Last December, I had the opportunity to wear my green 1824 dress again at an annual holiday ball. It took a lot of time to sew all the trim on the dress (there are construction posts about this dress here) and I don’t get many opportunities to wear 1820s clothes, so it’s quite lovely to have a general “early 19th century” ball to wear this dress to.
This year we had new garland decorations and were able to get some adorable pictures! I was quite pleased with my silly figure eight braid hair style and my other accessories (the green earrings added a nice matching pop of color, the hair wreath worked well as it has in the past, and I like the white shoes with this dress). I’m behind sharing the photos, but pleased that they’re finally making it into a post.
Don’t you want to jump out of your chair and join in the dancing?
A few weekends ago now, I went to an event at The Down Town Association in New York. It was an event out of my usual ordinary line of events and so I took the opportunity to create something out of the ordinary to wear. The title of the post rather gives it away… but I only had a week to put my outfit together!
Flower Basket, 1860s. This design was created by Jules Helleu or Léon Sault, possibly for Charles Frederick Worth.
Using this image as my inspiration, I determined that I needed to make a flower basket, but that I could use Annabelle as the base for the floral dress. I also wanted to use only items from my stash, thus limiting my options a little bit. So I spent my weeknights creating a fabric basket that fit over my hoops and then furiously pinned flowers to my skirt the day we were leaving for New York in the hopes that they would look good and at least a little like my inspiration image…
(What does a flower basket do with her hands without a bouquet?)
In the end, I enjoyed my flower basket very much, but didn’t like the fact that my furious pinning job didn’t really achieve the cascading flower look I was going for and that Annabelle’s pre-existing flowers were rather heavier looking than I had hoped, also contributing to the lack of cascading flower look. Maybe someday I’ll try again with the same basket and a different, or differently modified dress, but it was fun to do something different even if the results were not as great as I hoped for.
I like the basket when you don’t see the skirt flowers.(Maybe a flower basket holds her handles?)
As I mentioned, this event was held at The Down Town Association in New York, which was established in 1860 (perfect for my fancy dress!). As far as I can tell the association is still housed in the same building they’ve been in since 1860. It was quite lovely inside, with detailed architecture and beautiful rooms. One room was a library full of a rather random collection of books. I enjoy perusing books and so proceeded to examine the titles closely. And guess what I found? A volume of Burke’s Peerage and Baronetage from 1912!
This excited me quite a bit, not only because it was from 1912, but I think also because it reminded me of Persuasion, in which Mr. Elliot is described as putting Burke’s Peerage in a position of honor in his estimation of important things in the world. Regardless, I got distracted and insisted that I needed to take pictures and look through.
Here I am, reading Burke’s Peerage!
Burke’s Peerage certainly is an undertaking, and this volume only covered the alphabet through letter L! Unfortunately, I didn’t spot a second volume in the library, but I hope it’s there somewhere.
Last post relating to witzchouras, we looked at basic definitions of the word, determining that the garment and its name developed from Polish and French influences, that the garment was popular c. 1808 to 1835, and that the chief qualifications are that it is an outer coat or mantle lined and trimmed in fur. But let’s not stop there: here are more references to the witzchouras from the early 19th century.
Side note: A Louis d’Or is a French gold coin first struck in 1640. These were promoted by the French kings to fill the need for a large denomination coin, since the franc and livre silver coins were greatly decreasing in value. In 1726, France developed monetary stability and the Louis d’Or was established as being worth 24 livres, a value that remained static through the French Revolution. At the time of this quote in 1817, a Louis d’Or referred to a 20 franc gold piece, also called a Napoleon, so named because Napoleon coopted the idea of the French kings before him. (Sources: Merriam Webster, the OED for louis d’or, Napoleon, and livre, and the Encyclopedia Britannica.)
Louis d’Or from 1709
Throughout the 18th century, a franc was similar in value to a livre, and about 20 of either of these coins equalled one Louis d’Or. La Belle Assembleé tells us that a witzchoura in 1817 was worth 30-90 Louis d’Ors. What I’m driving at here is the relative value of one of these garments.
