SCA: A 15th-Century Velvet Houppelande

At my very first Gulf Wars, someone lent me a giant flannel houppelande on a cold night, which I threw on over my cotehardie, and I have wanted one ever since.  So comfy!  So voluminous!  It's like wearing blankets!  This year I finally made one for myself, since War of the Rams (BAM) in November is likely to be pretty cold in the evenings.  

This houpelande is made of the same cotton velveteen Ikea curtain panels that I used for my Regency pelisse, back in June.  Last year I acquired a huge box of these curtain panels from my local neighborhood swap group for free, and I still had 4 of them left (about 10 yards of fabric) - they were perfect for this project.  

I didn't have enough of the velveteen to make a full circle houppelande, so I used a simple A-line cut for the body of the dress, (adapted from a vintage 80s dress pattern) with side gores for as much fullness as I could pack into this thing.  The sleeves are D-shaped, and come to a short cuff at the wrist.  

The houppelande is unlined - I didn't have any fabric to use as lining, and I figured this velveteen would likely be heavy enough to keep me warm when worn over my other clothes. After it was put together I dyed the entire piece with teal and charcoal Rit dye, which gave the aqua-blue fabric a lovely medium blue-ish-gray color: 

After dyeing the whole thing, I added a collar and cuffs of white faux fur from my stash: 

 

The belt is one I made for a Burgundian gown that I made several years ago and never got around to wearing (oops). I had to move the hooks out several inches from where they were to get it to fit, but thankfully, the belt was long enough that I had plenty of space to work with.  The hooks themselves are gold-colored plastic highlighted with green nail polish to mimic an enamel look; I forget where I bought them originally, I've had them for aeons. 

The padded roll hat in the first picture is one I made many years ago.  It's nothing fancy, just a stuffed roll of damask upholstery fabric with pearl beads sewn on, worn with a netted/beaded snood and a couple of lightweight veils pinned onto it.  

So there's a big, new, warm outfit for BAM that I can wear on cold nights.  I also have my linen coat to wear over my Viking outfits, which won't be terribly warm on its own, but which I can wear with layers of hoods and caps, and my wool shoulder cloak.  

Edit:  It turns out the weather at BAM wasn't cold at all - mid-70s during the day, and only into the 60s at night, so I didn't get a chance to wear this at the event at all.  Maybe next year.  

SCA: Making Over An Old Dress

 Approximately one million years ago, I started making a pendant-sleeved gown for myself with some plain, tabby-woven silk that was given to me by a friend. She had dyed it a bright kelly green, and at the time I had visions of one of the hunting scenes from the hours of the Duc du Berry in my head: 

However, I never finished it, and it sat for so long that over the years it somehow magically became too small for me to wear. However, it was still quite a bit of fabric, and the construction was pretty simple: rectangular front and back, with triangular side gores. I thought, if I cut the top off of it, I might be able to refashion it as a Viking apron dress…maybe? 

So I dyed it with the blue dyes that I had left over from the last dye project (royal and navy) with a bit of charcoal to tone things down a bit, and I ended up with this gorgeous dark hunter green: 

I cut the top of the dress off at the waist, cut off the hem and re-hemmed it by hand (the original dress had a long train at the back, which I removed), and made some straps out of the fabric from the top of the old dress, et voila: 

Since this is essentially the skirt of a much longer dress, the gores start from just under the bustline, instead of at the waist, making this a looser, more A-line shaped dress than the ones I normally wear, which are fitted to just underneath the underbust and flare out from there. I really like the fit and shape, it’s very flattering on me and will look nice with or without a belt. 

The long seams of this dress were originally done on the machine (and thank goodness the old thread took the dye pretty well); I did all the new sewing by hand - the top and bottom hem are done with a herringbone stitch, and the straps are folded and whipped together, and attached to the dress by hand. 

I don’t currently have anything with which to decorate the top of the dress,  but that’s fine for right now.  I can wear it plain this coming weekend (our fall Baronial event), and then when I have time I might be able to weave something for the top hem before the Bjornsborg event at the end of the month.  

At the moment I’m just pleased that I have a new dress for free, and that it’s not blue. I love blue, but literally ALL of my apron dresses are blue, and I’ve been wanting some variation.  This color is probably not period-appropriate (neither is the fabric, really), but it’s what I had, and it’ll do just fine.