More of The Lost Art of Dress; Molly Gibson Sewing Ideas

 

Greetings and welcome. The video is at the end of this page.

Today I talked about the book "The Lost Art of Dress" with a particular message to home makers.

Here are the other books that refer to good grooming.

Another Elizabeth Gaskell story, North and South is available on FreVe, a free app from Amazon.  It covers the era of the cotton mills in England, where many single women and children worked.  You can order the DVD on Amazon, EBay, and other websites.

Another video I referred to was Princess Cut. 

You can watch it here:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lIFSH5loJ18&pp=ygUMcHJpbmNlc3MgY3V0

This young lady was not at a job outside the home, except for helping the family during harvest.

You can get a DVD set of Elizabeth Gaskell stories, which includes behind the scenes interviews.

In the above picture, the second lady from the left is Molly Gibson in her blue dress with white blouse. 

Today I illustrated the difference between being crude and refined, with crude oil and refined oil. 

Tea today was cinnamon Stress Soother from Traditional Medicinals.

From the first episode of Wives and Daughters, I created a "Literature Inspired Sewing " planning sheet. The planner  I sketched years ago, was called "Painting Inspired Sewing" where I used clothing from paintings, and I actually sewed all of them. 

There is a Pinterest collection of photos from Wives and Daughters, showing Molly's costumes.

Molly's Tartan Dress. I copied it in the sketch on the Sewing Planning Sheet.

This is Molly's yellow dress with lace collar and sage green shawl, which I showed in the last sketch on the Literature Inspired Sewing Sheet.

I quite like Cynthia's dress on the right, and think I can get the embroidered fabric.

Today's Dress for Home

Fabric: Brother Sister Designs, from Hobby Lobby.

Going out

With Apron

With Accessory (Woven scarf)

Victorian Outerwear

Mending Nets

by Eugene De Blass   1815-1894, Italian

With all the 19th century paintings that are surfacing and being shared on the web, I wonder that modern designers don't take a hint. Women love to look at the details of these clothes, with their drape and texture and color. Could not they be modified in designs for modern wear?

The aqua prints on the aqua and blue skirts in the painting look like some of the woven fabrics I've seen lately in the calico and quilting fabric sections of fabric stores.  I also like the red bandanna collar that the woman on the far right is wearing around her shoulders. Eugene De Blass painted this style many times.

A Helping Hand

by Eugene De Blass

 The vests and bandannas are so colorful, and the women's  shoes look quite stylish, even today. It was quite common even in the early 1990's to wear white or black stockings with dresses, and they were also available in pink, red, and other colors.  I know some young women who have developed a personal style using just long skirts which you can buy anywhere today, poets shirts, colorful vests which they sew, with these types of stockings and shoes. 

  I'm hoping to find time to make some sketches to go with these beautiful paintings, using modern patterns. You see the Victorians were not limited by their clothing to stiff, formal indoor events, and in this scene of mending nets, is portrayed a woman knitting, on the left. I'm still curious about their apron over-skirts, and remembered that back in the 1980's there were clothes like this from designers like Lanz of Salzburg, Laura Ashley and others. 

In the Orchard

by Ernest Walbourne,  British, 1872-1927

A Couple Playing Golf,

By M. Humphrey 

Most people immediately comment on the how the length of Victorian skirts "dragged on the ground" and although that may be so, I noticed in this video clip shows women catching trams and their dresses did not seem to hinder them at all, neither were they dragging in the mud.Certainly today, with updated sanitation and street sweepers, etc. a dress cannot get dirty now as it would have then.

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In a previous post, I shared how make a sewing planning sheet, and this is what one of my email friends sent me to share. She made these dresses for wearing at home.

You see where she has pasted a clip of her fabric on the planning sheet.

I have a new column on the sidebar called "Sewing" where I'm gathering the collection of sewing articles for easy reference.

Australian Woman and Her Daughter Strolling in a Garden of Australian Native Plants

by Percy Spence, Australian  (1868-1933)

Picking Flowers at a Water's Edge

by Ernest Walbourne

A lot of the country type clothing of the past was actually quite roomy, comfortable and colorful. I think it can be easily re-designed for today's wear and patterns made by Simplicity, McCalls, Burda, Vogue, and others. Here are some patterns that are similar in design, to the clothing of the paintings. All patterns can be altered to fit better, and I've put a link on the sewing section on the sidebar for an old fashioned and easy method of raising necklines and making facings. If you are familiar with sewing, you know that some of these costume-like designs could be modified for every day wear.

These are similar to my idea in a previous post about a dress with a jacket.

 Sleeves can also be added to any sleevless pattern,

Use my simple method for raising necklines, posted on the sewing section of the sidebar.

These patterns could be sewn in a current fabric found in your local fabric store.

View wedding patterns with an eye for casual clothing. It is the style that counts. This pattern would look good in calico, like a country-western type garment.

If you are going to make a neue mode pattern for the first time, you need to make a muslin sample first, just to see what the fit is like. 

You might also notice women and men freely mingling in this video clip from 1900 in England. The ladies are walking around in long skirts with apparent ease, and everyone is fully dressed,  even in good weather, yet they seem happy and comfortable.

This is a two piece garment I sewed yesterday, using this pattern for the top:

This is not a current pattern, so I do not know if it is available any more. It has a one-piece drop shoulder.

 The buttons are clear with a silver sparkle in them. To sew buttons quickly on the machine, do not clip the threads or remove the fabric after each button is sewn. Instead, lift the presser foot and pull the thread to the next button, and sew the next button. repeating until all buttons are sewn.  Then pull out your work and clip all the threads  joining the buttons.  The fabric is another "Fabric Traditions" brand from Wal-Mart but is also available at JoAnns, and is cotton. 

