The floof has grown

A couple weeks ago, encouraged by my boss and an acquaintance who works Dickens, I decided that:

a) I could in fact wear a black bonnet with an ecru printed dress and

b) I should make a day cap to go under it.

I pretty much ad-libed the whole thing based on diagrams of 1856 caps in English Women’s Clothing in the 19th Century. Something like this

So I started with one (1) antique handkerchief, one (1) yard of ~2″ wide valenciennes insertion and two (2) yards of 1″ valenciennes edging. Plus two (2) yards if 1″ silk satin ribbon in burgundy.

I cut a circle out of 1/4 of the handkerchief, approximately the size of my hair when it’s in a bun. I hemmed it with the narrowest rolled hem I could, about 1.5mm. I love antique cotton voile.

Then I gathered and attached the wide lace

Then I ran two lines of running stitch on opposite sides of the circle and gathered it up

Next the second ruffle goes on, and then I gathered up a 1 yard piece of the silk satin ribbon and attached it. The finished product looks like this

And under the bonnet

No front view because I didn’t have a hat pin (I lost the good one I got at Dicken’s last year which is annoying) and it isn’t sitting quite right.

I think the cap needs more ribbons, but I’m not sure if I can be bothered. I added the ecru velvet grapevine thing so that it at least matches the dress a little. I also dyed an ostrich feather but it really didn’t work so that idea was abandoned.

I also made a shawl out of 2 yards of chocolate brown wool crepe by cutting it into a square perfectly on the straight grain and pulling weft threads out until it had 1/2″ of fringe on either end. Easy, and appropriately gigantic.