Some years ago, in the Pre-Covid times, I decided I wanted to make a plain suit of Elizabethans. Something from the very end of Elizabeth's reign, and suitable for working in; setting up tents, fighting, maybe some hiking, sitting in the tavern, etc. A suit of late period clothing where getting it dirty would only add to the character of the garments rather than spoiling them. In the end, I settled on a suit of round hose in wool broadcloth, and a doublet in another broadcloth or hemp/linen canvas. While the doublet is still in the works (but is actually being worked on!), I actually finished the round hose over a year ago; I just haven't had any motivation to write (acquiring a new, functional computer helped a bit, but that was purchased *mumble* months ago...). Wish me luck on this...I'm well out of practice on writing at all, never mind project documentation; thankfully, I took a fair amount of notes...but not enough.
The hose are, as said, made in common man's cloths and suitable for the tail end of the 1500s and into the 1600s.. Finding exemplars was more difficult than the norm for this period, as working class people aren't particularly popular subjects of paintings, and I additionally had a particular look in my head. In the end, the Samuel Pepys's Cries of London was a major resource and inspiration for both the hose and doublet forms.
The Cries of London is a particular genre of artwork which often dealt with the lower classes of various cities (e.g London, Bologna). The term allegedly comes from the "Cries" or calls of the various traders as they tried to attract customers [Payne, abstract]. In the case of the examples collected by Samuel Pepys, the collection we know as gathered up to 100 years after publishing. The actual artist of these is unknown, as is the original date, although based on fashion style I estimate this example is from last quarter of the 16th century.
 |
| From Spitalfields Life Blog |
This particular fellow above is one of my best examples of what I was after; slightly more upper class; round hose as opposed to Venetians; and apparently for some reason I did not want Cannons on my hose--after so long since conception, I am not sure why I changed route, especially given my notes say I originally wanted the things; they make life with stockings easier.
Assuming they aren't either naked or wearing fantastical Roman armour, fencing manuals also make excellent exemplars for clothing, as in this plate from Di Grassi's His True Arte of Defence, showing a pair of simple, unpaned round hose.
 |
| "The offense of the high ward at rapier and dagger." Image 14 in Di Grassi's His True Arte of Defence From Wiktenauer. |
What is the Garment?
At this point in the late 16th century, you see a fairly wide variety of hosen; round hose of various lengths with or without canons, galligaskins, Venetians, even a few pairs of trousers (usually on images of sailors). Of particular note is that the sculpted codpiece was on the way out as a part of fashion, allegedly due to Queen Elizabeth's fashion preferences, and by this point it had all but vanished in favour of what would eventually be referred to as a "French Fly" (as opposed to the more modest front fall). Granted, this took most of her reign to mostly disappear, but by the target period was all but gone and part of the reason for choosing this target date--while I have no issues wearing a codpiece, tying the points is a nuisance, especially in the dark and with cold fingers.
{Side Note; The prior paragraph refers to the original target date of the 1590s-1600, which I suspect I missed after doing more research into the Cries of London.}
 |
Round hose, also referred to as Trunkhose and--colloquially--Pumpkin Pants are just that: a garment covering the upper potion of the legs, with or without canons (the tube-like lower cuff covering from the bottom of the hose to the knee), and ranging from crotch length all the way to the knee. You begin to see them as a fairly smooth progression from the more fitted Almain hosen decorated with slash and puff earlier in the century, starting to get more and more round from the 1540s (visible in the painting of the Archduke, above), all the way into the early 17th century. Shapes varied from a heavily padded or bombasted round egg shape, all the way to a somewhat odd almost triangular profile where the hips weren't as proportionally full as the bottom of the legs, which could be heavily structured as in the Sir Richard Cotton suit and the one following it in Patterns of Fashion 3 [pp88-91]. Often, especially for fancier and upper class examples, the outermost layer of fabrics would be cut into individual panes, which you could see an addition layer of contrasting (usually) lining through. These might additionally be decorated via embroidery, slashing/pinking, lace, applique, or stamping, and may or may not match the doublet.
