Gold Linen Doublet

Many years ago, at my husband's request, I had started a doublet of linen for him.  The hope was that he could use it for fencing during the warm summer months.  He requested as few layers as possible, and I cut out the pieces using our best pattern at the time.  Before assembly, we determined that the doublet, with just an outer layer and lining of linen was not going to be sufficient for fencing in.

The doublet sat, unassembled, on a shelf for 6+ years.  In that time, I was introduced to the Bara System as detailed by Mather Gnagy and how to draft a better pattern.  I also finally realized that modern sewing techniques such as bag lining were never going to get me to a better 16th century doublet.  And that historical garments rarely (if ever) were lined in the same material as the outer shell or were made from a modern "linen".  The linen doublets that I'm aware of are made of a linen canvas (different weave).  The gold color is also a bit strong.  Natural linens vary from brown to grey to gold, but not this bright.

Now that I've admitted all that's wrong, let's talk about what can be salvaged.  It seemed a same to have the pieces still sitting on a shelf, and we determined that my husband hadn't changed sizes too much, so the only thing left was to make the best of it.

The long, straight seems were sewn by machine for speed.  Everything else was sewn by hand using most of the Modern Maker techniques.  Knowing that I was using the wrong lining and wrong weave of cloth, I was actually pleasantly surprised at how much shaping and structure I was able to achieve.

The collar standing tall with no padding or lining in yet.

The shoulder wing. I did add a little inter-lining to help give it shape.

I really did start of counting the time I put in, but lost track along the way.  I estimate that I put in somewhere close to 40 hours prior to buttons and button holes.  All in all, I'm rather please with how it turned out, and I look forward to seeing it finished with proper buttons.

I did convince my husband that it would be ok to have an interlining to back the button holes and to  stiffen the shoulder wings and waist skirts.  Otherwise, there is no stiffening or pad stitching.

Finished minus buttons and button holes and sleeve cuffs.

Whaler's Cap

It took nearly a year, but I finally finished my knit cap inspired by the 17th century whaler's caps in the Rijksmuseum.  The cap traveled with me to California to visit family and to Amsterdam for a summer vacation.  I had intended it as something to keep me busy, so was not in a rush to finish.

 

But, having now seen one of the actual items I was inspired by, I started to notice certain details.

The first thing is how the brim was turned.  I was following a pattern which said to use a perl row for the turn of the brim.  But, after looking at the caps in the Rijksmuseum, I agree with Mathew Gnagy who blogged about how this doesn't seem to be the case for many historical examples.  The example he uses is a knit tall hat where the edge of the brim is a cast off row.

Unfortunately, I had this realization well after I had knit the brim, and I decided not to go back and start over (again).  For the whaler cap that is my inspiration, it appears that the brim was simply turned, no perl or cast edge can be seen.

The other big difference was that I started to run out of yarn, so the hat should be about an inch taller.  It still has a decent shape and height to it.

Clearly, the whaler's cap has some shaping to the brim that the Red Bay hat does not have.  I'd actually like to try another one that it truer to the shape of the whaler's cap, but I doubt my knitting patterning skills.  Perhaps some day.

I made no attempt to full or raise the nap on my hat.  I don't have any pictures of the Red Bay hat, but the whaler's cap certainly looks like some of the nap has been worn off.

Here is an article about the collection of whaler's caps, and a direct link to the collection at Rijksmuseum.