The OED gives us an idea of the value of a livre over time: in 1746 one captain was paid 120 livres a month (6 Louis d’Ors). Extrapolate that for a year, and that captain was making 72 Louis d’Ors, just enough for a witzchoura or two and nothing else! Another example from 1797 sounds outraged that an English sea officer was charged 300 livres for eight days of lodging (15 Louis d’Ors). That’s almost 60 Louis d’Ors per month, which would easily be a witzchoura, though I doubt that sea officer would need a witzchoura instead of lodgings! The takeaway message is that, as La Belle Assembleé says, witzchouras were costly and worn only by the wealthy.
It is worth noting that there are fur lined pelisses mentioned which do not qualify as witzchouras in the eyes of La Belle Assembleé. I’ll be examining these almost-witzchouras in a later post.
Moving along some years, The Ladies’ Pocket Magazine describes fashionable witzchouras in 1833 (the OED had quoted part of this in their definition of witzchoura that we looked at in my last post):
As we established before, by the 1830s the shape of the witzchoura had changed to accommodate the changing fashions of dresses under them: becoming more cape-like, with collars and loose sleeves rather than being fitted like a pelisse as they were in the earlier years of their popularity. Again, we are reminded that witzchouras are made from expensive fur, and the more expensive the fur the more likely to see it displayed as much as possible.
Moving forward once again, C. Willet Cunnington mentions witzchouras in his book English Women’s Clothing in the 19th Century referencing a year as late as 1849: “The Witzchoura Mantle, for the carriage, lined and trimmed with fur.”
This quote from La Belle Assembleé in 1849 could be the source for Cunnington’s mention of the style, as the phrasing is quite close to Cunnington’s description:
Here there is a mention of another garment similar to a witzchoura: in this case a burnous. According to the OED again, a burnous is a woman’s cloak or mantle from the 19th century resembling an Arabian upper garment of the same name. It is interesting to note that by the 1830s and 1840s a witzchoura is described as heavy, cumbrous, and very ample instead of the more fashionable and positive descriptions from the decades prior.
This is the second mention in this post of a similar (or possibly the same) garment of Russian origin. In addition to the specific evidence of the Polish origins of the witzchoura in name and relating to Napoleon himself, I’ve also come across multiple mentions of the witzchoura style being brought back to France from Russia by Napoleon’s forces. Both of these influences fit in with the dating we’ve established and lead me to wonder if these are two separate and unique garments. Perhaps, though I suspect that if they were indeed separate styles in name they would have been variations on a similar theme, just like the fur-lined pelisse mentioned earlier in this post.
From the Cranberry Scarf post, proof that I was wearing my wool skirt, though all the layers cover up the changes I made that completed it.The new placket closes with hidden skirt hooks and bars.
While the side seams, hem, and waistband were totally finished for the first wearing, the skirt never had closures. It just sat in my closet taunting me with it’s almost-finished status. When I went to finish it I realized that a side closure would make it much easier to get dresses and be less gap-y than the center back closure I had originally intended. Moving the closure meant re-do-ing the waistband, so I also used the opportunity to change out the pockets.
As a side note, pockets on day wear are genius! They’re so useful when you’re the public eye and you need to keep things like your car key, phone, and ID on you but you don’t want to leave them lying around. They free your hands from any sort of bag and ensure that your sensitive modern items are not lost or stolen. GENIUS!
New (modern shaped) pocket.
The pockets I’d originally put in were rectangles set in vertically that extended both in front of and behind the pocket slit. They are just fine in skirts with more fullness, but for this period they were hard to get my hand in and out of. So when I was changing around the waistband, I cut out a new pocket shaped like what you would find in a modern garment. The new pocket has a facing piece of the skirt wool sewn over the muslin where it might show when I put my hand in (that’s the square set of stitching on the upper right). Because I added a side closure I only have one pocket on the other side, but it is easier to use than the old pocket style was. Both the pocket and the waistband facing are made from scrap muslin (not itchy, not slippery, and who doesn’t love using up scraps?!?).
Both sides of the skirt have four covered buttons on them. Buttons were often used in the 1910s to decorate skirts and blouses (take a look at my 1915-18 Pinterest board, for instance, and you’ll see lots of examples). These buttons are just for show, though, because the skirt closes with hidden skirt hooks and bars.