 | ||
| Sir Richard Cotton, made 1618 |
My Goals
My goals here were as stated in the introduction; relatively comfortable and practical hosen in a certain style, albeit not copying a specific piece of artwork or extant garment, and in as close to correct materials as I could. As such, I allowed myself a certain degree of freedom from perfectly copying and documenting every feature, although most were documented before inclusion. Looking back, I'm finding that my overall form isn't perfectly analogous to the target period--again, as I didn't slavishly copy an example--, but the methods of construction are, to the best of my knowledge and research. Given the gaps of inactivity and life changes between conception and finishing the project, I will take that as a win. There was also the factor that if I were to attempt to document every single detail with three independent source--as you ideally should--I would never actually finish the garment or this documentation.
I did not have any Anti-Goals for this garment and suit; it was to be of as close to period correct materials as I can, period correct patterning, and methods of construction--i.e. handsewn. The only thing I did not want was for it to be fancy.
Who
I was aiming for what I would call "lower-middle class". Blue-collar workers, if you will; folks who have to work hard and not at a desk job, but well off enough that they can afford clothing which isn't rags. That said, it is perfectly plausible--especially as the suit ages--that it could have been purchased second-hand and was originally made for the social class above. I feel this is a decent justification for some of the details of construction I included which are slightly less practical and more fashionable, such as the various bits of padding I couldn't resist playing with the construction of.
I've
discussed the social class I had in mind...now it's time for the period
of history I was aiming for. I was targeting around the Death of
Elizabeth--the very end of the period covered by the SCA and flirting
with the dreaded Out of Period; 1590s-1605. Given the information I
just now processed on the Cries, I suspect I
missed and undershot by maybe 20 years if I were using the Cries as my main source, but it does fit stylistically with the Wams und Hosen pictured below.
A question we often forget to ask is "Where the wearer would have gotten the garment, and would it have been made specifically for the wearer?". While it is possible it could have been bespoke, I feel the garments would likely have been purchased premade, possibly with some slight alterations made to better the fit, and would eventually be passed down through the useful life of the articles--potentially decades, although mine are nowhere near worn enough for that particular impression. The possibility it would have been made by the wearer or family of the wearer is unlikely, I feel.
Materials
Round hose in general could be made out of a wide gamut of fabrics found in Elizabethan England, ranging from various grades of wool to layers of pinked silks and velvets, with woolens in between. The internal linings seems to have often been of linen, and while the thought is foreign to modern sensibilities, could and would be removed and replaced when worn out. As for the wools--reading through Clothes and Domestic Textiles in the Community of Staple and its Environs: Constructing the Forgotten Fabrics of the Sixteenth Century Yeoman by Tamsyn Young (a fascinating study, which I recommend)--Broadcloth, Kersey, Worsted, and Russet are mentioned as being used for hosen, as is buckskin (having fully leather trunkhose would be AWESOME). The following definitions are from The Typical Tudor by Jane Malcolm-Davies and Ninya Mikhaila.
- Broadcloth; a relatively generic term for a wide woven woolen cloth, at least 58.5 inches between selvages. Often of higher quality and tightly fulled. The colour and weight varied.
- Kersey: A twill woven woolen cloth. It was popular for hosen due to its stretchiness on the bias. (Author note: I suspect that hosen here means the closely fitted variety, rather than the sculpted later version I am making)
- Worsted: A lightweight, usually twill cloth made of worsted long staple wool. In other words, it was relatively smooth and unfulled.
- Russet: A relatively coarse woolen cloth, made in "sheep's colours"...i.e. undyed. Noted as being particularly common for country folks and lower classes.
Other materials are, of course, also used, including linen and fustian [Typical Tudor, pp83]. The most common colours noted are "sheep colour" (which lines up neatly on the pie chart as a similar percentage as those made of russet), black, and white.
 |
| Hose und Wams, 1600-10, Zurich National Museum. |
I ended up using a luscious black broadcloth from Renaissance Fabrics as my outer and primary material. I believe it is the heavier offering which has a percentage of nylon, but am no longer sure (given it was purchased almost 5 years ago); regardless, it is absolutely a dream to sew and work with. When I originally designed the outfit, I went with black because it was a "safe" colour, later came into the thought that black wool would be uncommon as a harder to obtain colour with natural dyes, and now have been vindicated by the Tudor Tailor Team's survey showing black as a common hosen colour.
