HA (Historically Accurate) Steampunk (Pt1 -shirtwaist.)

 For the longest time... huh, how many times do I write that? but then, so many ideas, so many thoughts in my head, and when one of them comes to life it is a reason to celebrate, isn't it?

Anyhow, steampunk always fascinated me. I was a fan of captain Nemo as a child, even before I went to university and had seminars on 19th century literature and fantasy literature as well.   But since then even more. And even more than that, since I make historical clothes. I wanted some steampunkish clothes for myself.

Because what is steampunk? 

Not easy to define, as it has many  subgenres,many way of realizing, many substyles. 

However, basically it is an imaginary historical period, an imaginary "what if". What if, around the turn of the 19th/20th century, the world, instead of going and developing toward electricity, would have gone to a different direction: steampower. Stories feature steam powered machinery, clothes reference late Victorian /Edwardian/turn of the century clothing, but with a twist. The emphasis is on the words "imaginery" and "referencing". 

Since it is not a real historical period, there are no hard rules. With HA (historically accurate) reenactment, we are always try to be as accurate as possible. We look at pictures, paintings, read letters, journals, etc. and leave as little to our imagination as possible. With steampunk we use our imagination as much as possible. Clothes do have a distinct style, but the variations are wide, from round cage crinolines to bubbly bicycle bloomers, from corsets, to waistcoats, from chains to cogwheels, from top hats to tricorns. 

The genre has its books and movies: Think of Jules Verne, 2000 Legaue Under the Sea, Think of H.G Wells, Time Machine. Think of movies like the Stardust, the Golden Compass, and some Dr. Who episodes.

For the clothes there are some recognizable elements, like the cogwheel decorations, tophats, brown-ish colors, black and white, black and red, black and purple colors, and stripes. Stripes scream steampunk, especially in black and white or black/brown.

As for a time period -fashion history-wise, things could be placed anywhere from the 1860-ies to the early 1900 (from crinolines through bustles to the Titaninc-era fashion, but since it IS an imagined time, almost anything goes. To tie to a real time period, I chose a year that has significance in our own history. 1896 the year of the millenium. According to history, Hungariany came into the Carpathian basin in 896, and the country celebrated its millenum with a giant set of events. From a huge exhibition through a lot of events, building, to the first underground line of the continent.

I wanted steampunk-ish clothes, so I needed some stripy clothes. I started with a shirtwaist. A shirt. 

If we are talking about the "turn of the century fashion", I prefer the years just before 1900 to the ones that came just after that. (The thing is, that even the fact that I am doing things this close to that 1900 is a miracle in itself, as I was never a fan of the period. Much preferred the earlier times. But the 1890-ies did grow on me).

Anyhow, the shirt. With big, puffy sleeves, wide cuffs and striped linen fabric, and dark gray mother-of-pearl buttons.

I used the Truly Victorian 494 pattern with slight modifications. The shoulder piece (yoke) is a cm or two narrower, I omitted the peplum-y piece at the waist and/or the waistband at the back. Also I made the sleeves shorter and added a wide cuff. The original pattern instructions would have you simply turn up the hem and sewn down, but that felt so unfinished to me. 

I found a bit of leftover lace, so I added bits of it to the collar, the buttonband and the cuffs. 

This way the shirtwaist is fully historically accurate, but can also function as a part of historibounding and steampunk sets to.

Fabric: I love Textil

Pattern: Truly Victorian 494

Photos: Norbert Varga @Bodeszphoto.

Weekly SO

I despise layers. 

In my hair that is.

I have been utterly dissatisfied with my hair lately, and I am thinking about what to do with it. By now I do not mind its color, and I LOVED, when it was really long, but the upper layer keeps breaking off about shoulder length, and looks scraggly. 

I am almost resigned myself to a big(ger than usual) chop and try to let it grow from there...

I was looking for hairstyles on the net, and boy. Everybody is having so much hair, and everything about layers. 

Which I hate. Even, when I had more, shorter (or maybe longer) hair, than now, whenever some hairdresser tried to cut layers in it, I ended up going back to have it all one length. 

So, where do I find slightly longer than shoulder length hairstyles like that (for thin hair)? Any suggestion? 

Late Victorian petticoat (pattern-hack)

More than once you've heard me saying that the biggest secret of historical clothing is underwear, what is underneath the clothes people generally see. 

More than once you've hear me saying that petticoats are important for historical clothing. 

If you have some kind of understructure, like panniers, crinolines, bustles, etc, that is why (so the lines of the structure would be invisible, smoothed over), if you don't, that is why (to properly hold out skirts). 

But petticoats not only work for HA (Historically Accurate) clothing, but can also add a romantic, swishy element to HB (historibounding) too. 

Last week I showed you, one of my favorite skirt patterns, the one I use for HA, turn-of-the-century skirts as well as more modern ones (Ora Lin's Trumpet Skirt). Now, I will show you, how I use the same pattern to make petticoats (underskirts) to wear with those late-Victorian/ early-Edwardian /historibounding "walking" skirts. 

I already told you, that I usually cut the skirts I want to use for HA and HB as well between the so called "everyday" and the "floor length" line given on the pattern. 

When I use the same pattern to make petticoats, I simply cut off about 20 cm from the bottom of each panel (if you are practiced and/or brave, it is enough to turn back the bottom 20 cm of the paperpattern, or you can make yourself a whole separate set from the pattern pieces - you can guess, which one I do). 