Braving the cold to show off my completed skirt placket.
I referenced Jennifer Rosbrugh’s great placket tutorial (I could remember all the directions exactly, but it’s so much easier to just take a quick look to remember which pieces to cut to different sizes and where to put them!) and this tutorial showing how to add hidden side pockets (Again, nice to to have to think very hard: easy directions and good illustrative photos!). And I’m super pleased that the skirt is complete! Yay!
It’s time for a little more information about witzchouras! Back in January, I shared my round-about journey to figure out what a witzchoura is. Now it’s time to look at witzchouras in more detail to determine what qualities define them.
In that last post, we left off with this enlightening sentence from the book Empire Fashions by Dover Publishers: “Around 1808, a high-waisted, fur-lined woman’s coat appeared, the witzchoura [wi choo ra].” Here is an example of what a witzchoura looks like.
Costume Parisien from 1813
My go-to source when I get geeky about word history is theOxford English Dictionary, and lucky for me, it has an entry for witzchoura! The OED tells us it as an obsolete noun from the French vitchoura and the Polish wilczura (a wolf-skin coat) that is defined as “A style of lady’s mantle fashionable c. 1820-35.” The OED also shares four uses of the word from period sources. Here they are, with slight edits:
1823 La Belle Assemblée Dec. Witzchoura pelisse of gros de Naples,..trimmed with a very broad border of swansdown. 1833 Ladies Pocket Mag. The witchoura is a very ample mantle, made with a very deep collar, and cape, and long, loose sleeves. 1835 Court Mag. [The mantle] is of the Witzchoura form, drawn close at the back, with large Turkish sleeves, and a deep falling collar. [1898 M. Loyd tr. O. Uzanne Fashion in Paris Witzchouras had not yet [c1806] come into vogue.]
So far, our qualifications for a witzchoura include: a high waist for earlier witzchouras (to correspond with the fashionable silhouette), fur lining, fur trim, the fact that a witzchoura is a coat or mantle (for outerwear, with another garment worn underneath), that it was most popular c. 1820-1835, and that it had not yet become fashionable c. 1806. Other sources add to a witzchoura’s qualifications those of its being full length, having large sleeves and a wide collar (or sometimes hood or cape layers over the shoulders) especially in the 1830s when the silhouette changed, as well as the general period of the “early 19th century” for its popularity, which makes sense since we’ve just looked at sources that mention dates between 1806 and 1835.
There is some information telling us that the garment became popular after Napoleon gained a Polish mistress in 1808 and other information that tells us that the garment was Russian in origin and became popular after the Napoleonic Wars brought the style back to France and England. (For more information about these early witzchoura influences, check out this post at the Sewing Empire blog.)
I’m excited the word has Polish or Russian origins, because “witz” sounds Polish or German to me. Also, I love that the last quote from the OED tells us that witzchouras weren’t popular just a few years prior to the year 1814. Oh, how fashionable is a merveilleuse!
I used the deadline of the HSF/M Challenge #2: Blue to finish the nagging little things on my 1811 Elusive Blue evening gown that either didn’t make it to completion in time for the first wearing last April or that bothered me after wearing it that first time. The changes: lengthening the hem of the underdress, adding a drawstring below the bust to control where the fullness and folds will fall beneath the overdress, fixing a section of pearls on the back hem that had come loose, and creating trim to finish off the sleeve openings.
The trim on the sleeve openings is probably the most noticeable and interesting of the things that brought the dress to completion.
Just the facts:
Fabric: Scraps of elusive blue and dark blue fabric from the original dress.
Notions: Extra pearls, thin yarn for cording, and thread.
How historically accurate is it? The trim is directly inspired by this extant gown at the Met and is entirely hand sewn. I think it would be recognizable by someone in 1811, so the only points off would be for inaccurate fabric choice. Let’s say 90%.
Hours to complete: As usual, I did not keep track for the changes/finishing or for the original construction. I can safely say, “a lot.”
I attended a small Regency ball last weekend. It was charming and not nearly as packed full of people as I have grown accustomed to at these events in recent years. The smaller crowd made for a much more subdued (but still pleasant) evening than I was expecting.