Other fabrics used in this project was a heavy linen for the lining shorts, deerskin split (purchased from Uncle Georges Discount Leather years ago and also used for the Party Pluderhose base shorts) used for pocketting, heavy fustian from Period Fabrics for interlinings, and raw cotton wool for padding along with a really crappy coarse woolenish (it's most likely fully synthetic).
Almost all of the sewing was done with various weights of black or white linen thread treated with beeswax, coad, or both, as is my preference. The exception is the buttonholes, which were sewn in silk buttonhole twist, from Wm. Booth.
Construction
Now for the easy part of writing, with all the pictures! The pieces of the garment are fairly simple; each leg is roughly a trapezoidal shape, with cutouts for the front and back rise. Both the inner shorts of linen and the woolen exterior have similar shapes, but the linen lining is both shorter and less full in order to force the wool to blouse and poof. There is a separate, shaped, waistband with a seam at center back. Lastly, pockets, leg bindings, and the fly. That's really about it--no dealing with drunken angry octopods as in working with pluderhose!
Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of details regarding exactly how I drafted it...I'm writing this about 3.5 years later from what notes I took. So if you were hoping for a tutorial, I'm sorry. That said, both Modern Maker and Tudor Tailor have systems and patterns available. In all likelihood, I didn't use either as I tend to do things the hard way. I believe I based the proportions of the rise--really the most important and tricky to fit portion--on that of my favourite pattern draft of trousers from 1818, because I knew the all important rise would work for me, and I can always tweak the angles to better match period drafts.
In the end, I re-used the same pattern from my Nauseatingly Stripy test pair, with a few modifications. Primarily, I shifted the seam from being an outseam to an inseam, and threw a curve into the top edge in order to force them to blouse a bit more. My notes say the curve was added based on Modern Maker II, and the switch from out to inseam based on examples in PoF3 and the V&A book showing an inseam to be more common
The size of the waist was based on the examples in PoF3, which range from two to three times the waistband measurement. As the wool is fairly heavy and would be supported with additional layers of fabric, I chose to err on the smaller side of the spectrum at roughly double my waist measure (at the time).
At that point--naturally, after cutting my wool--, I ran into a few issues and realized the bottom cuff would be much too big. The solution to this was to rotate the rise and seam so the inseam would be roughly on bias and give me a leg opening closer to twice my thigh circumference.
The base shorts are slightly different, as you can see. Overall, they are shorter--but not so much on the inseam--and much narrower at the waist. Keeping the inseam the same should help allow for movement, but the outseam and waist being smaller helps force the woolen layer to blouse and poof out. This was based on experimentation and analyzing the available resources (PoF3, V&A books) when I made the stripy pair. I was originally going to sew these in the same leather as with the Party Pluderhose, but found I didn't have enough leather for it to be a viable option...so heavy linen it was.
These were simply sewn up the inseam with white linen thread.
The pockets, on the other hand, I could do in leather. You see leather pockets used on a couple of extant suits, including the Cotton Suit. I am not sure if there is a reason, beyond durability. The shape of the pockets is likewise based on those of the Cotton suit, although I did have to piece them.
The triangular top edges of the pockets get sewn to the vertical pocket slits, and the bags hang loose. As is my wont, I went large on the pocket size--I mean, what's the point of having pockets if you can't keep a bottle of wine in one, and a picnic in the other?
Sewing the pocket in place was simple enough, just a prick or backstitch through both the leather and wool, with the raw edge of the leather turned to the outside, where it wouldn't be visible in the pocket opening. On the other hand, determining the best way to finish the pocket opening was much more involved. After discussing it with the Modern Maker, in the end I went down a rabbit hole and determined that based on textile fragments from the Vasa warship, it would be perfectly reasonable to simply overcast the raw edge. I will publish that bit of digressive research in a separate post at some point, since I got a good page of survey notes, and may probe a bit deeper.
