August 2022 Recap: Crossing the Finish Line

Written By Emily Pretzlaff

My August Goals were:

  • Finalize the recipes and work on my class materials for my September University class.

  • Finish the calzas (now that I know where they are!)

  • Make another camisa.

  • Figure out what I want to do for Viking Garb (again) before Battle on the Bay.

  • Begin the actual construction of my belt for the final Persona Challenge display. This will need Hakon’s help for both method and tools.

  • Research of the Month: Educating a Princess: Elizabeth I’s Commonplace Book by Moira Duncan

The biggest news this month is that at long last, after a year of work, The Green Saya outfit aka The Woman in the Yellow Dress project is complete! All of the intended pieces are done, as are their write ups! I did those blogs in 3 parts: the saya and camisa, the jewelry, and the headwear.

The herringbone on the neckline turned out exactly as I wanted!

I decided to start off with a new camisa this month. I’ve wanted to dress mine up a little bit, and the camisa with simple but unidentifiable blackwork on the neckline was the only thing missing from the Green Saya outfit. It seemed fitting to start there. For my design, I was really trying to address the issue I’ve been having of tension at the underarm gussets by adding an additional inch to each of the shoulder sides of the neckline. All in all, the fit is actually quite successful! It has the additional ease I wanted without really altering the wear too much.

The embroidery aspect proved a fun opportunity to dip into my copy of The Geometry of Handsewing. I chose to do a double woven herringbone stitch on the collar tape for this piece, in black and gold. I think it will pop next to the green, but still be subtle enough to keep with the spirit of the original painting. After some initial testing, I decided on a 1/4x1/4” grid layout for this herringbone. Actually getting the grid onto my fabric tape was a bigger challenge than expected, and I did have to restart once, but with practice I think it’s manageable.

Almost 10 of those hours were spent on finishing seams….

Bea had an awesome idea of trying to keep a “time sheet” on projects. She mentioned liking to see that in project notes and blogs etc. I have generally not kept a good measure of how much time I’ve put into any one project but I think it’s an interesting idea. It’s also an opportunity for a spreadsheet and, as we all know, I never turn that down. I set up a time sheet system for my Herringbone Camisa and I was very interested to see what the final count on that is. It’s definitely a fun exercise in data, but generally turned into yet another place for me to make snarky commentary on my project.

As soon as I finished the Herringbone Camisa, I started right in on finishing the calzas. It only took a night to finish them and I am very glad I did. I was worried about this set, since they’re a little tight in the thighs if I squat but, other than that, I’m thrilled with the fit. Unlike its predecessors, this set uses an applied waist band and a drawstring for its closure and is incredibly comfortable. I have sufficient linen for one more set and I believe that will be a task for a future month.

Finishing my sewing projects relatively early in the month (both of these were done before the 15th) left me plenty of time to focus on my research and class development.

Educating a Princess has proven absolutely fascinating. The paper makes several references to both Princess Mary’s Spanish tutor, Juan Luis Vives, as well as both Queen Isabella and Queen Catherine’s approaches to education. There are a lot of really great sounding follow up references as well and some great discussion on how the humanist school structured these books and why. One thing I had peripheral knowledge of was Sir Thomas More’s dedication to his daughters and their studies but to see it how forcefully he asserted this practice was really cool. The thesis itself explored the difference between male and female education systems and how Elizabeth used both to reinforce her position of power as Queen of England. Additionally, it also explored some of the sources she chose and where she actually got the information (i.e. did she really do all this impressive translation and reading or did she actually get it from pre-existing collections?).

Reading this paper gave me a lot to think about on the headings I’d like to use. I did follow the rabbit hole of resources from Educating a Princess and began reading my way through Juan Vives’s actual instruction book for Princess Mary. This has given some good quotes and I’ve made some progress on the various headings I wanted to include in the actual period example. For the display, I think I’ll actually do both a commonplace book for Mariana the 16th century woman and one for Mariana the SCAdian. That way I don’t have to pick between languages and formats for certain pieces of information and we have a proof of concept.

The Viking garb goal was a soft goal this month. I spent time sending pictures back and forth to friends as well as digging around the internet myself. I did grab myself a set of brooches for an apron dress, which feels appropriate to have since Hakon, Hrefna, and Sof’ia are all very much on the Viking bandwagon. We still need to sort out apron dresses and under dresses. I’m not too fussed about not having chains of beads, but I could probably put some together with the jet and lapis I have if I really need to. Fabric has been acquired and white apron bibs are already complete, so our plan is to knock those out over Labor Day weekend.

The University class was the most turbulent goal of my month. I went back and forth on how it should be structured and what materials should I create. I have ultimately decided to keep the lecture portion of the class relatively short (about 20 of the 50 mins) and use the remaining amount for samples and discussing the recipes themselves. Thankfully, Hakon has a projector I can use so I can in fact create a slide deck. The first set of samples is made and in my freezer as well.

Now onto things outside of my goals:

As a combination Apprentice Day/birthday celebration, Bea and Margretta came over for a sewing day. I used this as an opportunity to test out my fritter recipe again and I think it’s just about ready. I am really thrilled with how that progressed, and I think it’s a real winner of a recipe. It’ll get its first public test at my University class in September. I do still need to figure out how to present it in large quantities at KASF (currently thinking a pie press).

I did also finally spend some time making albums and orienting the rest of the images from our trip to the National Gallery of Art a little while back. I have pictures of pretty much the entirety of Christoph Weiditz “Tractenbuch” along with the companion explaining what each folio is and both volumes of Carmen Bernis’s “Indumentaria Española en Tiempos de Carlos V.” Both are very exciting and I can’t wait to dig more in depth into both for my upcoming gonete for Persona Pentathlon.

Last but not least, the Summer Saya finally got worn to an event and there is a picture of it so the write up has been completed! That’s been a long time coming and I’m happy to have it done. One thing I did not account for is how much I need the visual reminder to turn my elbow out when shooting. Having a very baggy camisa on the range made that really challenging and I did come home with a solid bruise. I’ve got plans for a solution already in the works.

My September goals are:

Emily Pretzlaff https://marianaruizdemedina.com
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Fall University 2022 Recap
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The Summer Saya