Trip to Colorado and wearing the Victorian Mourning Dress

My husband and I went on a get away for our Anniversary to Colorado and did a few fun costumy things while there. 

The first night we drove about 8 hours in the rain to Fort Collins. Fort Collins has a very cool little pub called Dungeons & Drafts.  The food is very good and the drinks are excellent, as well as themed for geeky, nerdy things. For example, I had a Butter Beer (Harry Potter) and a Frost Mage (World of Warcraft) for drinks and my husband had The Cap (Captain America) and a sonic screwdriver (Doctor Who).  The whole place is reminiscent of a Dungeons and Dragons Inn and they encourage people to dress up in any costume.  In fact you get 10% off if you do.  Finally they have a game library from which you can borrow games to play with your friends while you eat.This is a really fun place and we would love to go back again.

Dungeons and Drafts

Game Library

 The main reason for the trip however, was to go to the Emma Crawford Wake and the Manitou Springs Coffin Races.  These are annual events in Manitou Springs.  The Wake is held at the Miramont Castle and is basically a short dinner theater that moves from room to room in the castle.  It is historical and intended to educate about wakes in late Victorian times and the effect on the whole household.  After the wake, dinner is served.  Many guests dress up, so I wore the full Victorian Mourning gown and my husband wore his full Victorian.  Unfortunately, we only got a background shot with my husband in full dress.  We also did not take pictures during the wake to avoid distracting the other guests or the actors.  Still it was a lovely evening.

Men's basic without the hat and coat

Back of my dress and my husband in full dress

Dress back

Dress front

 Since we planned on attending the Coffin Races the next day, we stayed in a very cool Victorian Bed and Breakfast called the Avenue Hotel. I highly recommend this place, the breakfast was amazing, the rooms are really beautiful and the owners are wonderful.  We were so comfortable there and had such a lovely time.  A friend of mine and myself wandered around the house and took pictures. Also the front yard was wonderfully decorated for the coffin races so we took some spooky pictures.

The next day we had our amazing breakfast from the Avenue hotel and then went off to tea at the Miramont Castle and to watch coffin racing.  The basic idea is that the coffin (shape and style up to the team) must contain an "Emma" (again the dress for Emma is up to the team) and must be pushed by 4 people.  The teams run in heats of 2 coffins and the winner has the best time.  Some people did go for speed but most went for style.  For example, there as a Viking entry with the coffin as a ship and a giant sail, which added a great deal resistance for running.  Other really crazy ones were: Khaleesi from Game of Thrones in the coffin pushed by 3 large dragons (wings are also bad for running and the heads appeared really hard to see out of) and Drogo; the fast food guys (again Jack in Box giant ball head is not good for vision or running); the news crew with news helicopter coffin; as well as lots of amazing Halloween themed groups.  Also many of the crowd were dressed up.  I tried to get pictures but there were way too many people to get good clear shots of the coffins.  However the whole event was simply a ton of fun and I hope to go again.

Victorian Mourning Gown Bodice

The bodice was relatively simple and was fairly straight forward, thankfully the Truly Victorian Pattern was easy to work with.  I made a quick mock up and discovered the the neckline had to be lowered and the collar redrafted. However the rest of the bodice fit really well and went together fairly easily.  The only hard part is the beautiful pleats that make the tails in the bit were a bit difficult to set, but so worth it.  The bodice is fully boned on the seam lines and on the darts and has a waist tape to keep the back firmly pulled to my waist above the bustle. This waist tape also prevents the bodice from riding up when worn.

Once the bodice was together, I stitched a bunch of beaded trim purchased from M&J Trimming onto the bodice.  The three appliques on the back above the pleats and the one in the center back below the collar are left over from the trim on the skirt.

Bodice back

Bodice front

 A quick note on construction, I decided to flat line all the pieces and then use cotton bias tape to finish all the edges on the inside of the bodice.  This made for really really nice edges, but lots of hand sewing.  This bodice took me much longer than any other I have made, but the smooth edges were so worth it.  The only area of the bodice with an additional lining is the tails on the bodice which in addition to flat lining in cotton, have a silk lining as well in case they flip up while wearing this bodice.

Here is a good detail shot of the trim.

Finally, I made the sleeves out of some of the left over semi-sheer ruched silk used on the false underskirt.  This fabric was stretchy so I made up the sleeves and then altered them until they fit right.  I then used some of the sheer stuff left over from the skirt ruffle and made some quick ruffles for the sleeve edges.

 

Victorian Mourning gown skirt

I have been plugging along on the Victorian Mourning gown and it has taken way longer than I anticipated.  I really underestimated the time required to sew on all the little beaded appliques.  However the base skirt is finally finished.

