Edwardian biker clothes, part two: Red biking sweater and a split skirt

  I don't like "retro" knitting patterns. There I said it. The truth is, I do not like "retro" clothing either, if we consider retro anything that comes after 1915 or so (with a VERY few exception, but that is another matter).

Anyhow, back to knitting. Retro patterns, those that came out in books and magazines between 1915 and 1970 feels off for me. I do see their appeal to those who generally like the fashion of that era, and knitters, but they are not for me. 

However, a couple of years ago, the bicycle sweaters of the 1890-ies took the costuming world by a storm. Everyone was making it.

 By then I had the plans to extend my "turn of the century" period into a bit backward, to the 1890-ies, and also, make a cycling outfit. Also, the year's end was coming, and I needed plans for my New Years good luck sweater.

Now, if you read this blog for a while, you know what it is, if you are new, then... We all know that for crafters (especially knitters) the months before Xmas is spent with gift making, but in January we can relax, and concentrate on other stuff and thus someone declared January the "month of selfish knitting" when we knit (make) stuff for ourselves. About the same time, my friend, Angela, started to knit a good-luck sweater for the new years... And also there is the saying, start as you mean to go on, in other words, do the things in the first (few) day(s) of the year, you would like to spend the rest of that year with. So combining these things, I came up with the idea of starting a new sweater at the first thing in january first, concentrate on knitting that... adding the fact that accoring to the chinese, red is a lucky color, MY new years good luck sweater IS red. Now, things got a bit watered down in the last couple of years. There have been times I really have not knitted anything else, until I finished the New Year's sweater, there were times I did knit that in three days. However, I was alone, only Chris for company, and only knitting (and maybe spinning) for a hobby. Nowadays, I am not alone anymore, I did turn back to my other hobbies too, and travel more, so I cannot always concentrate to knit only on that sweater (like in a car, I need to knit something that soes not need me to look at it), sometimes, it tooks me months (or even longer) to finish that sweater... and it also happened that I have not even finished it (at least not in the year I started it)... 

So what does that bicycle sweater and the new years sweater has to do with each other? You guessed it. In 2021, I decided to make that as my new year's good luck sweater. I had the Prior Attire book on victorian sportswear that has a pattern, and I've read it. I found other patterns on the net that is avaliable for free, I looked at those too. I also looked at quite a few of these sweaters, and made up my mind to knit it without those written patterns. 

Okay, now I needed yarn. I was planning to get DROPS's Soft Tweed for the project, but they do not have it in red. Also, my house is full of yarns. So I started to dig in my stash and came up with this.

It was about the right thickness and about the right amount. It only had one fault. It was orange. When I had my red hair, I loved the orange color, especially, in that rusty, burnt orange shade this yarn also has. I actually miss it from my wardrobe, however, it does make my hair look yellow, and me like a three day old corpse.  But I am a yarn dyer (among a bunch of other things), so I skeined the yarn and dunked it into a pot of red colored dye-solution. The result had two different color-variation, one that comes from the original orange/dark gray swirl effect and the other coming from the handying process.

So I started kitting...

Which was incredibly boring, and pretty long process. All that k1/p1 ribbing on the round. Not to mention, those giant sleeves these sweaters have: each took up as much knitting (and yarn) as the whole body did.

I know, it is probably not the most period appropriate way, but I've knitted the body on the round, only separated the front and the back underarms. The two sleeves were knit flat, but with a hindsight, I should have done those on the round as well.

So I've knitted up the pieces, and put the whole thing away in a drawer, in pieces. And it stayed there for months. No, actually for years. Sometimes, I had the notion, how fun it would be to appear a fall/winter, turn-of-the-century event in a bicycle outfit, but...ehh. Don't even know why. Because of the handsewing? Admitedly, lately, as many other knitter, I tend to knit stuff that needs little or no sewing, but I am also a dressmaker, I have nothing against sewing, in fact I have nothing against handsewing either. Maybe, because the yarn was bleeing a little? I must have been rushing the dying process, and not setting the color properly, but I know how to fix that too. So? Really do not know.

Until, a couple of months ago, American Duchess posted about a sweater like this on their page, and it also seemed I wason a finishing streak (finising off projects I abandoned), so I dug the pieces out of the  drawer, looked around for buttons in my boxes, and put the thing together. Arranging and sewing up the pleating on the shoulders were  abit tricky, there were places where I needed to sew SIX layers, but managed it. Then dunk the whole thing in hot water with a ton of vinegar, then rewashed it with my lavender shampoo, and layed it out to dry. 

Now, I was afraid that the neck would be too narrow, as I really hate high, thight necked stuff, but its better than I hoped, though, if I would make this again, I would make the neck just a tad wider.

Also, I would make the lower portion of the sleeves narrower, but that is about it.

As for the split skirt, they are once again, the result of the rational dress movement of the 1890-ies, when women wanted clothes that allowed them to move around easier. Like on horses, or, even more, on bicycles. 

There are many version of the split skirts, some have panels on the front that can be buttoned to one side, some only have a huge fold there that is sewn down to a point, some hide the split under big folds. There were a few samples we could see in television, Amelia True had one in The Nevers (that series started out so great, it is such a shame that got swallowed up by the Wheedon scandal and mee too, but thats another story). (If anyone knows, where can I find a fabric with that color and striping, do not hold back, LOL).

Also the lead actress were one in most episodes of the series titled 1899 (yet another series that was reat, but got reaped by netflix way before its time). 

Anyhow...

I made mine based on the pattern from Truly Victorian, withouth much modification (except taking off a couple of cm's from the waistline, and shortening it a bit). 

Actually, I started it in the last couple of months of 2023, thinking it would be great, if we did our usual skating event, but then, the event was cancelled and other stuff came into precedence and the poor split skirt was there for months without a waistband and hemming. Then we had that event, where I was about to talk about some sport-history, with special attention of bicycling and flying, and I thought since I finished the sweater, its high time I finish the split skirt as well.

My friend, Bob, also made a split skirt, to go with her horseriding ensemble, she also looks great in it. Maybe even better than I.

Split skirt pattern: Truly Victorian

Sweater pattern: I made up mine, but you can find one in the Victorian dressmaker book, or in Ravelry.

Modelled photos: Norbert Varga @Bodeszphoto.