Event-based Motivation: Spiffing Up Garb for Raglan

One of the good things about moving to Wales is that one of the biggest SCA events in the UK is (relatively speaking) right in my backyard. Raglan Fair takes place every September, when hordes of SCAdians descend upon on the grounds of Raglan Castle, set up camp, and proceed to cook, craft, shoot, and bash each other with sticks for ten days straight. For me, the upshot of this is that, for a week and a bit, I get to hang out with a significant number of people I adore but have very few opportunities to see in person. Last year (our first in Wales) I spent just one afternoon at the castle as a member of the general public, not as an attendee, but this year I decided to take a week off work and register for the whole event.

I've had friends in the SCA for most of my life, but I've always been more of a Renaissance Faire kind of girl. This means that most of my garb is a.) not overly concerned with historical accuracy, and b.) designed for 100+ degree weather. In other words, throwing together enough SCA-appropriate garb for a multi-day event was going to require some creativity and a little bit of sewing.

There's nothing quite like a looming deadline fuelled by fear of mockery to motivate me to finish a project. In this case, I used the few days before (and during) Raglan to spiff up a couple of old costume pieces and start one new one.

The first piece to receive my attentions was a green tunic dress that I made (I think) sometime around 2005 or 2006. Sometime around 2007, I started replacing a row of modern fabric-covered buttons on the neckline with thread-covered ones, which is a painfully slow and fiddly process. While I was working on those buttons, I learned a bit more about garments of the early medieval period, and became somewhat paralyzed by an awareness of lots of minor anachronisms, so it languished for some time in my project backlog.

The tunic neckline with thread-covered buttons (left),
and the backside, showing fagoting stitch closure (right). 

At long last, the need to make use of every available piece of vaguely medieval garb for Raglan gave me the incentive that I needed to turn it into a functional garment, anachronisms and all. I finished the last few buttons, and instead of making new buttonholes or loops to match the new button placement, I just decided to accept that the buttons were decorative rather than functional, and loosely stitched the neckline closed with a fagoting stitch in heavy linen thread. After almost a decade in the "unfinished projects" pile, I can lay my tunic dress to rest in the "garb" pile instead.

I also have two other linen tunic dresses, but both of them look a little under-dressed without another layer to go with them: one because it's pale blue and not quite 100% opaque, and one because it was squeezed from the last remnants of fabric left over from another project and is a bit shorter than it could be. Both would work well underneath a Viking apron dress/smokkr.

I made a smokkr to wear to the Vista Viking Festival around 2007, but it went missing somewhere between Los Angeles and St Andrews. A smokkr is fairly simple to construct, so I decided that it was worth trying to throw together a new one before Raglan, since it would allow me to make use of two other finished pieces of garb.

I got as far as measuring and cutting out all of the pieces of my new smokkr when I was inspired to check my storage containers filled with costume pieces one more time, just in case I'd somehow failed to spot my old smokkr before. Sure enough, my old smokkr was there, having been swallowed up by a natural form ballgown and a bustle era day dress.

The hem is still basted, but there's a new
fabric loop, and the seam allowances
have been bound.

My old green smokkr has plenty of problems: it's made from cotton twill (hey, it's machine-washable, it was $5/yard at my local fabric store, and I was going to be wearing it in 90+ degree heat), the shoulder straps are made from lucet cord (we have no evidence for anything other than fabric loops), there are no loops on the front to fasten the turtle brooches (I was just poking them straight through the fabric), the hem was only ever quickly basted, and I'd shaped the top edge into something vaguely pinafore-like, which I considered more flattering at the time. However, unlike the pile of freshly-cut fabric pieces for my new brown smokkr, it was a wearable garment.

New bead hardware. Two
strands still have the old
clamshell knot covers.

I threw it on, and it still (more or less) fit. It was a bit tight around the bust, but luckily, I'd left myself nice, wide seam allowances. I decided to abandon the new brown smokkr temporarily and divert my energy toward spiffing up the old green one.

I trimmed the top edge straight, let out the seams across the bust, used the trimmings to create fabric loops at the front to attach the brooches, bound the seam allowances, and re-attached the old shoulder straps. Good as new!

I also re-strung a couple of my bead festoons on heavy waxed linen thread, since some of the thin nylon thread I'd used previously had broken, and made some new wire fixings for the ends.

New trim and decorative stitching across
the top of the smokkr.

I wore my newly-fitted green smokkr early in the week, but the pile of brown herringbone fabric from the new smokkr was staring at me. I cut a wide band of the brown herringbone fabric and stitched it to the top edge of my smokkr, and then finished the bottom edge with a herringbone stitch in bright red. I'm really happy with the color combination. Even though the green smokkr still isn't as historically accurate as it could be, I think I've made a significant improvement.

Since there was no more time pressure to finish the new smokkr in a hurry, I decided to really take the time to do it properly, and will post about it separately as time permits. Now that Raglan Fair is over, I'm trying to use the momentum from finishing/refurbishing these old projects to continue tackling my sewing backlog. With luck, I may even find the time to start some new garb so that I don't have to panic so much before next year's Raglan!

Tunic dress, smokkr, brooches, bead festoons.