Maciejowski Bible dress

So there is this super cool book called the Morgan (Maciejowski) Bible.

It has some super cool stuff in it.

Lemme highlight this one for you though.

LOOK AT THOSE GORGEOUS BLUES.

This photo is a bit saturated, but if you look through the book, you'll see these fantastic dresses all over the place. Tight sleeves, stupid long length and a brooch at the neck, holding the neck closed.

 

At our Market Day at Birka event, I found the softest, gooiest (no really) blue linen and I immediately knew what it was going to be for. And then I decided to handsew the whole darn thing because I wanted to be PRETTY gosh darnit. 

Of course, I forgot to buy blue linen thread and instead just sallied forth with my plain undyed linen thread until later, when I was able to order some from the now out of business, Hedgehog Handiworks. The actual sewing went surprisingly well, however, after embroidering the coat for the then-Princess Honig, my hands started cramping and I had to take a break, so my general math for how long it took me is a bit messed up. I loved felling the seams, I just wish it didn't take so long. 

THIS blog shows how they also used what we call a St. Birgitta's Cap in the same book (as well as all over the gosh darn place), so I had to make one of those too. (but I did not handsew it as I was kind of rushed. But I still found time to embroider that weird pink stuff onto the edge sooooo... *shrugs*)

I ended up adapting a pattern out of the Medieval Tailor's Assistant and then, because realistically I cannot sew to my arms every time (but man, I thought hard about that), I added suuuuper tiny cloth buttons so that I could still roll up my sleeves.

I finished the dress in time to be pretty at Panteria, for my friend Astridr who spent Panteria being apprenticed to Mistress Astrida. We ended up using my family's pavilion for the ceremony and it was lovely. 

I was really excited about this dress because I allowed myself to go crazy on the length (since I'm so tall and cheap, I often don't give myself enough length so I use as little fabric as possible) and I just feel SO PRETTY in this. I'm really loving my foray into the mid-late 13th century. It seems to hit all my buttons so far.