Then I cut about 5-6 stripes of 15 cm wide, across the fabric, ruffle it up evenly and sew it to the bottom. I usually use a strip of lace between the skirts body and the ruffle, and on the bottom of the ruffle, but the petticoat works without that as well. If I have a few extra cm's of the fabric, I cut the ruffles 1-3 cm wider and put 0,5 cm wide pintucks into the ruffles, so it holds the skirt out even wider. 

There isn't much to sewing them, but I might just do a detailed post if I managed to photograph the process. Would you be interested? 

In some cases, I weat two petticoats, other times only one.

Fabrics: I Love Textil

Pattern: Trumpet Skirt (Ora Lin)

Photos: Norbert Varga @Bodeszphoto

Weekly patternmuster (sewing)

That is the Regalia Blouse By Sew House Seven.

In the name of wanting to sew more stuff for my everyday wardrobe, I've been digging around the net for patterns. Patterns that are (possibly) made by indie-designers and/or patterns that I like, and/or somewhat different from the mainstream. Bonus points if it has historybounding qualities. 

Picture from the Sewhouse Seven website

This blouse checks all of the above.

It is feminine, works just as well with jeans as soft, flowing skirts. On the pattern site you can se several variation of it, with short sleeve, or longer bodice, colorblock version, classic striped, or patterned ones, and it works for all of them. 

Failure

 I failed. 

I failed to make my New Years Good Luck Sweater.

I've been doing it for more than a decade now, my rules kind of formed themselves, though it was increasingly hard to keep myself to them (see, last year the sweater was NOT red).

I had an idea for this year's sweater since last January, and I've had a swatch knitted. I seem to remember I even picked the yarns at one point, but I could not find that bundle, so I supposed I did not do that (picked the yarns) after all. I was rummaging my stash to collect enough yarn that might work as a variation of the original idea, I did cast on and knit for a while...

And I did not like it. I did not hated it or anything I just did not LOVE it. At the same time, I had something else on the needles. Okay, I do have a bunch of things on the needles all the time, but this one I started in December, and unlike the one I started at New Year's, I loved this one, and insted of putting it away in favor for the NYGLS, I desparately wanted to finish it. 
Also I have some stocking on some other needles, I really, really HAVE to finish. 

So, even though I am generally hard headed and stubborn, this time I felt, I am to old to have dragging on something I do not enjoy, because in my head, I want and need to do something else... After all, it was supposed to be SELFISH knitting.

So unceremoniously I pilled the needle out and frogged it. 

As for luck... I've made no secret out of the fact that 2025 was not my best year. I am not saying it was so bad, it does not matter if I make a good luck sweater or not, because it could not get worst... I thought that the year before and the universe said, "hold my beer", and proved me wrong. 

I did finish (at least the knitting of) the sweater I started not long before Xmas, and I am working on the stockings I promised months ago for someone. When those are out of the way, I will think again. I might restart the good luck sweater project, or I might just cast on for some-whatever-thing and I will postpone the New Year's Good Luck Sweater project for next january.

What would YOU do? Would you slog through it, just because yo always did? Would you have done something else? Or would you just forget about it for a while? Or?

White bubble

 Bubble pants that is. Totally not historical, however, it uses one or two things I learned from making and wearing historical clothes... (Come to think of it, the thought of a series about that - what I learned from making and wearing historical clothes- is on my mind for a while, though I have no idea, if anyone would be interested in it. I thought historybounding would be interesting, but then, hardly anyone saw that post).

Anyhow, back to these white pair.

I've sewn this 4 times before (even posted about three of them: here, and here, and here), and I still love it and have plans for more. (Who knows, how much of an ADHD trait is that if I like a piece of clothing, I want it in mulitples, possibly every color).

They are white, and I never made a secret of the fact, that as much as I love color and colorful stuff, I also love white. So much so, that I came to the conclusion, that it is utterly unnecessary for me to get any other color for summer clothes, as when I dress up, I always reach for the white.

Also I also tend to wear white when/ where most people tend to wear black - in concerts, especially the concerts of one particular band. Even in winter, if I have jeans on because of the cold, my top is always white. 

So getting a pair of white of this pattern I made for myself was -kind of inevitable. 

The thing is with storebought stuff, that - at least for me- so often they are "almost", but/or/and "not quite".

Like the neckline is just a bit to high, the skirt is just a bit to short...

And the pants, that have kind-of wide legs, but not really whide enough.

Or they do have pockets, but those pockets are just a bit too small to put a cellphone in. 

If you sew for yourself, you can have as wide legs, as you want. As deep pockets as you want (or as many fabric you have left).

And, if you thought, I wouldn't really wear these in an actual concert... here I am, wearing them on December 31st, in situ- in a concert, paired with a very old, wide leather belt of mine.

The thing about that belt is, that I bought it when we first moved to Budapest, when I was about 19-20 years old.  I kept it for its nostalgic value, though I haven't used it for decades, in the last 15 years of because they were way to small. 

Fabric: white microcord, from I Love Textil

Pattern: my own pattern

Photos: Norbert Varga @Bodeszphoto

Weekly SO

I hate winter.

I cannot stand feeling cold. 

I don't even like snow, I simply do not see it as beautiful. 

When everyone is about how beautiful it is, all I can think of: when it is going to go away???

I look like I am smiling.. but I could've cried.