf@eerc.berkeley.edu ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Apr 1995 10:05:22 +1000 (EST) From: Carolyn Fraser Subject: Re: cotton > Hello, > > I am not sure if this is of interest to anyone, but recent discussions about > the use of cotton by reenactors led me and others into an off the list > discussion of just what the word "cotton" meant to earlier centuries and just > what forms it may have been used in (i.e. batting, textiles) and how commonly > it was used. ..... > Oh, and if this really is too boring for the general list, let me know. > Thanks. > > David > Boring? Never. This is the type of discussion I subscribe to this list for. I too hope we have not reached the end of this discussion. I may have nothing to contribute to this particular topic at this time, but I derive great enjoyment listening in on topics that I have neither the time nor resources to research at present. Carolyn Fraser, Brisbane Australia ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 3 Apr 1995 19:42:32 -0500 (CDT) From: Marjory Duehmig Subject: Pinocchio Hello, My fellow coatume designer (who has no email access) is in the midst of designing Pinocchio...one glitch, needs help with the "growing nose". If anyone has had any experience with this area please email me or post here. Thank you sincerely, M "You do not dismiss a muse at whim"---Nick Bantock Marjorie Duehmig, Associate Professor of Theatre, cfmad@eiu.edu Eastern Illinois University, (217) 581-5958/FAX (217) 581-6027 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 03 Apr 95 17:59:36 PST From: "Barnes, Cynthia" Subject: CD-ROM costumes & tech junque ???> A friend of mine mentioned the other day that she had gotten a >packet of info from Thrifty's describing Kodax's CD-ROM services. She Hope> Not quite. You can also have the CDs made from slides. If you go up to the maximum number of images per disk (100 now but more soon?) the cost can come down to under $1.00 an image. We are using this technique to put some rare illustrated books online. Since someone wondered at the cost, (I presume the guy who started this thread, who is a hardened computer pro, knows all this ...) here results of 5 minutes worth of digging: Microtech's ScanmakerII (24bit color, 400 or 600 dots per inch) is being advertised in Byte magazine for $1100. Low cost CD-ROM recording is supposed to make the under $1000 price point this year (Byte, Feb '95). That's alot cheaper than a press run! Blank CDs in qty are under $1. 400 dpi is pretty grainy, especially on a small image. 600 dpi is about the same as art book quality. computer nerd masquerading as a costumer, --cin Cynthia Barnes internet: Cynthia@caere.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 3 Apr 95 18:33:03 PDT From: aterry@Teknowledge.COM (Allan Terry) Subject: Wearing period garments Regarding the postings on whether it is OK to wear period/antique/vintage garments--I have strong feelings about (not) imposing your views on this subject on other people. Museum curators are in the profession of preserving garments. Collectors may or may not wish to wear items from their collections. Costumers are in the profession of making costumes in whatever way best suits the play, film, or reenactment activity, and their budget. Vintage clothing dealers are in the profession of selling garments to anyone who wants to buy them for any purpose. Over the past few years, I've read a number of comments and articles written by museum curators strongly urging that everyone who deals with historic or vintage clothes in any capacity should follow curators' rules. This simply isn't reasonable. The argument that "there aren't many vintage clothes around" doesn't wash. I've collected them for over 20 years and have not seen any type of item dwindle in availability since I started. Go to any vintage clothing show and you can see thousands of garments dating from the mid-19th century through the 1950s or 1960s. At a show last month, I bought two Regency period pieces and saw several late 18th-century ones displayed by the same dealer. And the merchandise at one show is only a _very_ small fraction of what is on the market. Most museums are very choosy about what they collect, so wouldn't want most of the items you see for public sale. In fact, some are museum deaccessions (or is it deaquisitions?). Many people donate heirloom quilts or wedding dresses to museums under the assumption that the museum will preserve them better than the family. In fact, many musuems regularly sell off clothing and textiles to vintage clothing dealers. More than once I've seen items with the Metropolitan Museum of Art's tags all over them. And at the vintage clothing show I mentioned there were quite a number of pieces with the DeYoung Museum's tags sewn into them. I bought two--a spectacular late 1870s reception dress with a long train, and an 1880s formal dress, both in great condition. I'm not saying museums have the storage space or budget to preserve every garment that comes their way. But they shouldn't expect the rest of the