The first thing I did was fill out the front panel with beaded appliques and beaded fringe (both of these were purchased from M&J Trimming).  I added black beaded loop fringe to the ends of the bows on the front of the dress.  I then took a beaded trim that consisted of square medallions, fray checked between the medallions and cut them apart.  I then sewed the separated medallions down the false opening panels.  Here is a full length picture for the the overall effect and a detail picture to show the medallions and fringe.

I was very worried with how long adding the beaded appliques took that I would not get the butterfly train done and the back of the skirt would be too plain. I had already planned to do the bustling but decided to add a sheer ruffle out of fabric from my stash.  I stitched down the ruffle and hid the stitching with a narrow velvet ribbon.  The ruffle is added only to the sides and the back.

To get an idea of how the skirt would look, I put on my dress dummy over some of my underpinnings.  I plan to wear my red silk corset and my basic bustle.  The corset is drafted from my own pattern and the bustle is made from a Truly Victorian pattern.

I have not posted about the red corset on here so I will give a little information.  I drafted the pattern myself.  It is funny to see it on the dress dummy because the shape on the dummy is completely different than the shape on me.  Contrary to the view on the dummy, this corset is over bust (although low in the bust) and gives a very different final shape.  

The bust is shaped by the addition of a gore on either side and the boning stops just below the bust gore.  The bone channels are flossed with black heavy cotton thread and with slightly different patterns on the top and bottom.  I am trying to get more adventurous in my flossing and some day hope to be able to make designs like the ones from the Symington Collection Flossing Sampler, a portion of which is available free here.

Here is the corset with the bustle for full effect.  I love this bustle.  Since the bustle effect is due to ties in the back, you can adjust them or completely untie them so the bustle is flat for travel.  So very convenient.















With all the underpinnings on my dummy, I was finally able to look at the skirt.  I am pretty happy with it and am glad it was not too plain to wear on its own.

Skirt Front

Skirt back

Skirt side

Victorian Mourning Gown begginings

My friend and I are attending an event in Colorado, a Victorian Wake at the Miramont Castle in Manitou Springs in a couple of weeks.  The Miramont Castle is really fun to wander through and I could not resist the chance to attend the Wake.

Of course this means I needed a dress. I have always wanted a Victorian Mourning gown so this was the perfect opportunity.  I have a Pintrest board for inspiration here.  Although I have decided not to copy a particular dress, my favorite is this dress from the Met Museum here.  I love the false front/split skirt look and decided I need this for my dress.

To start with I needed patterns.  I am using several from Truly Victorian that I will modify as needed.  I have always had good luck with their patterns.  I will definitely make the bodice and the base skirt, but I have not yet decided on the butterfly bustle yet.  It would be so lovely, but I worry about the train in the crowd.

The skirt plan: I will make this skirt with the bustled back and ruffle. I plan on only adding the ruffle to the sides and the back of the skirt.  The front of the skirt I plan to make in different silk to appear as an underskirt and will add narrow partial front pieces of the main silk as a false opening. 

TV261-R 1885 Four-gore Underskirt

 If I have time, I would like to make the detachable Butterfly Train.  I just dont know if I will have time before this event and again trains and crowds are bad together.

TV361 Late 1880s Butterfly Detachable Train

 For the bodice, I really wanted the triangular neck opening, so I have decided to use the 1883 Tail Bodice.  I plan to use the short tails and 3/4 sleeves for this particular dress.

TV462 1883 Tail Bodice

For fabrics, I bought silk from Dharma Trading company.  I had originally wanted  to use silk velvet, but they were out when I went to order.  I settled on the 19.5mm Black Charmeuse as a substitute.  Although this is one of the heaviest silks they carry it is still super light weight!  More light weight than anything I have made Victorian with before.  This makes me nervous but we will see how it goes.  I also rummaged around in the stash and found some other silks for accents that should work well.  For example, this sheer silk below to fill in the false front in the skirt.

Sheer silk with lining

To start with I cut the front panel of the skirt out of some of the stash silk.  This silk is see through so it is lined with black cotton.  I treated the sheer silk and cotton as one  piece and darted it as per the pattern instructions. I then prepared some double sided Charmeuse silk pieces for the false opening.  I then stitched all these pieces together to be treated as one for the front of the skirt.  For the start of the decorations, I made tubes out of the black Charmeuse and made bows.  The bows are hand stitched to the skirt to keep them from moving, but the tubes are left free  until they meet the false sides to give the impression of being separate pieces.  Here are a couple of pictures so far!  I took pictures both with and without the flash.  No flash is truer to the colors, but the details or lost.  The flash image shows the details much better.

Skirt front no flash

Skirt front with flash