Not wearing them, or even sewing them, but my brain has been shorting out on the subject of drafting/draping trains on my courtesan gowns for quite some time.
I think it is because I usually make the body of my skirts as a straight tube of three or more widths of fabric. If I add a small train of 5" or so to the back panel of such a skirt it is generally full enough that it can adjust to the slight drape without an awkward pull to the waistline, but the trin looks too small (side to side) and too shallow (front to back). If I were to extend the extra train fabric to two or three panels of the skirt the train would likely appear wide enough but I think the skirt would break with a fold line at the floor rather than gracefully trailing behind.
I haven't had any luck finding descriptions on the Internet about adding a train in my situation, but I think the edvidence of the Elenore of Toledo burial gown has given me the information I needed. It's the triangular sections that connect the straight front and back sections! In hindsight it seems fairly obvious that such a section would be needed to guide a trained gown into a graceful sweep |\ .... but I'm gonna say it anyway, Eureka!
Since I only have 2 1/2 widths of fabric to work with it is especially important that I build in as much room as I can in that back sweep or the whole gown is likely to look ridiculously skimpy. The extant gown shows that part of the back panel was taken away at the sides on the upper half and likely used to fill in the bottom, making the back piece more of a wedge. Since my waist is proportionally unusually small I don't need the fabric at the top of my skirt nearly as much as I do at the hips and below so I too will be sneaking some fabric out of the upper back to add to the lower.
Stitch, stitch , stitch...
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