Adventures in French Hoods – part 1

So, I’ve gotten everything I need for this French Hood.  Yay!  And I’m ready to start my adventure.

I’ve gotten a pattern from Drea Leed’s wonderful Elizabethan Costuming site for a French hood dating circa 1535-1540, traced it out onto my interfacing.  Time to cut, and then bind the wire to it.

After tracing out the pattern onto my buckram and cutting it out, I proceeded to start binding wire to the buckram–I used a heavyweight embroidery thread to do this, which other than being a bitch to thread onto my needle was actually very easy to work with and did very well.

All told, it only took about an hour and a half or so for this stage.  I think I may try it with stiffer wire — I’m not sure if the wire I’m using holds its shape well enough; but time will tell.  I’ve got enough jacquard to do this at least twice.  So we’ll see what happens.  I may ask Trish about it tomorrow at game — she may have a tip or three about it.

Because I hate myself…

Because I hate myself, I’m going to try my hand at making a French Hood.  And…well…because I think it’d be fun to make one, and if I can make one, that means I can make more.  It should also keep my hands busy during Thursday gaming when I don’t need to be rolling dice, which is even better (making jewelery during game doesn’t work as well because I actually count beads as I work, which distracts me from contributing to game).

I’ve got the wire I need and some bridal jacquard I picked up on a whim and I’ve got stuff for veils and the billements coming out my ears (I make jewelery, too, duh), I just need to go get some buckram for the base of the mess.  Maybe I’ll see if I can do that on Wednesday after work.

I’m also going to try my hand at making some masks, because no one sells masks.  Or nice hats.  I should do both, I think, as long as it doesn’t make me crazy (which it invariably will, but it’s a nice thing to try at least once, I think).  There’s a lot of stuff  I think I’m going to try.  It’s a question of whether or not I actually get to it.