1932 Book of Authentic Colonial Costumes for the George Washington Bicentennial

I recently discovered that there were some adorable "authentic" colonial costumes made in 1932 for the George Washington Bicentennial Celebration. They are a delightful combination of my two favorite eras in fashion history and one day maybe I'll actually purchase one of the costumes if I can find one that will fit me. In the mean time, I was lucky enough to purchase a booklet illustrating all of the costumes!

I thought people would be interested in seeing all of the costumes so I took the time to scan the entire booklet and uploaded a pdf of it too my google drive. Please feel free to take a look and share it with anyone who loves vintage and colonial fashion!

Felicity Wardrobe Project: Concept and Plan

Because I need another project idea to work on, I have decided that I really want to make more historically accurate and adult versions of the outfits my favorite American Girl, Felicity Merriman, wears. This idea came to me when I was contemplating what to do for Halloween next year (I already have a plan for this year, and yes I do plan Halloween costumes a year in advance!) As a librarian, I like to go as recognizable book characters. With my new obsession with 18th century clothes, I wanted to find a character who would wear those clothes. After thinking for a short time, I remembered some of my love for the American Girl books and dolls as a kid and realized Felicity would be the perfect choice!

There are six main books about Felicity. Their covers have changed over the years, but my focus will be on the original covers and illustrations, which are the ones I read as a child and had the ones that were the basis for the doll outfits I remember.

I would like to eventually make all six of these outfits in more adult/historically accurate versions.

I would also like to make her lovely green riding habit which she never actually wears in the books but was one of my favorite doll outfits when I was a kid and appears in the paper doll sets, as seen at left. The collection of the six outfits from the book covers plus riding habit would make a wonderfully complete 18th century wardrobe. It also has many colors that compliment the outfits I want to make for 18th century Belle, so between the two I would have a very extensive wardrobe of things to choose from with a lot of different mix and match possibilities.

One major challenge with this project is that three of the outfits have very distinctive prints that are not going to be possible to find. I need to decide whether to just use whatever close approximations I can come across or whether to try and recreate the patterns digitally in order to print them from a service like Spoonflower. Right now I am leaning towards the latter because I don't think I'll be satisfied with what I can find otherwise, especially for the Meet Felicity dress. I can find floral prints I like well enough for the Felicity Learns a Lesson and Happy Birthday, Felicity! outfits, but if I'm already digitizing a pattern for one outfit, I might as well go all out!

I will not be reproducing the dresses exactly as they appear on the covers. Most of Felicity's outfits are not terribly historically accurate and even if they were, she is a nine year old girl and I am an adult woman so some changes will have to be made to make them both period and age appropriate.

Click read more for my plans so far!

Retro Royalty: Concept and Plan

I'm still slowly working on my 18th Century Belle project, I hope to get some real progress done on my stays this coming week, but have been thinking about a second project this time inspired by mid 20th century vintage-style fashions!

I would like to create vintage looks inspired by the most iconic outfits of my favorite Disney princesses. Unlike the 18th century Belle project, I will likely only create one or two outfits per character instead of their entire movie wardrobe. The outfits will be based on fashions from the 1920s through the 1950s depending on what I think suits the character the most. I will focus on the traditionally animated princesses first. Here is a list of the traditionally animated Disney Princesses:

• Snow White
• Cinderella
• Aurora
• Ariel
• Belle
• Jasmine
• Pocahontas
• Mulan
• Tiana

I will not necessarily make outfits for all of these princesses, but it's fun to come up with ideas for them. 

The first princess I have a really great idea for is Ariel. She's also the first princess alphabetically so maybe I'll go through these in alphabetical order!

Ariel:

• Purple and green gathered-front, keyhole dress with fitted skirt and bottom ruffle

Aurora:

• Pink (going for the pink version kills me a little but makes sense if I am doing a blue Cinderella dress too) long sleeved off the shoulder dress with full skirt

Belle:

• Yellow ruched cocktail dress

Cinderella:

• Blue full skirted cocktail dress 

Jasmine:

• Turquoise lounging pajamas

Mulan:

• Dark blue/light blue wrap dress with red and pink sash

Pocahontas:

• Tan fringed flapper style dress

Snow White:

• Blue and yellow dress with dull skirt and puffed sleeves

Tiana:

• Green and yellow full skirted cocktail dress

I'm not sure that I'll actually make all of these, but it's fun to come up with ideas. I'll for sure make the Ariel one though, I already have fabric for some of it!