The raw edge was overcast with a fine whip-stitch in 100/3 black linen thread, and small bar tacks stitched in at both top and bottom of the pocket to reinforce the opening. Once that was done, the pockets had to be basted shut for the remainder of construction to prevent them from gaping and throwing off accuracy during further construction.
Next step was adding an additional doubled strip of heavy fustian, cut from the width of fabric so the springy weft would be put to good use. While you may or may not see a strip like this on extant garments--a cursory look didn't show any, but that was hardly exhaustive--it is commonly found on lady's skirts to give volume to the pleats. My hope was that it would give the necessary amount of poofage...you will see the results later.
Following that, a row of basting stitches in heavy linen thread was run along the bottom cuff while the garment was still flat, and the inseam sewn up with a backstitch. The use of backstitch was chosen here both because the fabric is thick enough that a running stitch isn't an option (stab is, however), and to allow for some stretch in the seam. Recent discussions point out that a Holbien stitch--or a stab stitch--would have been more common. The seam was additionally felled.
The waistband is actually shaped in this piece, being deeper in the front to line up with the slight drop in the front waist of the legs. While the original plan here was to use several layers of linen inside the wool fashion fabric, the extant garments do not appear to be particularly bulky in this portion--generally only a single layer of reinforcing fabric. As such, I used a doubled piece of the heavy fustian as my interlining. Before violently pressing the folds into permanence, I made use of a prick stitch along the fold line to prevent the interfacing from shifting during the life of the garment.
For the waistband, I ran a simple gathering stitch in heavy thread and sewed the waistband on right sides together. Yup...you're reading that right; no cartridge pleats. After I made the stripy trunkhose using that method, I learned that cartridge pleats were--to the best of our knowledge--not used, especially in men's hose. I estimated the gathers correctly--I couldn't have fit much more fabric in there.
As you can see, only one side of the wool waistband was initially sewn in, going through one layer of wool and two of fustian in order to support that edge. The second edge would eventually be roughly overcast down to the inside and covered by the lining shorts.
The cuff is a mere strip of the wool, sewn right sides together, and with the raw edge whipstitched down on the wrong side. This raw edge would be covered with the foundation shorts eventually. I didn't want to faff about with hook and eyes or points or any other kin of fastening on the cuff--they seldom work on my leg shape anyways--, so kept it quite simple.
Now that I actually had a left leg as well as a right, I could sew up the rise. Presumably, I did this with a backstitch as well. I only sewed up to a certain point in the front,to allow for the front opening and fly.
As you can see, the mould more or less reaches the entire length of the waistband, although it's much smaller and flatter in the front. The bulk of the padding is centered over the hollow of your butt, just back of hip. It was roughly gathered and coarsely whipstitched in place.
Much better.
I got the lining sewn in at the same time. Just overcast into place at the top and bottom with a few pleats to make it fit. Over the next year, I slowly worked on the lacing points in the waistband, using 16/2 linen thread and a simple whipstitch.
The last stages of the garment was to make the front fly. Overall shape was based on the Cotton hose, once again, with the overall length being based on my own measurements--I have a rather long front rise. Buttonholes were sewn to 16th century specifications in black silk buttonhole twist, and the fly itself is just a single layer each of heavy linen and the wool
The buttons themselves are simple solid metal ones about .25" in diameter, obtained from Bad Baroness Buttons, in bulk. Lovely things, and quite weighty. Since they're so simple, they work for a variety of periods, and you can (currently) get them 100c for $40. Choosing between silver and gold was by popular vote.
The installation of the fly couldn't be simpler. It was just overcast stitch on top of the edge, sewing from both sides. While the overall piece is simple and doesn't change for a while, exactly how it was attached varies by period, ranging from on the outside of the fabric, to inside, to eventually having the edges concealed between the fashion fabric and lining. On the whole, at this point it very much gives the feeling that the fly is an afterthought...which it may have been in some cases.