Rest at Home

Hello Ladies,  

A friend and I were discussing ideas for having a day off in the home. Usually around my house, it is a day off for the one who has a birthday. We were talking about how the whole family could have a day off from their usual chores.

Painting by Albert Lynch

Taking time off would require some careful planning, particularly for meals and cleanup. Food could be prepared the previous day. 

Children would be free to do whatever interested them, from having adventures within the realm of home and yard, to painting a picture, and just about any thing as long as it didn't prevent some other family member from having a peaceful day of rest.

Morgan Westling (American)

Ladies who take a little time for water color or some other quick art or craft have lowered their blood pressure,  decreased anxiety and developed confidence and physical stamina.

Spend a little time gathering some things to spoil yourself with for your time off at home. You might want to locate your favorite books and teas, bath products, craft and art supplies, movies and music and other things.

Another friend of mine said she gets a pile of reading material and sits in a comfortable chair with a blanket , then proceeds to read to her heart's content.

I wondered how I would take a day off without planning a schedule for it, but it naturally fell into place. I did have to make sure the kitchen was clean and the laundry caught up so that I could truly relax. It was hard for me because I do not like to sit still for very long. 

I want to share with you what someone told me about the importance of rest for women, to prevent strain on their backs and to promote good health in other areas:

Never stand, when you can sit, 

and never sit when you can lay down.

Ilya Repin

I can certainly understand that. We go, go, go, like we are racing to a finish line and we imagine it promotes good health, but some of us have found out it is not good at all, and that rest is just as health-giving as exercise.  You might notice after only a minute or two of rest, how your body seems to revive and refresh! You may ask, "How long should I recline and rest?"

 but you do not really have to ask that, because your body will begin to "tell" you when you have had enough rest and you will feel a good urge to do something after only a few minute's recumbency.

Someone else told me she loves to sit in her reclining chair and look through cookbooks.  That is such a great idea, since one does not often look through a cookbook unless desperately trying to find a recipe for a certain occasion.  Leisurely looking through these books is a lot more relaxing, and then you will become more familiar with where the menus and recipes are.

Maybe you cannot take a full day off, but you can take "moments off" throughout the day. Recently while sewing for an entire day, I tried it. I sewed "step one" on the sewing instruction sheet, and then got up from the chair for a refreshing drink and a walk around the house, inside or out.  After sewing "step two" on the instruction sheet, I arose from the sewing chair and put in a load of laundry. After step 3, I put dishes into the dishwasher, and after step 4, I cleaned the bathroom sink.  After other steps in the sewing project, I relaxed with a little bit of gentle rocking on my outdoor swing, and after sewing a seam,  I was able to walk outside,  breathing in the lovely scents of the season. I was quite surprised that the sewing project was finished in a day. I usually try to sit and sew until something is finished but it is very tiring. 

We bring nice things into our homes to make the place comfortable for everyone, and yet for vacations we want to get away from it. This is a way to make those investments pay off.  

Mr. S. gets so much done, I am always trying to figure out how he does it. I finally observed that he does things for ten or twenty minutes and then gets up and does  something on his list that requires physical activity. He completes a lot of things without tiredness setting in. 

The free online homemaking coach called Flylady suggests taking 15 minutes to work on a room where there are things that need to be sorted through, instead of trying to complete it all at once. In a busy home where there are meals to be made and floors to be swept, and people to look after, this makes time for everything else. I have done this when I was painting walls. I painted one wall and then put the paint supplies away.  Years ago I would take a week off to paint and make myself miserable, but now I am experiencing the success of doing things in increments. 

As I was asking around about taking time to rest at home, one lady told me she makes sure she has a day to spend time taking  care of her hair and her skin. I knew immediately that was why she was looking so vibrant and healthy!

Take time to look out the window, walk outside, sit on the porch, smell the scents, and really listen to the children. The resting times make the rest of you function a lot better. The more often you rest, the more it combats the world's stress. Rest builds strength physically and emotionally.

  

In quietness and confidence shall be your strength. Isaiah  30:15

Frank Weston Benson

Take a little time also and look up the artists and the paintings for many more. Morgan Westling had a lot of paintings of women in creating relaxation, painting, reading, writing, etc.

Once A Year Planning

Sitting In the Garden,

by Susan Rios

Susan Rios would like to expand her mailing list informing people of her painting events. To receive her newsletters, sign up here.

Picking Daisies, by H. Seeger (German, 1857-1945)

from http://www.lovelywhatevers.blogspot.com/

Before I complete this part of the sewing series, I want to show some planning techniques for selecting clothing, even if you buy ready-made. You might sketch a garment or include the picture of the pattern you are going to use, on your scrapbook planning page.  I have attached snips of fabrics and made notes about what the dress might be suitable for (travel, homemaking, church, etc).

click on for details

Take some time once a year to make a planning page like this(the spring is an ideal time to begin), and  use a dark pencil or pen and your crayons, to illustrate your planning page. I have a deluxe box of crayons containing just about every color that you can get in crayons, and use them a lot.

You can also make a scrapbook page with a collection of clothes from catalogs and magazines, to give you ideas for sewing or selecting to wear. I hope you do not have a problem printing it out.

A collection of clippings for ideas in design and color.

On the planning sheet there is a clip of yellow and sage fabric similar to the dress and shawl worn by Molly on the way to her father's wedding. She also wore it while staying with the Miss Brownings. If you want to get a look at how calicos and cotton prints are used in every day dressing, look through Wives and Daughters films and notice Molly's clothing.  There is a good screenshot of the bodice of this yellow dress with the shawl  here http://enchantedserenityperiodfilms.blogspot.com/2008/02/wives-and-daughters-screencaps.html