SCA: Side Quest: Sprezzatura Viking Outfit

While I waited for the mail to bring me the final piece of my big hand sewing project, I started something on the side to keep me busy: 

So, in my SCA household, (La Compagnie della Sprezzatura), we each have a set of clothing in our preferred style in the company colors, with or without appliquéd device, that we all wear together on certain days. Lots of styles, but the same colors - it’s a neat effect. 

This is our company heraldry - I don’t know the correct heraldic terms for it, but it’s yellow and blue with a chalice and white (silver?) star floating above it.  I made a table runner after this device  in 2023: 

This outfit is mostly machine-sewn, which was kind of fun after all the hand sewing I’ve been doing the past several months.  I did hem both pieces by hand, and finished the neckline of the yellow dress and applied all of the trim pieces by hand.

The yellow dress was a lightweight “chambray” linen, meaning it had a yellow warp and a white weft. I overdyed the whole thing with yellow to cover up the white threads. It’s not exactly the shade of yellow I was hoping for, but I got this stuff on clearance for $12/yard, which is unreasonably cheap for 100% linen, so I’m happy with it as is I think. 

The blue dress is a medium-weight linen (about 9oz I guess?) which was given to me by a friend as a thank-you gift for helping them with a project. The teal trim on the top is scrap sari silk, and the zigzag tablet woven band is one I made last year and had in my stash (cotton crochet thread).  

I don’t plan on doing any appliqué on this outfit with the company heraldry - the colors are going to have to suffice.  I know a lot of people like to put big fancy appliqués on viking clothing, but it isn’t documentably period for this type of outfit — and neither is this vivid ultramarine blue or bright-ass yellow, I know, but we all pick our battles, LOL. 

So now I have a Sprezzatura outfit, hooray! I’m all set for our next “uniform” day, whenever that is (probably November). 

WE INTERRUPT THIS PROGRAM...

 So, this is my sewing machine: 

Don't get me wrong, I love it.  It's 26 years old (1994), and it's been a workhorse, and it's my baby.  It's made everything you see on this blog, and much, much more.  It's yellowed with age and a lot of the markings have rubbed off over the years.  But it still sews - even does buttonholes and all twelve fancy stitches.  

The problem is it's also developing age-related issues.  It's slow.  The dials and switches are hard to operate.  The thread catches all the time.  I've had it serviced, and I take great care of it, it's just showing its age.  

I also have a "new" machine, as of about six years ago - a Singer Curvy - that has been nothing but a problem since I got it. It ran well for a year before it needed a new pedal.  Then the needle shank fell out of alignment.  I had it fixed.  Then something else broke.  I had it fixed.  Then the needle shank went off again.  I had it fixed.  It did it again - and this time I wasn't willing to just keep sinking money into this thing.  I had already spent more than the machine was worth in repairs, and I just wasn't going to do it anymore.  

Enter my friends Chris and Franchesca.  Chris texted me yesterday morning and said, "Hey, did you ever get that sewing machine issue sorted out?"  A conversation about my two machines ensued.  Long story short, the pair of them showed up at my house last night with this: 

That's a Husqvarna Viking Tribute 140C - Franchesca's old machine.  She got a new one recently and decided she needed to loan this one to me so I could work on something nice.  Holy crap! I think I said "thank you" about a thousand times.  (If you're reading this, Franchesca, THANK YOU!!!)  

I took it for a short drive this morning - I ran a little sampler just to familiarize myself with basic operations, changed the thread and the bobbin, and then repaired a mask that needed longer elastic.  I can't WAIT to get going on big projects with this thing!  It runs so smoothly and quietly, and practically does everything for you.  I'm about to download the manual so I can learn how to do all nine million stitches that this thing does (especially buttonholes, I'm going to need to make a lot of buttonholes in the near future).  

So anyway, I just wanted to show off my new toy.  I can't wait to really get into it!  

Cheating FTW

I have to share a nifty thing with you guys.

My shiny new sewing machine is down for repairs, so I've been using my old 1994 Singer 2517.  It's a hoss, but definitely leaves something to be desired in the buttonhole department.  It's almost completely a manual process - each of the four sides of a buttonhole are stitched individually, and the wheel has to be turned to the next setting for each side. Stitch, turn, stitch, turn, start, stop, start, stop, wash, rinse, repeat.  It's got a clear foot that allows you to see markings on the fabric to guide your buttonholes, but it's actually really hard to see any detail through, and doesn't let the fabric slip under it smoothly at all, so I end up using my regular steel one - and no matter which foot I use, the feed dogs walk the fabric ALL OVER THE PLACE when the buttonhole settings are in use, so it requires a LOT of pressure and fidgeting to get the things to come out relatively straight.