The only downside was that the hall was exceptionally cold and not being full of people did not warm up very quickly! Few of us had planned for the situation and we were mostly scrambling to find any scarves or sweaters to wrap ourselves in. Many of us were resorting to items that we’d worn to keep ourselves warm outside, sacrificing fashion for warmth (it’s been below freezing here in Boston for at least the last three or four weeks consistently). I, for example, wrapped up in my pink cashmere scarf despite wearing a red dress. I thought it looked odd, though I was told that the colors looked good together. But there were a few lucky solutions that were both fashionable and warm: a large paisley shawl and a plaid scarf/wrap that looked very Scottish were the two most fashionable looks in my opinion. After some dancing and about midway through the evening, many had warmed up enough that scarves were being discarded, though I do believe I kept my scarf wrapped over my shoulders and chest throughout the entire evening.
Elegant, fashionable lounging during the refreshment break.Delicious refreshments alluringly laid out.
I wore my red 1813 evening gown and my homemade red and gold tiara. (I had hoped to finish and wear my 1811 elusive blue evening gown, but I would have had to do a lot of last minute sewing to finish it in time and after my recent skating costume last minute sewing adventure I was not inclined to do so again so soon. It is very satisfying to have a closet of options for an event, especially when plans to complete something new go awry.) I also brought along my red and gold reticule, because it matches the outfit so perfectly (although the only thing I kept in it was my phone… which is the reason for the slightly blurry, grainy photos).
All the red and gold Regency pieces in my wardrobe put together in one outfit!It was so cold getting dressed that I was not inclined to do a complicated hair style. Heeheehee, fake hair to the rescue! I just put my hair in a pony tail, braided it, and wrapped it around itself. Simple! The big braid is what makes it look complicated, but it is pre-braided fake hair. I think it completes the style perfectly and has a bit of a “chinoise” look to it, too.
What do I mean by “chinoise”? The word itself is from the French adjective meaning Chinese. In terms of fashion, there are scarce references to “chinoise” styles in Regency fashion plates (compared to the abundance of Regency fashion plates showing other styles). Here are a few examples. This Merveilleuse from 1814 has a “Coeffure Chinoise,” this lady from 1812 has a “Coeffure a la Chinoise,” and this fashion plate shows “La Toilette Chinoise.” (I do sort of wonder how some of these attributes, and the hairstyles in particular, said “Chinese” to people during the Regency, but of course the world was perceived very differently then and people had access to vastly different quantities and types of information than I do today.)
I’ve often noticed that “chinoise” hairstyles make use of braids that wrap around the head. In addition, there seems to often be a vertical emphasis to the hair and to a bun, if one is present in the style. It is these attributes that say “a la chinoise” when I look at my own coiffure from last weekend. Sometime, I’ll have to try to make a more exaggerated “chinoise” style with a very tall and flyaway bun such as the Merveilleuse from 1814 has. I’m pretty sure my hair will have no trouble with that since it is naturally curly and wanting to fly away!
This is one of my favorite outfits of all time. I just want to hug myself, with all the fur, and I love the trim on the back! The whole thing is so cozy and so hug-able and the skirt has such a nice drape and the accessories work so well… and I actually got to go skating in it! I am just utterly chuffed (to use a British word) with the whole thing!
I was on the fence about whether this outfit would apply to the Historical Sew Fortnightly/MonthlyChallenge #1: Foundations, but then I read Leimomi’s teaser post about her foundation entry in which she reminds us about different interpretations of foundations and the intent of this challenge to create loose guidelines open to interpretation.
I was convinced (or pushed off the fence, if you prefer to think of it in that amusing way). I’m claiming my all new 1895 skating outfit for the first challenge of the new year! It does rather stretch the idea of foundations. Is the skirt a foundation because it is literally worn below the jacket, thus being a foundation as you would think of one in a building? Or is the bodice a foundation, because my direct inspiration is a lonely jacket without a skirt and therefore it is the foundation of the outfit because I wouldn’t have made the skirt without having the jacket? Either way, there is an element of a foundation in there.
