Quick, to the OR! Can this dress be saved?

The summer camping season is upon us! Which means it'd be nice to actually have a week's worth of medieval clothes. That don't involve trailing hems. Or coat-weight wool. Or any of the other lovely-yet-impractical things that I so enjoy. So it was time to dig through all the simpler stuff that hasn't been needed for a while (years, in my case), and see what still works and what doesn't.

Firmly in the "doesn't work" camp was a particolor cote in the late 14th to early 15th century style. It was not the first, but close to the first thing I made after joining the SCA, and definitely the first dress I made on this (drafted) pattern. It was never perfect, but it was serviceable. For instance, it's not lined or reinforced, even for the lacing, and so although it's in no danger of ripping out, it does pull and gap rather than laying flat. A bigger problem, though, was the shoulders. Blame archery, I guess, but my arms and shoulders are bigger than they used to be, and I basically couldn't move my arms forward with this dress the way it was.

I had saved enough scraps of both fabrics from this dress that I was pretty sure I could re-engineer the thing, so I set out on sleeve reconstruction surgery. This works better as a series of photos with commentary in the description:

The starting point: left, right
The existing fit problems: front, back
Re-cutting the armscye: start, middle, end, laid flat
Final shoulder seam adjustment: more angle
Replacement sleeve: test, pattern, front, back

Or just look at the whole set here.

I think this was a complete success, and I just have a few raw edges to finish now before it's completely done!

The end of the retinue bag project

Retinue bags for TRH Calontir
Originally uploaded by Catrijn.

Last year, I made bags to be used by the retinue for my local SCA royalty. I had enough material left over, though, that I went ahead and made an additional pair for the prince and princess as well.

I handed them over to the coordinator this past on the weekend, on the morning of Crown Tournament. Coincidentally, this was just hours before close friends (including someone I'd asked for advice on the project) were crowned as said prince and princess.

So all the exciting projects I thought I might have time to work on this year? Probably not. At the moment, I'm rushing to make some very basic additional clothes (geometric-cut tunics) for my husband and I before the summer camping season.