So on my latest project (which I'll show you in a few days once it's finished), I tried something new:

That's Washi tape.  Washi tape is a craft masking tape that is re-usable and doesn't leave a sticky residue on surfaces.  My roommate uses a lot of it in her paper crafts; she got this measuring tape Washi in a sampler pack she ordered (Etsy? I think?), and passed it along to me. It only goes to 16" and and then repeats; but the measurements are accurate, and so I've been finding lots of ways to use it in my sewing room - there's a yard-long strip on my table in front of my machine, and a 6" strip on the machine it self for a quick guide. 

On my most recent project, I also used it to help me make a nice set of buttonholes.  I wrapped one piece of tape around the edge of my garment, to line up all the buttonholes correctly near the edge of the fabric, measured my buttons, and then placed a second piece of tape on the outside - all I had to do was go from one piece of tape to the other, and I used the measurements on the tape to space the buttonholes out evenly.  I still had to put a lot of pressure on the fabric to keep the buttonholes straight, but that was the ONLY thing I had to worry about. And when I was finished, the tape lifted right off the fabric, didn't pull the fibers at all, and didn't leave anything behind. 

It worked GREAT!  I had 42 buttonholes to do on this proejct, and the tape was a HUGE time-saver. In the 22 years I've been using this machine, I've never had it go as smoothly as it did with the Washi tape!  I will definitely be doing this again! 

Until I get my new machine repaired, that is.  

. 

We Interrupt This Blog Post For An Important OMFG!!!

Guess what this is?

The Squee 'Heard Round the World

If you guessed that this is me opening a gigantic box which I thought contained fabric and which turned out to be A NEW FREAKING SEWING MACHINE!!!!!  you'd be correct.

Turns out that a friend of mine for whom I do a LOT of SCA work for him and his fighting company, of which I'm a member (yeah, that guy) decided that he'd get me a span-damn-tacular birthday present as a thank-you for sewing for him and for his/our fighting company.   He told me that I'd be receiving a package of fabric in the mail, for just these reasons.  He even told me it would be arriving yesterday.  When I got home and saw the box, I couldn't imagine what could be in something that size - I've ordered some things I'm expecting this week, but nothing this big!  His name was on the outside, so I knew it had to be the fabric, but holy cow, how much fabric could be in a box this size?  And why on earth is there inflatable package cushioning in there for fabric??  Then I saw it.

don't you just want to pet it? 

It's a Singer Curvy (8770).
225 built-in stitches, including 7 buttonholes. Fully adjustable stitch length and width on any stitch. Single- and double-needle capacity. Automatic needle threader. Heavy duty metal frame (but the machine is very light).  Drop-in bobbin.  One-step buttonholer, which also lets you free-sew buttonholes yourself.  Comes with a zipper, blind hem, and satin stitch presser feet in addition to the regular one.  Adjustable feed dogs.  3-way adjustable deck/free-arm platform.  Seam ripper, cleaning brushes, dust cover.

watching it do the Greek key was *mesmerizing*

Here's a little sack-cloth linen sampler of just *18* of the 225 stitches, including me playing around with tension, length, and width as I was getting used to the machine.

This thing sews soooo smoothly.  It's comfortable, slips so easily, sews so quietly, and moves so smoothly that it's almost hypnotic to use (keep in mind that my eighteen year old Singer runs well but rough; and my Brother runs like a shopping cart in a gravel pit).

I didn't just play around with it.  I put it to work on the new Samurai outfit I'm doing for Takuan, on the appliqué around the bottom of the pants.  I'm sorry, Old Singer, but, um, your services are no longer required.

So this is the computer.  The computer.  MY SEWING MACHINE HAS A COMPUTER.  Mkay. Sorry.  There's so much information in the booklet on how to use this thing, and the buttons don't really say anything (aside from the ABC one)...but it's actually very simple to operate.  For example, see the numbers on the LED screen (it's got an LED screen, you guys)?  Skip the first button.  The next two adjust the stitch width up and down, then the last two do the same thing for the length.  There's a stitch selector, and each of the patterns is numbered. There's a dual-needle selector, a mirror-image selector (yes, it will sew any one of those 225 stitches backwards for you), an "eraser" button to delete all settings and start over, and some quick-select buttons across the bottom.   Easy as pie.





As if this thing wasn't awesome enough...

• it has a serging stitch that will - you guessed it - sew and overcast in the same pass, just like a serger machine.  
• it has some embroidery stitches I've seen on Norse and Russian garb used to embellish seams and hem edges, that I had been going to do by hand.  
• It won't do an eyelet all by itself, but two of the seven buttonhole stitches make keyhole buttonholes, the top part of which is basically an eyelet that just needs a wee bit of satin-stitching across one side to close it to a full circle.  So it's a two-step eyelet.  Guess what I don't have to do by hand anymore? 
• it has a hand-stitched stitch that looks like...wait for it...a hand-stitched stitch.  Like this: 

I don't have to do that by hand anymore, either.  O_O

Anyway.  I'll quit gushing now.  LOL.  Yeah, right.  I probably won't shut up about this thing for weeks.  

Happy freaking birthday to me. :)  

Next week. Early present. :)