Wait, there's more?

I'd like to announce two new goals that I am going to try to reach with this Kickstarter Project. 

To reach these goals I need your help spreading the word about this project with your friends or reaching out to blogs who might be willing to let its readers know more. All the help I can get is very much appreciated and I've enjoyed receiving your feedback for this project.

Please share this link: http://tinyurl.com/kickstarter-tff

Stretch Goal #1: reaching $10,000 AUD activates an extra chapter in the book: Reticules, pockets and purses.

Once this goal is unlocked Aylwen will add an extra chapter for no extra charge for ALL BOOK BACKERS on reticules, pockets and purses and will include lots of colour photos, embroidery designs and patterns for making your own.

Embroidered silk reticule to be included in extra chapter

Stretch Goal #2: reaching $15,000 AUD activates a new companion book: Gentlemen's Fashion of the Georgian Era

Once this goal is unlocked Aylwen will offer you a completely new reward - a long awaited and requested "Costume in Detail" book on Men's Fashion of the Georgian Era. Aylwen will take photographs of men's garments both inside and out and include close-up photos of finer details and trims. This book will be available for order as soon as this stretch goal is unlocked and will be selling at the same price structure as Trims, Frills and Furbelows. A limited 10% discount will be offered to those subscribing to both books before 19 December 2016. 

Amongst garments already selected for the book on
Men's Clothing is a rare pair of men's drawers from the 1780s.

Snowshill Costume Collection

I have organised a small costume study tour to the Snowshill Costume Collection with Althea MacKenzie on Thursday 19 September 2013 and have room for a few more to join us. Once your name is on our list, please let me know if there are any items you particularly want to see in the collection at Berrington Hall in Leominster, UK.

I have found a few items online at http://historicalcostume.wordpress.com/ and there are more in the book, Costume in Detail.
Registration for the tour is by paypal to garden@earthlydelights.com.au - £45 pounds pays for private transport but does not include entry or refreshments. We leave Bath at 8.30am and aim to return by 5pm, traffic allowing.

Regency Seams

Clothing construction methods were different in regency times. They did not have overlockers or sewing machines - it was done by hand. Fabric was very expensive and less plentiful, making frugality a necessity. Garments were fitted to the body and not sewn together from patterns.

Today we sew seams together by machine, right sides together with seam allowances of 1.5cm. The seams are then ironed, graded, notched or clipped to lie flat when turned, then ironed again. In regency garments in our collection the seams are narrow and outside seams are carefully finished to enclose all edges.

Bag-lining is very popular today, with lining pieces cut from a pattern, sewn together to make a garment, and then inserted into the garment towards the end of construction. In the garment below the fabric and lining have been treated as one during construction. Each piece has its lining attached to it before it is added to the next piece of fabric.

The construction methods and pattern style of these two dresses from England is very similar to an embroidered muslin dress in the Snowshill Collection c.1810 featured in Costume in Detail by Nancy Bradfield. The sleeves are very long, they feature apron-front bodices pinned at the shoulder. Both have white linen lining, the silk dress has tiny sleeves under the long sleeves and both feature narrow under-pieces at the front. Both have decorated bodices.


These photos show the side back and shoulder seams, together with the raw edges of the armscye seams inside a silk dress in our collection. In my next blog I will show how this method is done with step by step photos.


This shows the inside of a cotton dress in our collection.


This photo shows the lining of the front bodice and where the silk finishes.


Above are the finished seams of the front opening which are pinned closed underneath the bib front.

Seams joining the front skirt with the bib front. Shown here are the inside seams.