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Suit ca. 1780

From Kerry Taylor Auctions

#18th century #1780's #suit #coat #waistcoat #breeches

As of last night The Pile is now down to 5 unfinished sewing projects, which was my goal number for this year! I cut out the front lining of this waistcoat in 2020, which was long enough ago that I had to redo my pattern and piece a bit extra onto the edge to make it fit, so it's a good thing I hadn't cut out the rest of it. (Annoyingly, I realized after making it that the front of the collar sits much further back than all the extant examples with a similar shape, so next time I'll add more to the pattern as seen in the last picture.)

My inspiration was a Magasin Des Modes fashion plate from 1788. (From the Bunka Gakuen Library archive.)

I'd actually tried making a version of it in early 2014 too, but it was bad and foolish and I'd been wanting to redo it for ages.

The main fabric is from an obi, though this time it's rayon instead of silk. The front lining is silk taffeta and was originally meant to be the outside, but due to it not fitting anymore and the fact that it's so much thinner than the obi fabric I used it as the lining instead. The back is cotton handkerchiefs from the thrift store in the same lovely woven stripe pattern as the purple ones I used in my purple & gold jacket last year, and the back lining is linen from my stash. The trim is 2 cm wide strips of dark brown fur from a thrifted coat.

I think about half the sewing is by machine and half is by hand. This time I remembered to photograph all the steps and am going to write a very long blog post on it. One of the bad foolish things I did in my first version was putting the buttonholes through the fur, but this time I did a nice sensible hidden placket.

#sewing #me #18th century #waistcoats #1780's