Category Archives: Tutorials

Construction of a 1830-60 men´s shirt Part 2: The front

Part 1

The sewing pattern is available via Etsy.

I want to start with a simple shirt without a bib front. The picture shows a shirt from my collection. A bar covers the end of the button tab, underneath the bar the shirt front is laid into a box pleat. The bar can be shaped as desired, rectangular, or as shown on the picture.

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Cut the front of the shirt T-shaped, take care to cut exactly on the straight grain. Fold both edges twice to form the button tabs and topstitch.

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Line up the two tabs along the center front, left side is on top. Lay the excess fabric of the front into a box pleat. Fix the box pleat with some stitches to the end of the button tab. Take a piece of fabric for the bar, turn in the seam allowance and place on top of the button tab end. Attach with a prick stitch or a fell stitch. Cover the end of the button tab on the inside with a piece of fabric too.

IMAG0695 Continue reading →

Construction of a 1830-60 men´s shirt Part 1

Before I´ll show you how to sew an early Victorian men´s shirt, I want tell you a bit about the little but obvious differences between Victorian and Georgian men´s shirts.

During Georgian and Regency era, a shirt always was a quite simple piece of clothing, made from rectangular pieces. Gussets provided sufficient movement at the shoulders and underarms. Excess width was gathered along the neckline and sleeves. Nearly nothing of a shirt was visible underneath a high-necked waistcoat, except from the jabot, made from fine fabric.

Men´s Shirt with Jabot and high stand-up collar about 1800 / Continue reading →

1830-40´s Corset

IMG_5243All tunnels stiched? Now it is time to add the cording. The technique is called Trapunto, that means you add the cords after stitching the tunnels. This is a time-consuming and exhausting work, nobody told it would be easy. You can avoid this step with adding each piece of cord after you stitched one side of the tunnel, then make the second seam beside the cord. The result will be smoother with the Trapunto technique.
For adding the cord, I threaded a blunt point needle with a strong buttonhole thread, make a couple of stitches through the end of the cord. To harden the cord´s end I used glue and let it dry for some hours.
Widen the holes with an awl. If you have problems pulling through the cord you can widen the tunnel with the awl first.
Pull the cord through the tunnel, the end should just slip into. Cut off the cord close to the fabric and shove the end back into the tunnel with your awl.

 

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