Regency: The Pineapple Reticule

Here is the silliest thing I've ever made: a pineapple reticule! 

A few weeks ago I learned that pineapple reticules were a thing - at least one of them, that I know of. This knit pineapple purse is housed in the Kyoto Costume Institute’s 1800-1810 collection (as featured on JaneAusten.co.uk) 

The extant purse is knit in silk, in several shades of yellow and green.  The blog linked above states that pineapples and other tropical fruit were very much en vogue during the early regency, but sadly, I cannot find any other examples of period fruit-like knit or fabric objects online. But this one example is enough for me! 

There are lots of patterns for similar knit reticules on Ravelry and Etsy. I am not a knitter - I crochet (crocodile stitch, maybe?), but I didn’t happen to have any yellow or green yarn sitting around. What I did have was a three yard length of 6” wide yellow poly satin fabric that I wasn’t doing anything with, so I decided to sew a little pineapple bag. 

For the body, I sewed four 6" wide strips of satin together to make a large rectangle, then pintucked the whole thing on the bias, and sewed the result into a tube. The lining is yellow cotton from an old sheet I had sitting around to make mock-ups with. 

The  “leaves” are big triangles attached to the top edge of the tube, and I ran a drawstring (pale gold ribbon) around the top of the bag just beneath the leaves on the inside of the bag so that they'd stand up when the bag is closed.  I didn’t have anything green to use for the leaves, so I cut off part of the yellow piece and dyed it green with Rit’s Dyemore for synthetics in “peacock green,” which yielded this lovely leaf green color: 

The leaves being put together, and the yellow cotton lining: 

And here's the round, flat bottom of the bag, also green. The little covered button on the bottom is just for fun, and just because I love covered buttons:

Y'all, I CANNOT stop giggling at this thing.  It's so silly!  This is officially the silliest thing I've ever made, and it pleases my heart.  HEE HEE HEE.  

Regency: Teal Cotton Open Robe

After working my butt off on SCA projects since Thanksgiving, I needed a creative palate-cleanser project - and I was itching to do something new with Regency stuff (besides the apron, that was actually a functional thing I needed).  So my first “real” project of 2024 is this teal open robe, along with a new shawl and some new jewelry to go  with it: 

I had this teal cotton in my stash for years, and I'd originally intended to do a Really Awesome Regency Dress with it (like this one), but after chipping little bits off of it here and there over the years for small projects, it ended up only 3 yards long - not enough for something big and fancy.  But it was, I realized recently, exactly enough to make a short-sleeved open robe to wear over my white 1800s gown.  

My inspiration for the color palette for this outfit was this painting of Princess Amelia (youngest daughter of King George III and Queen Charlotte) by Sir William Beechey (1797).   While I didn't want to recreate this exact outfit, I did want to do something with the same color scheme, with which I am in LOVE - the teal dress with the delicate little silver/white designs, the rust/burnt orange shawl and gold sash and armband. She also wears long strands of clear (I'm assuming rock crystal) beads - which you don't see in Regency art very often - and which sort of pick up on the look of the little silver/white dots on her dress. 

The teal dress in the inspiration picture has some sort of white/silver design on it - it’s probably sprigged - and I’m not sure what the design is actually supposed to be. Stars, dots, probably little flowers? I decorated my fabric with little trios of silver dots, which is a design I’ve used before for Medieval stuff; I really like the look of it, it’s delicate and subtle. I chalked out grid lines on the fabric every 6” and then dotted the intersections and centers of the grid with a silver paint pen: 

The robe is about half machine sewn and half hand sewn - I did the primary construction of the bodice and bodice lining on the machine; but the lining is inserted and the skirt attached by hand, and all the hemming and edging is down by hand as well. 

There's a wee bit of a train on the back, too, for the lovely drape it gives when one walks or the wind blows.  

ACCESSORIES

SHAWL

I made the shawl for this dress out of an old SCA costume. The fabric is a soft, lightweight silk twill, in a deep russet color. The SCA costume was a 12th century *cyclas*, which was just made of two rectangles and some triangular gores, so I removed the gores and the neckline and joined the two rectangles together (flat felled seam + rolled hem edge) to make this shawl. 

SASH

The sash in the inspiration painting looks to me like a dark dusty gold, possibly with some kind of print or embroidery on it, but I suppose it could be brown? Mine is a length of gold poly satin, purchased from Etsy as a “bridal sash” and tied around the waistline of the robe. The color is way too light - I wanted a darker gold, almost bronze - but it’ll do for now. I think eventually I’ll get some nice silk and make a new sash for this outfit. 

JEWELRY

I LOVE the rock crystal bead jewelry in the inspiration painting so much! I haven’t seen clear crystal jewelry much in Regency paintings - usually you see pearls or coral, or colored gemstones with fancier outfits.  My beads are glass (for budget reasons), 14mm round, and strung in two 16” strands. Yes, the bead strands should be waaaay longer than they are in order to look more like the inspiration pic, but I used what I had.  