world to do so either. Other professions have other goals. Sure, you may believe that historic items should be preserved for posterity. But in most cases, no one tries to stop the owner of a historic house from modernizing the kitchen, plumbing, and wiring to make the house livable--and then living in it. No one argues against refinishing and reupholstering antique furniture--and then sitting on it. No one objects to a book collector reading his/her books, or a china collector eating off his/her dishes. I could, obviously, go on to list many other types of antiques that no one worries about "using up" the way they worry about vintage clothes. I think vintage clothes are targeted not simply because they are fragile--so are many other antiques. Frankly I feel that textile curators have become very defensive about their profession over the past few years due to budget cuts and the difficulties of finding work. Consciously or not, they perceive other professions or hobbies that deal with vintage clothes and textiles as competition and try to limit their activities. Finally, I strongly believe that the owner of a vintage garment is the only person who has the right--and speaking realistically, the power--to decide what to do with it. If a collector wants to preserve a garment, that's his/her choice. If he/she wants to wear it, that's his/her choice. If he/she wants to cut it up to make costumes, that's also his/her choice. You may not agree with someone else's choice. But that doesn't mean that your beliefs or the rules of your profession--that is, your choices--are the only correct ones. Fran Grimble ------------------------------ Date: 04 Apr 95 02:54:46 EDT From: Gary Anderson <72437.674@compuserve.com> Subject: Books Re Viking and Early Northern European Textiles References >From Janet Wilson Anderson We (Raiments) occasionally get in some books from an importer of Scandinavian books, and three might be of interest to those seeking both Viking and early textile information. All three are based on archeological research, and contain pictures of actual artifacts found at the various sites. 1. "Northern European Textiles until AD 1000", Lise Bender Jorgensen. (and my apologies that this alphabet leaves out all the barred 0's and vowels with 0's over them). Published in 1992, this is a very scholarly study of the history of the development of organized textile production in Northern Europe. It covers over 5000 years of early textiles, with especial concentration on the definition of a number of cloth types, with illustrations of types of weave, along with the sites found, distribution of the particular cloth and a chronology. Not for the casual browser but an invaluable resource for the dedicated and serious scholar. 2. "The Vikings of Ribe", Stig Jensen, 1991. The first Danish city to be named, Ribe first enters the record in about 860, and lasts till about 1200 A.D. Excavations there have been proceeding since 1973. This book summarizes the history of the town, and the trades carried on there with ample color photos of the artifacts of various types of activities. The text is accessible and well- organized, but the visual wealth of primary source artifacts not shown in other sources makes this book exceptional. 3. "Danish Prehistory at Moesgard", Annette Damm, ed. 1988. Moesgard houses the Institute of Prehistoric Archeology, Medieval Archeology, Ethnography and Social Anthropology, which have all conducted extensive research at this site. The site's history dates from the Stone Age (ca 13,000 BC) and this book covers its history up through the Viking Age ca 1050 AD. The photos are black and white, again of original artifacts and there are some of grave finds of Bronze Age men's and women's outfits, plus a fair amount of weaponry of the various eras. All three of these have been either written or translated into English. We have not listed these in our catalog because the supply and prices vary, particularly with the weak dollar. Contact me separately if you are interested in obtaining them. I also second the recommendation of "From Viking to Crusader" for its wealth of photos of original artifacts. I'm not sure how much longer Rizzoli is going to continue to have this book (they have one of the worst records among major publishers for short runs and virtually non-existent backlist), so grab it while you can. JanetWA of Raiments- who grazes through many eras in search of primary sources RE Book News in General >From Janet Wilson Anderson A warning to all the rest of the bookaholics: I been talking recently with a number of publishers and they are all saying the same thing: With the weaker dollar and the rise in paper prices, the price of books is jumping dramatically, especially imported books. So if you've been contemplating certain expensive reference works, BUY THEM NOW! The next runs of Hunnisett's two volumes, for example, we're hearing will be "substantially" higher. Even Dover has been taking up their books with each reprint, and we're seeing 10%-30% increases from them. Hardbacks