Just the facts:
Fabric: 5 yds of ivory wool, about ⅓ to ½ yd of dark brown faux fur, probably about 3 yds of scrap muslin for flat lining the jacket, a bit of scrap canvas to stiffen the collar, and a bit of ivory flannel to line the inside of the collar.
Pattern: Made by me and based on my inspiration jacket as well as patterns published in Authentic Victorian Fashion Patterns (a Dover book).
Year: c. 1895.
Notions: 5 yds of brown braid, thread, a bit of high loft polyester batting to keep the sleeves puffed out, about 1 yd of ivory hug snug to finish the bottom of the jacket, hooks and bars for the skirt, and thread.
How historically accurate is it? Pretty darn good. Definitely recognizable by someone in the 1890s. The construction is accurate, aside from the use of hug snug instead of bias and faux fur instead of real fur. So, 95%.
Hours to complete: Um… As usual, I did not keep track. I definitely spent at least 15 hours the few days before the event sewing on my braid and fur trim… Plus full days of pattern making, fitting, cutting, and sewing. Maybe 30-40 hours? I care so much more about the finished project than the time it takes to get there! And I loved sewing this, so I didn’t mind that it took time!
Total cost: $75 for the wool, probably about $8 for the fur yardage I used for this project, $4 for the braid, and the rest from the stash = $87
My accessories were a matching fur muff that I made a few years ago and wore once for caroling (with my as-yet-undocumented 1860s winter cape) but more often with my 1917 winter ensemble and a revamp of my 1883 wool hat. I didn’t have time to make a new hat because of all the last minute fur and trim sewing, so I pinned a fur scrap around the 1883 hat and added some feathers to stand up a bit more like 1890s hats and called it good. My main inspiration (and the reason I feel it was an acceptable looking style to have the squashy fedora hat look in the 1890s) was this image.
For good measure, here’s my Pinterest board for the entire project. And here are pictures of us skating (with ice skates: all our snow and cold weather does occasionally come in handy here in Boston)!
Yes, we just crashed a local outdoor ice rink on a Sunday afternoon. One of the attendees even wore vintage skates! Turns out they can be hard to skate in because they’re not very supportive… but they looked fantastic! We got lots of comments from people asking what we were doing, why we were dressed up, and that we looked good. I was asked by multiple groups of young girls why I was dressed up and one group in particular asked what the swirly thing was that I had, which I got to explain was a muff to keep my hands warm!
Here’s our skating group. People came in a variety of late 19th century and early 20th century winter outfits as well as modern clothes.
With my skating ensemble I wore fleece lined tights (modern, but warm so I didn’t care), knee high bamboo socks (modern again), my 1903 silk petticoat (super useful for the 1890s, also), a modern tank top (instead of combinations, because I needed to go to work later in the afternoon and change out of my outfit in the back seat of my car without being indecent…), my 1895 corset, and a long sleeve modern waffle tee (mostly to shield my skin against the wool seam allowances and also for warmth). And I was perfectly warm wearing this out for skating on a day that was sunny and right around freezing. In fact, with the muff and wool hat I actually was too warm at times.
Pleased, chuffed, and smiling all afternoon! So fun! Maybe we will get to go skating again this winter!
The text reads: “Toque de Velours. Witz-choura de Satin.” I’ve looked at enough fashion plates to guess the meaning of most of the text. After some quick reference to translation programs, I confirmed my suspicions and translated the text as: “Hat of velvet. ____ of satin.” The question is, what does “Witz-choura” mean?
First, let me tell you that I originally read the plate as “Toque de Velours. With-choura de Satin.” That z looks remarkably like an h, despite the fact that I don’t think “with” is a word in French (also, I don’t really associate the letter z with French words, so I was happy to interpret it as an h). I followed this path for awhile, though, despite the fact that it didn’t quite make sense. Assuming “With” meant what it does in English, I proceeded to try to figure out what “choura” meant. I looked at English dictionaries, including the Oxford English Dictionary, with no luck. And in French dictionaries the closest thing I found is that “choura” is conjugation of “chouraver” or “chourer,” a verb which seems to mean “to steal” or “to rob” in English. But that didn’t make any sort of sense! The only other reference to the word “choura” I found was that it has a connection to an Arabic word relating to the parliament of an Islamic state. Again, no connection. So then I thought, what’s the word for shoes in French? Maybe “choura” is an older form of that word? Turns out that “les chaussures” means shoes in French.