*

Yay! This was a quick, simple project, and a much-needed break from SCA stuff for a minute.  It's easy to wear, and versatile. 

And I have no idea what's next!  I have LOTS of ideas for new Regency costumes, new Viking stuff and weaving projects, and even a dip into Victorian for the first time (maybe), but where to start?  I think I need a break…I’m also refinishing an old wooden table right now, but I’ll be back soon. 

 

Regency: A Work Apron

Here’s something a bit weird: I made a Regency item for SCA use.  I remembered kind of late that I had promised a friend that I’d help him in the kitchen at Candlemas, and I had this fancy Italian dress that I needed to protect - so I needed an apron. 

I had wanted a Regency apron for a while (I love Elinor’s tan gardening apron in the 1995 Sense & Sensibility movie and have wanted one ever since).  And so I figured, since nobody would really see me in it at the event, I would go ahead and make a Regency apron to wear over my Italian outfit. 

(I swear those pockets are actually even, I don't know why they look wonky on the mannequin; they look fine on me). 

There's not really a pattern; it’s really just a couple of rectangles and some long ties. It’s made out of an old, blue, cotton sheet that I had saved to use as mock-up fabric. The shoulder straps cross over and loop around the waist tie in the back; and there are two large pockets on the front. 

I also made a pair of sleeve covers, which I know I’ve seen somewhere in period on a maid or someone like that - probably on TV - to keep my silk sleeves clean. They’re elasticized at the top and bottom for ease of wear. 

Wearing a Regency apron with 15th century clothing is a bit silly, but I got a pretty blue apron out of it and now I won't get any food on my Italian outfit, so, win-win. 

SCA: Candlemas 2024: Green 1490s Italian - the Accessories

A week ago I posted about the 1490s Florentine outfit I made for Candlemas in February - today’s post is about all the accessories that went into the outfit: 

Hair/Headgear

I’ll talk about my hair first, since it was a lot of fun - I used fake hair for the first time ever for this outfit! It was given to me by a friend several months ago, and I finally fixed it up and wore some of it for this outfit. It was really neat - it’s been two years since I cut all my hair off in order to grow out my gray (and I’m growing it back as fast as I can!) - and it felt soooo good to at least have the feel and weight of long hair again. I miss my hair! 

Anyway, I clipped two long silvery-gray extensions into my hair, then braided it all into a single braid down my back. The front of my hair was parted in the middle and smoothed down over my ears, and I curled the bits that were too short to be included in the braid. I wrapped the braid in gold ribbon, wider at the top and end to hide the elastic bands which contained the braid, with thin gold ribbon spiraled around the length of the braid. 

My inspiration for the hairstyle and headgear were from several paintings, like these: 

La Bella Principessa, Leonardo DaVinci

fragment from a painting of Lodovica
Tuornabuoni, Domenico Ghirlandaio

La Belle Feronniere, DaVinci

I created a reta - a netted skullcap like you see in the first two paintings - using a base of cotton needlepoint mesh canvas.   Once I had the shape figured out, I sewed/knotted the mesh pieces together, and then spray-painted the piece gold, which stiffened the mesh so that it held its shape better. Then I sewed gold metallic braided trim over the seam to hide it, and around the edges, and then attached a long gold ribbon to the corners to tie under my chin. 

Over the top of it all is a feronniere - mine is a long thin black velvet ribbon, onto which I threaded three gold beads spaced out along the front. 

The whole look goes something like this: 

The hair needs work - I like the false hairpiece, but my own hair in the front/side is very flyaway and frizzy looking.  Gotta figure out what to do about that.  

Jewelry

The necklace that I made to wear with this outfit is one of those kits where you press an acrylic cabochon (over a picture or flower petals or what-have-you) into the [pewter] setting - I’ve used these kits for Regency jewelry in the past. For this pendant, I painted the back of the cab with blueish iridescent nail polish, and the effect is sort of labradorite-ish, and I love the way it looks, and the way the color looks with the green and aqua/gold colors in the outfit.  

The pendant is hung on am 16" gold chain; and worn with a second much longer chain which is tucked into the neckline of my gamurra. 

I opted not to wear earrings with this outfit, since my hair covers my ears anyway. 

Purse

I wanted a new purse/pouch to go with this outfit, since my other SCA pouches are all blue and red. I used scraps of the sleeve fabric, cut into orange-wedge-shaped pieces, and lined the bag with some spare blue cotton sheeting I had lying around.  I couched a thin gold cord along each seam line on the outside, added a little fabric-covered button to the bottom to hide the joint between all the seams, and laced the top with a gold satin ribbon.  

Tada! I did a practice run on the whole costume today - doing my hair and getting completely dressed took me about forty minutes! SHEESH. I need a lady’s maid.  Everything is finally finished, though, and now I just have to sit back and wait until the event.  In three weeks.  I guess I'll go crochet something, hehe.