are facing 20 - 70% price-ups. And that's just the domestic stuff. On the positive front, Jean Hunnisett's new book covering 1300-1500 AD is well on its way to completion and should be available late summer/early fall. R. I. Davis (author of Men's Garments 1830-1900, newly reissued and expanded) is finishing up his book on Men's garments of the 17th and 18th Century, and is looking at a late Fall/early winter publication date. His publisher (who is also Jean Hunnisett's publisher) has convinced him to do his patterns in the gridded fashion of her books. So they should be more accessible to those who can scale up patterns. Since there is so very little available for men at all, and particularly on the 17th century, this should be a very welcome work. (and did you know that Davis was the Costume Construction Master on "The Madness of King George?) I'll be at the American Booksellers convention in the end of May (right after CostumeCon 13, followed by the CSA convention, and the Military Book Show) and will bring news of new books back for my fellow costume bookaholics. JanetWA of Raiments - in perpetual search for more books to feed her habit and yet another bookcase... ------------------------------ From: Mrs C S Yeldham Date: 04 Apr 95 10:39:00 BST Subject: No subject Two strongly worded messages from Fran and David, and I find myself somewhere in the middle. The reason period clothing is rare, as with any other antique, is because people used them, wore them, and wore them out.(One could produce the paradoxical argument that, after a certain amount of time, survivals are around because they are untypical - the typical items were more likely to be worn out). So, we must be careful now with them, and the older they are, the more care is needed (a generalisation, I know). So, perhaps 19th and 20th century clothes we can still afford to impose our views on them. But can't you just hear the 21st century clothes specialists lamenting how careless we are with 20th century stuff! But where do we draw the line, 1940s clothes are now being collected - the V&A collects modern designer items, should it also collect modern street clothes - the typical, should we throw away nothing and send it all to museums? Carrying David's argument to extreme is perhaps unfair, but does show its weakness. I have two criticisms of Fran's arguments. Firstly, I don't think its very fair to blame museum curators because they do not have the money to do the job they know should be done. Obviously, if they get a better example of an item in, sometimes they have to make invidious choices. It is part of their job to set standards (as it is for archaeologists), even when they cannot abide by those standards themselves. Perhaps if we had a representative range of beautifully conserved clothes available to all of us in museums around the world, then the rest of us could do what we liked with the remaining clothes, but we are far from that position. Certainly in the UK the money given to museums is subject to very political arguments, whatever our views, there are people who see it as a waste of money. Secondly, I think she conflates 'power' with 'right'. Obviously the owner of a garment has the power and legal right to do what they like with it, including dyeing, burning or using it as a dogs blanket. Does this mean the owner has the moral or ethical right to harm a period garment, or even to use it in the way they like, regardless of what future generations may wish to learn? I think conservation for future generations has a stronger claim than she is admitting. Caroline Opinionated! Moi! ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 04 Apr 1995 08:13:38 -0400 From: Joe Marfice Subject: Re: CD-ROM Project OK, OK, I'll step in, but only reluctantly. I, at one particularly unpleasant time in my life, held a job as a Mastering Engineer at a CD-ROM factory, which specialized in small-run data jobs--which is exactly what we're proposing (orders under 10's of thousands being small orders). The CD's end up costing about $1 to produce (roughly), so they cost the customer around $2 (again, roughly) apiece. There's a setup fee, so naturally, smaller orders have a higher actual per-CD cost. Industries such as the cattle market keep market statistics on ROM; nuclear facilities save important operating records on ROM; therefore, this tiny-order business exists. That's the actual cost, assuming that you have data ready for press. They deal in Mac and IBM formats, and can put both on a ROM (although that obviously limits data capacity, and in today's increasingly cross-speaking computer world, probably soon unnecessary). They really don't care what your market is, if you foot the bill. Which would come to a few thousand dollars up front (really small money), for CD's that would have a market value of much higher. Now, add in the costs of scanning in costume pics (many of us might have free access to such; I probably do, for instance), and assuming text writing and editing is volunteer... this project becomes cheap and