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!

• Meet Felicity: Printed cotton robe a l'anglaise with matching printed petticoat, cap, faux coral necklace, and brocade bag.
• Felicity Learns a Lesson: Printed cotton jacket with lace-up front and stomacher, red petticoat, and cap. Felicity's jacket does not have a stomacher, but I'll be basing mine on the one seen in Costume Close Up and the J P Ryan pattern.
• Felicty's Surprise: Sapphire blue silk robe a la francaise with two different stomachers, pearl necklace, and matching cap worn over pocket hoops. The Couture Courtesan has already made an amazing recreation of this dress and I will definitely be looking to her interpretation for inspiration when I make mine. The doll had white shoes trimmed with blue bows to go with this outfit. I am not sure that I will bother with different shoes, especially since Felicity wears this dress with black shoes with buckles on the cover of the book.
• Happy Birthday, Felicity!: Pink wool round gown with pinner apron and matching floral crown or other headpiece with blue clocked stockings. I am still looking for good historical images of floral headpieces in the 1770s to use as inspiration for this. I may end up going with a cap and floral trimmed straw hat instead. Also it was uncommon for English and American Colonial women to wear bibbed aprons as adults so do I have to decide whether to go with historical accuracy or doll costume accuracy in this case.
• Felicity Saves the Day: I will probably just throw up my hands with this one and do a chemise a la reine even though 1774 is about 10 years too early to be wearing one. I've seen earlier portraits of young children in similar clothes, but simple white dresses with colored sashes definitely aren't seen on adult women until the 1780s at the earliest. Alternately, I might consider just making a white dress with blue and pink trimming in a more appropriate style for the period. Either way some sort of floral trimmed straw hat will be part of the outfit. The doll had sage green brocade shoes to go with this outfit. I am not sure whether I will bother with different shoes.
• Changes for Felicity: Blue striped linen gown and petticoat with cap, red wool cloak, white mitts with red embroidery, and white muff with blue embroidery. In many illustrations Felicity wears this same dress with a simple white apron, so I will make one of those as well.
• Other Outfits: Though not worn in any of the book illustrations, I really love Felicity's green riding habit and want to include it in the wardrobe I make. It will require very few changes to make it historically accurate and there are a few good riding habit patterns available. The Felicity doll has had a few other outfits, but I don't associate them with felicity because they were not available when I was a child so I am not sure I will recreate them. Many of these outfits were available after Mattel took over the company so their accuracy is even more dubious than the original gowns. I may consider them in the future, but for now, I think seven outfits is more than enough to keep me busy for a long time to come!

All dresses will be worn over a shift, stays, pocket, and bumpad with ivory clocked stockings and my lovely black Kensingtons, unless otherwise noted.