Historic Heroes: Concept and Plan

I'm coming up with new ideas far faster than I can make them. A while back, my husband suggested doing an 18th century take on Wonder Woman which, of course, made me start thinking about how I would do 18th century versions of other comic book superheroes too. The main superheroes I keep up with are Wonder Woman, Supergirl, and Batgirl so I started thinking about how I would translate their iconic outfits into and 18th century style.

Wonder Woman: Red redingcote with blue petticoat with silver and gold trim

Supergirl: Blue sacque with "S" design on stomacher and red petticoat with gold trim

Batgirl: Purple brunswick/pet en l'air with yellow lining and yellow and gold trim with stylized bat icon on stomacher/waistcoat.

If I use the same shades of red and blue for Wonder Woman and Supergirl, they could even mix and match the pieces, though the outfits would no longer be representative of specific characters at that point.

I've also had an idea for a not so heroic comic book character:

Harley Quinn: red and black zone front gown with dagged edge trim

I really love the idea of making one (or all) of these outfits to wear at comic-con type events. At this point I just want to combine all of my interests with 18th century fashion! If only I could make things as quickly as I can come up with new ideas!

18th Century Belle: The Blue Dress, Part 1

Belle's blue dress is one of her most iconic looks, second only to her fabulous yellow dress. There is very little about her blue dress that looks influenced by 18th century fashion, so I had to think a bit about how I wanted to interpret it. Though I am not a huge fan of her look in the live action movie, she does have some jackets over her blue outfit, which gave me an idea!

 

I decided to interpret her blue dress as a two piece outfit with petticoat and jacket. I will make it out of linen since it is more of a working class outfit, but I still want to give it a little trim and ruffles to make it pretty! The white collar will be reinterpreted as a white fichu tucked into the neckline of the jacket. I'm going to make my first set of stays in a blue color as well so that if the jacket is removed it will have more of the look of the animated outfit and also her outfit for the Broadway production.

I've purchased some of the fabric needed for my underpinnings and have found a source for the linen. I'm hoping I can get started soon, but I do have some other things I need to work on before I can really put all of my free time into this project!

18th Century Belle: The Plan

I have no real time frame in which I want to finish all of these pieces, but I thought I'd outline a basic plan of the items that I definitely want to make and those that I am considering making. The color palette I will be going for is one of soft blue, sage green, dusty pink, dark rose, and mustard yellow. I based this palette on color selections from screencaps of Belle's outfits and I think it's a lovely palette overall!

I will, of course, include some other neutral colors like black (for shoes) cream, and white, especially if I decide to a version of the dress from the end of the live action movie:

Though there is nothing about that dress that looks 18th century, I'm having some lovely ideas for it as a white floral dress inspired by dresses like these:

I would try to find or custom make a floral print that includes the colors from the other dresses for potential mix and match options. That, however, will be one of the last on my list of things to make since I want to focus on the outfits from the original animated film first. I'm also considering the dress from The Enchanted Christmas since I think it would translate beautifully into an 18th century style:

That dress is just begging to be made into an open robe gown with a cream colored stomacher and petticoat. I love the idea of a quilted petticoat for this dress since it's supposed to be a winter gown.

So what will I focus on first? Here's are some lists!

18th Century Belle: The Concept

I have been interested in historical fashion for many years. I do a lot of sewing, but haven't really delved into the realm of sewing historical dresses before. However, I've been seeing many historical dresses in some of the sewing communities I frequent and it's been inspiring me to try some of my own. One woman is even making an entire 18th century wardrobe of her own this summer. You can follow her progress on the Sewing Magic blog. If all these other seamstresses can make beautiful 18th century costumes, why can't I? The answer, of course, is I can! 

My next question then became what sorts of dresses would I make? I could just make whatever outfits struck my fancy with whatever fabrics I find, but I know myself and I know that having a theme will both help motivate me and limit me so I don't go too overboard and try to make a million different things. My mind was going all over the place with themes I could use but nothing felt quite right. Then one evening when I was lying in bed unable to fall asleep, inspiration hit! I could recreate the wardrobe of my favorite Disney character in an 18th century style.

Art by Maria Elena Naggi from The Art of The Disney Princess