Conclusions:
The digression regarding moulds was fascinating as was the discussion and subsequent experimentation. I really like how they effect the hang and poof of the garment.
What I would do differently?
- ....maybe not take three years for a relatively quick to make garment...
- I am not sure I can really improve on it at the moment. That's not hubris, just forgetfulness.
How Historically Accurate is it?
- The materials and fabrics used are quite close. Obviously, the dyes are modern, and I still suspect a percentage of nylon in the wool. The linen and fustian are likely poor examples compared to extant, but are recognizable. The "wool" used to cover the moulds would probably make a period person go "ewww" if they touched it.
- Pattern is based on period cutting manuals and examples by Janet Arnold. I think, anyways...I didn't take adequate notes regarding this.
- Construction techniques are good.
- Being the person to make it is unlikely...I feel a garment like this would likely have been bought "off the rack" rather than being bespoke, and it's unlikely a tailor would have worn something this plain, as it isn't the best of advertising.
Time (and cost):
Bibliography
- A Tudor Suit—The Doublet. (n.d.). Properly Dressed. Retrieved August 2, 2019, from https://www.properlydressed.co.uk/blog/2019/6/18/hs8eyszmnhi45iv88p9iinq3794671-8tcwh
- Anzug (Herren) | Sammlung Online des Schweizerischen Nationalmuseums. (n.d.). Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://sammlung.nationalmuseum.ch/de/list/collection?searchText=Wams&detailID=100056522
- Arnold, J. (1985). Patterns of Fashion: The Cut and Construction of Clothes for Men and Women, C.1560-1620.
- Braun, M., Costigliolo, L., North, S., Thornton, C., & Tiramani, J. (2016). 17th-Century Men’s Dress Patterns; 1600-1630.
- Finnchad, B. M. (2015, July 16). Matsukaze Workshops: Buttonholes through the Periods. Matsukaze Workshops. http://matsukazesewing.blogspot.com/2015/07/buttonholes-through-periods.html
- Gnagy, M. (2018). The Modern Maker Vol. 2: Pattern Manual 1580—1640 (Vol. 2).
- Images of the Outcast: The Urban Poor in the Cries of London (review). (n.d.). Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236821840_Images_of_the_Outcast_The_Urban_Poor_in_the_Cries_of_London_review
- Italian (1570), & English (1594). (n.d.). Giacomo di Grassi ~ Wiktenauer, the world’s largest library of HEMA books and manuscripts ~☞ Insquequo omnes gratuiti fiant. Retrieved July 22, 2023, from https://wiktenauer.com/wiki/Giacomo_di_Grassi
- Museum, V. and A. (n.d.). Doublet and Trunk Hose | Unknown | V&A Explore The Collections. Victoria and Albert Museum: Explore the Collections. Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O356786/
- Malcolm-Davies, J., & Mikhaila, N. (2022). The Typical Tudor. Fat Goose Press.
- Samuel Pepys’ Cries Of London | Spitalfields Life. (n.d.). Retrieved May 15, 2018, from http://spitalfieldslife.com/2013/02/21/samuel-pepys-cries-of-london/
- Vincent, S. (n.d.). `When I am in Good Habitt’: Clothes in English Culture c. 1550—C. 1670. 292.
© John Frey, 2023. The Author of this work retains full copyright for this material. Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this document for non-commercial private research or educational purposes provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies
Sorry to hear that you've had a rough few years (I think many of us have...). But so very glad that you're back and sewing and blogging again!
ReplyDeleteAlso, it's great to see other people doing non-fancy clothing. It's so very easy to get swept up into the bling and fanciness, but I think there's a subtle beauty to the plainer stuff (or perhaps that's my love of sheep-coloured wool talking...). It's also an interesting research challenge to do lower class stuff as (as you say) the evidence is so much sparser, even for more well-documented eras.
It hasn't been too rough, per say. It's just my priorities have shifted. And retail work is tiring.
DeleteI completely agree. The fancy stuff is cool, but working class clothing, well made with an eye for detail, is what will catch my attention more.