Home

Intro

        The first problem I had was in finding the appropriate fabrics. I eventually (with Dad’s help) found a gorgeous summer sky blue wool. I think Dad bought about 40 yards of the stuff – anyway, my sister and I ended up with full length cloaks from it, Dad had a doublet and I had a full gentry gown!!!!!! And there’s still plenty left after 11 years!

        Mum found a set of 6 exquisite porcelain “Tudor Rose” buttons in two shades of a delicate pink with white accents. These were earmarked to “catch” the blue oversleeves, so that “puffs” of the undersleeve could show through. Julia suggested that, if asked, I say they were of bone rather than of porcelain as that was not invented in the 16^th Century.

        To decorate the gown, I used two different widths of black velvet ribbon. The underskirt and the undersleeve "puffs" were a cotton sheet dyed a lovely rose pink. Part of this dyed sheet was used as the “undersleeve”. A few years later, I replaced the cotton with a Thai silk in the same colour – far better!!!!!

         My head was covered with a cotton cap made in the “Mary Stuart” Heart shaped style and edged with a teeny bit of lace.

         My ruff was a disaster but worked for the event – after the September (1993) Mini-Recreation I dumped it in the bin. It was one of those ubiquitous cotton sheets edged in fishing sea line with a 100 lb pull! As a result the stupid stuff insisted on twisting on itself and making the ruff buckle! I had to use pins to ensure it behaved itself which could be painful!

ABOVE: 1593 Gown – Back View. 

With ‘Lady Mary (Waldegrave) Clopton'

 – Julia Barrett

Back

Forward

Many thanks for the Images to:-