Bring Up the Booty

It was a busy week in Elizabethan-Costume-Land- I finished hand sewing the binding on the inside of the stays (the outside seam is machine stitched), dyed my gown fabric under the expert tutelage and supervision of a master dyer (Ms. Tiffany L.) and whipped up a bum roll.  Things are really starting to move along!

Dying is messy!  I wanted to keep the colour of the fabric very similar, while making it a bit darker and richer

Sample swatches:  original fabric is on the right, with progressing dye formulas going left.  These are darker than the final outcome because they have been rinsed but not washed, so no almost no dye at all ran off.  

The final fabric, compared to an un-dyed swatch.  It's amazing how different this cotton sateen looks in different lights- right now I'm looking at it right now at at dusk under electric light, and it looks very green.  Sometimes it seems peacock blue, sometimes turquoise, sometimes aquamarine.  Very versatile stuff!  I'm going to run the entire bolt through another wash n' dry cycle before cutting it, to reduce the chances of the colour bleeding or rubbing off.  

Although it's a (relatively) small difference, I think that the dye job took away the "icy" quality that the fabric originally had, especially in the sun.  The new colour is still bright and bold, but not pastel. 

Trying on my newly completed corset with the bum roll!  The green petticoat was a stitch-and-dye project from years ago- an effort to reclaim some very wild looking mustard yellow textured silk.  I'm wearing it over a vintage (possibly 50's? 60's?) single hoop petticoat made of net, which was found in my great-grandmother's attic.  I'll be making my own Spanish farthingale in due course, but wanted to try on some of the layers with the existing hoop to get a sense of how the proportions will work.

Booty booty booty, rockin' everywhere.  

My bum roll is made of cotton (left over from the stays) and stuffed with poly-fill from the craft store.  I may decide to take some of the stuffing out (it's currently very ample) but it may well compress and deflate with more wear.  I based the pattern on a diagram in Jean Hunnisett's wonderful book Period Costumes for Stage & Screen: 1500-1800.  Jean created the costumes for the fantastic BBC miniseries "Elizabeth R," which were largely based on portraits and are considered some of the most accurate representations to be put on screen.  Her book series in an amazing resource, and even includes patterns for some of the designs used in the production!