do-able. Anyone else out there think 600 Mb+ of pics is worth a few $$? As for a recent comment that it would be hard to fill up that space, stop to consider just how memory-hungry graphics are. Yes, 660 Mb of space is a lot of text, but really not an inconceivably large amount of photos. One trip through the National Gallery could do it, easily... Yicch. I hate talking CD-shop. | Broom, at The Lady Perrine | aka Joe Marfice | Ministerium honor est. \|/ which means "Latin sure is a compact language, don't you agree?" /|\ 513-222-2330 233 Perrine Street //|\\ af289@dayton.wright.edu Dayton (my fayre citee), OH 45410 ------------------------------ From: stella.nemeth@solar.org (Stella Nemeth) Subject: 60's wigs Date: Mon, 3 Apr 1995 04:52:00 GMT Alison wrote: THe 1960's magazines also seemed to use at least one hairpiece or wiglet (up to 3 or 4 for fancy hairstyles) in everything they showed. How many people really wore wigs & wiglets that often? I remember my mom having one wig, which she only wore to parties & she didn't like it because it was hot & itchy (but she liked the look of the "perfect hairdo"). ++++++++++++ I'll own up to having owned a hairpiece in the late 60s and early 70s. Mine was one of those things that was made up into curls and a braid intended to be put on top of put up hair. I got it because I nearly died from trying to get my own hair combed out after having it done in one of those hairstyles. I had more than enough hair of my own to have it done that way, but you wouldn't believe the pain of taking it down a day or two later. The advantage to the hairpiece was that I had clean hair that didn't itch and that hadn't been hairsprayed and teased to destruction. I never had an actual wig, and didn't know anyone who did, but hairpieces were extremely common. --- * CMPQwk 1.4 #1455 * Mafia DOS: "Thisa you lasta chance (y/n) ?" ------------------------------ Date: Tue 04 Apr 1995 08:05 CT From: UDSD007@DSIBM.OKLADOT.STATE.OK.US (Mike.Andrews ) Subject: Mildew prevention Susan Fatemi wrote to the list concerning mildew prevention: > the best prevention for mildew is good ventilation / air circulation and > moderated temps. In the winter, textiles should be stored in the heated > house, not an unheated basement, storeroom, etc. Take your things out once > in awhile and check them. {deletia} > Sorry, I don't know any products that absorb moisture except silica gel and > it wouldn't really work in a closet. When I was stationed in Korea and other ultra-humid points East, I was taught the virtues of the "hot locker" for mildew prevention. I made a "hot locker" by placing an electric lamp (60W or so) near the bottom of my wall locker (used for clothing storage) and keeping it on all the time. A "hot locker" could equally well be called a "dry locker", as the purpose of the lamp is to warm the air and to reduce the humidity in the locker, so that conditions are unfavorable for the growth of mildew. I suppose a small heating element would work as well, but don't know of any suitable for this use. -- Mike Andrews Mgr., Tech. Support, Okla. Dept. of Transportation udsd007@ibm.okladot.state.ok.us ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Apr 1995 08:45:11 -0500 (EST) From: andrea ruth leed Subject: medieval dying techniques While browsing the art library the other day, I had the incredible luck to come across one of those books too old to be in modern electronic card catalogs--it's called _Ein Buch von Alten Farben,_ and it's a large book devoted entirely to medieval dying. There are transcriptions (in old German, naturally) of hundreds of "reciepts" from the 13 and 1400's for dye colors and paint pigments of red, blue, green, rust, gold, etc. I'd really love to translate them all into English--but I'm afraid it may have been done already, and that I might be wasting my time. Has anyone out there ever seen a book full of medieval dye recepies? Or anything out of the Nurnburger Manuscript? I looked through a number of libraries, and couldn't find anything of the sort. Oh, well. I guess I'll just go ahead and do it. When the muse strikes... Drea Leed aka Jerise de' Pellegrini ============================= aleed@ezmail.ucs.indiana.edu ------------------------------ Date: 3 Apr 95 23:05:00 EST From: "Gina Balestracci" Subject: cotton David Rickman said: >This, I hope, will not be the end of this discussion. I hope not, too. >Oh, and if this really is too boring for the general list, let me know. Au contraire! This is fascinating! These are the sort of discussions that are the best thing about this list. I'm mostly lurking at the moment because of other obligations, but this thread (that term always makes me smile when I'm reading this list) is wonderful. gina balestracci@saturn.montclair.edu ------------------------------ From: jennyb@pdd.3com.com Date: Tue, 4 Apr 95 15:28:55 BST Subject: Re: medieval dying techniques I haven't seen those recipes, but I would be fascinated to hear more about them. Jennifer ------------------------------ End of Volume 275 -----------------------