Historic Patterns for Beginners

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, young Kjirsten began trying to sew historic costumes. Mostly, I wanted to wear big pouffy dresses. I looked like this:

That's me on the right. Yep, I was in theater.

My mother bought me my very first book of historical patterns (the Holkeboer one in my earlier blog), and I slowly, painstakingly enlarged the pattern to full size. It was this one:

With a lot of help, it eventually became this dress:

Since then, I have converted to this pattern for my Empire dresses, which is way easier, and already human size:



from www.folkwear.com

This Folkwear pattern is a good one--in fact, I like Folkwear in general. The directions are great as well. And Empire period is great for beginners because it is pretty basic and does not require a huge investment of fabirc (it takes about 3 yds to make a dres. Yay!). I recommend it to beginning seamstresses for this reason. Plus, if you're looking for accuracy, the underwear is not that extensive, which is a real relief.


When it comes to accuracy though, I stand firm that you have to draw your own line. Some costumers that I really respect make my head swim when I hear them talk about really specific details like thread-count in your fabric and hand-sewing the whole thing and not wearing panties. If you want to go that far, I bow to your commitment.

It all comes down to what you, personally want out of that dress. If you want to know in your heart that you hand-sewed every stitch in that dress, go for it, but most people looking at you will never know the difference.

For myself, my accuracy depends on the project. I stick to natural fibers and historic colors whenever feasible. I am careful to get accurately-cut patterns or draft them that way myself. I have an obsession with getting the right number of layers. I am careful about construction techniques. I always use accurate closures.

But for the most part, I machine sew everything I can because I work a full-time job and would never get a single project done if I didn't. For some projects at museums, I will hand-stitch visible details. I buy synthetic ribbon, because silk is pain in the butt. I use synthetic fabrics in some cases. I refuse to be accurate for my Halloween costumes.

Accuracy is a tricky thing and takes a lot of research to get it right.

So if you are looking to start some historic sewing, buy a good pattern, take the time to do some good research, and decide just how far you want to go with your accuracy.


Other patterns I like for beginners:

Simplicity 4551 (most of the Martha McCain stuff is pretty good)


Almost anything from PastPatterns.com


Laughing Moon (great patterns, with good history and directions)