I was about to pursue this train of thought, when Mr. Q interrupted me. When I complained about my lack of useful results he suggested I try, amongst other ideas, a search of Google Scholar. My initial search turned up lots of science related publications with authors whose last names were Choura. But then, when I added the word “fashion” to my search, I was returned one result which was to the point and clarified the whole business (at least a little bit!). Mr. Q broke the mystery wide open!
The clarification comes from the book Empire Fashions by Dover Publishers. The relevant sentence can be found here and reads: “Around 1808, a high-waisted, fur-lined woman’s coat appeared, the witzchoura [wi choo ra].” Ohhhh, I thought, that’s not an h it’s a z!
Upon searching for it with the now-corrected spelling I finally found relevant information! All that will be in future posts, though. I thought I’d break it up to avoid having one really long post. So you can look forward to a post with descriptions of witzchouras and then also a post with images of them. At least I was on the right track!
(Click here for my original post about the 1814 Vernet Project, to which this post refers.)
Ahh! It’s halfway through January and I feel rather behind on posting my 2014 summary. It seems like everyone else is so much more on the ball with that than I am this year. Well, without further ado…
Completed projects in 2014:
January: The Make Do Shift (HSF #1)February: A Pink Regency Belt Style Sash (HSF #3)March: ca. 1860 Corset For Me! (HSF #4)March: New Annabelle hair wreathApril: 1811 Elusive Blue Regency Dress (well, mostly finished)April: Red/Gold Regency Reticule (HSF #5)May/June: Anne Adams DressMay/June: Round Regency ReticuleJuly: Georgina Evening Bodice and Hair Crescent (HSF #13)July: Orange ParasolJuly: 1850s CollarAugust: 1920s Sinamay Hat (HSF #15)November: 1917 Cranberry Red Scarf (HSF #23)November: Our Apartment Redecoration ProjectDecember: 1950 Baroness Dress
Looking forward to 2015, I’m planning the following for certain:
Finishing a modern cotton dress I started last year
Finishing a 1910s evening dress I started last year
Finishing an 1880s day dress I started in 2013
A 1900s evening gown
An 1830s evening gown
Knitted red gloves
A robe de style
A late 1910s day dress
Finishing an 1814 pelisse and day dress I started at some point
Of course, I have lots of other ideas in mind, too! A lot of it depends on how busy I am, how much time I have to sew, and what events pop up.
As usual, I completed some things on my looking forward to 2014 list and some things just totally fell by the wayside. In particular, while I started panniers for the court gown project, I didn’t finish them, nor did I start any other part of that ensemble. I’m a bit sad that I didn’t work on this project very much. I’m pondering whether to leave it on my list of things to do or to reallocate the fabrics for some other project. I was so excited to participate, but I have so many other things to make that I can actually wear to events… and I wasn’t boosted along in my enthusiasm by the general blogging world because it seems lots of other excited people were busy last year also. Alas, life takes up so much time!
I did exceed 100 followers and 200,000 views on the blog this year. And I announced my engagement (and to be fair, planning a wedding is definitely something that is keeping me busy in my spare time!). I was also awarded the Liebster Blog Award for the second time. This time by Susan, of the blog Threading Through Time.
I participated in the Historical Sew Fortnightly 2014, but only completed 7 challenges out of 24. I think I was mostly busy with life or busy with other projects that didn’t line up with the HSF for most of the year. I will likely participate in the HSF 2015 this year, though as in the past two years I won’t go super out of my way to make projects just to satisfy challenges if they’re not also being made for another purpose.
And in terms of events… 22 for 2014: 9 balls, 8 other events (teas, picnics, outings etc.), and 5 performances.
We spent the beginning of this month vacationing in the Caribbean. As we continue to sail along on our life adventure, I hope to create many more fond memories and retain the relaxation from our Caribbean escape. I hope your year is full of the same!
The Quintessential Clothes Pen 