1898 Wedding Underthings Completed!!!

*Heavy Photo Post!*

Hello all! I hope your weekend has started out wonderfully!  So far, mine has been quite nice.  My incredible husband chose "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" for our movie tonight and I thought it was quite fun!

Earlier today I did my hair (it was most uncooperative indeed!!!), put my pretty Wedding frillies on and asked Colton to shoot away!  This post is super photo heavy because I decided I wanted to wait and photo all the underthings at the same time.  It is such a shame that most of the time, Victorian underwear wasn't seen by a lot of people.  It was just so gorgeous!  I had a lot of fun making these pieces of underwear.  They were a lot of work, but I think that work totally paid off!

Garter Belt

Sadly, today I wasn't wearing any American Duchess clocked silk stockings (I still need to purchase some) so I "couldn't" wear my belt.  Besides, if I was wearing it, I wouldn't have been able to have had photos taken of the belt! 

 It was very interesting to make as there really wasn't a pattern for it.  For the actual belt part, I used the yoke section of Folkwear Edwardian Underthings 203.  The garters I had to guess on.  Inspiration for the bows came from here and here.  Lara Greene-Vaught of  Lara Corsets supplied the hardware, I found the fabulous French Embroidered ribbon at French Kiss Ribbons on Etsy, and the silk for the belt part was left over from mom's blue corset!

Pretty blue silk ribbon from Lara!

The closest I was going to get to modeling it today....

More inspiration I found in my August 1893 edition of The Delineator!  I am 99.9% sure these were worn under the drawers.  At least that's how I will be wearing mine!

French Drawers

The antique bow lace I found screamed to be used on some French drawers.  Sadly, the pictures don't show the awesome flounce...

Advertisement in the back of my August 1898 Delineator for "Ladies' French Open Drawers".  Huzzah for printed "proof" of what I am wanting to accomplish!

French Petticoat-Chemise

Another item from the 1898 Delineator was a French petticoat-chemise.  These were an extra layer of petticoat used to hold the skirts of the 1890s dresses "out"!  Love how long this one is.  I extended Truly Victorian TVE02 Edwardian Underwear chemise pattern.  The same bow insertion lace was used on the bodice and the hem.

Looooong petti!

Description in the Delineator for image "8":

"At figure No. 8 is shown a French petticoat-chemise made of fine nainsook and trimmed with insertion and edging, ribbon-run beading covering the joinings.  A very shallow yoke at the top has fullness at the center of the back and front like the lower portion of the chemise, which may hang loose or be confined in Empire style by a belt.  A flounce completes the lower edge of the chemise."

Pretty deep ribbon lace flounce looks beautiful with my FAAAAAAAABULOUS American Duchess shoes!  I LOVE these and am so happy that I was able to get some!

Brocade Corset

I wanted bust and hip gores for my corset and since I LOVED how my 1840s corset turned out, I decided to go ahead and use Simplicity 7215.  For the trim around the top, I trimmed some of the bow lace.  It turned out really sweet!

Petticoats

Under petticoat

I had enough antique lace that I decided to make an under petticoat to go with the over petticoat that I purchased off of eBay.  

I know that I got inspiration for this somewhere, but cannot find it anywhere now! When I remember, I'll post a link!

Every single panel between the insertion lace took me 1 hour to complete!  All those tucks...pain in the neck.  Seriously!  But it turned out perfectly puffy, which is what I was shooting for!

Over petticoat

I found this lovely on eBay.  It is GORGEOUS and was the whole reason all the rest of the underwear ended up the way it did!  It makes me so happy!  I had to cut the waist down about 3 inches however because the original owner was about 10 feet tall!  Just kidding...she was probably only 5' 10".  Tall lady!

Delicious, frothy goodness!

"The petticoat has a deep full flounce that gives the proper flare to the skirt and is trimmed with deep embroidered edging."  Delineator, August 1898.

Mine has strips of batiste between the insertion lace, a batiste flounce then a deep lace flounce.  Under the outer flounce is another row or ruffle with a flounce.  It is the most beautiful petticoat I have ever seen!

Corset Cover

I fell in love with this corset cover from The MET, so used it as inspiration for my corset cover.  Of course I had to put insertion lace in mine!

I LOVE this lace.  I am hoping that somewhere, sometime I will find a whole bunch more!

Another image from the August 1898 Delineator!  This particular magazine was so perfect for this suite of underwear!!!  Huzzah for "proof" backing up what I am envisioning!

The Cover of the awesome sauce Delineator that helped me with my underwear.  There are some pretty spectacular color fashion plates in it, one of which is inspiration for Mom's Mother of the Bride dress I will be making!

Now that the underwear is done for the Dressing The Victorian Bride program, I now have to start on the actual wedding dress.  I am excited and dreading it at the same time... Bring on the ivory silk!!!!

I hope you all have a seriously blessed weekend!!

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Hahahahaha!!!  The look on my face is priceless!!!  In the video, I share pictures of some of my ancestors.  How I miss them!