Mantua musings - it just makes sense.

Last night I started on the pattern for my mantua (Reconstructing History 708). I tell you, this is going to be one huge thing. The paper was huge (respect to you, Kass, for working with such huge sheets of paper. You told me your printer is in the attic, and I just had this vision of someone staggering up the stairs with a huge pack of paper!!) and so was the pattern.

At first glance it didn't make any sense. Lines seemed to be missing.
Then you 'zoom out' and you get the big picture. The lines aren't missing, the mantua is just that big. It's huge. It's a challenge! We have never turned down a quest such as this and we're not about to start now! *cue righteous laughter*
Flexing of muscles ensued. The brain fired up.

Laying out the pattern piece was fun. Just to see if I 'got it' we put the paper piece, folded over the shoulder, on the floor and put the turning gore and the side gore in place. "So this goes there...." "No, you put the turning gore over there, and then you sew this there and place C on C there!"
Some five minutes later, things clicked and it all fell together. It was there all along. The shape of the side gore suggests that it should be 30° that way, but it isn't! And it all makes sense!

Still, it's a huge thing and I have great respect for Kass to actually draft such a pattern with intricate sleeves and tucks and folds and darts and pleats and duuuude!
It just makes sense.

Now to just cut the damned thing already.

Holy crap

I don't have enough fabric! Need at least 15 cm in the width and at least an additional meter in length for the wool.
The secondary fabric I have is blue cotton. It's also slightly too narrow for the sleeves and also at least 10 cm too narrow for the side gore - which has now officially become the bane of my existence. And I can't seem to figure out how to down- or upscale the side gore either since the thing is just so darned impossible to visualize.

I don't have time to order new fabrics from e-bay. If I can't figure this out I'll have to buy new fabric at Schröder, which is expensive.
*sighs deeply*
Let's see if I can make this thing work...a slightly narrower side gore should not be a problem and I can live with the sleeves being a tad shorter in the back...

EDIT: It's not going to work. I would lose two thirds of the width of the side gore and would have to eliminate the turning gore altogether. I.e.: not a good idea. I'll just buy 10 yards of something pretty at Schröder and try again. *sigh*

When does the hurting stop....

I know I shouldn't sew under stress. I generally never do. I'll just grab ye olde costume from the cupboard or even cancel an event to avoid sewing under stress. It always turns right around and bites you if you try anyway.
Today isn't any different.

I nearly proceeded to cut out four mantua body pieces. How? Well, I had figured that it might have been wisest to open up the fabric and lay the body piece next to the selvedge on either side. It would leave a 30 cm scrap on one side, as the arm bit would otherwise overlap, so I would offset one side.

I open up the fabric, fold it double widthwise and proceed to cut out on pair of mantua body bits. Ready to proceed to the other side, my brain catches up with my scissors and I realise I have just cut out two body pieces where I had intended to cut one. This is not as bad as actually cutting four body pieces in stead of two, but still...I was left with a strip of fabric 70 to 85 cm wide and nearly 3.5 meters long as well as the rest of my cloth.

Not to worry though! This is something you can do with historical costuming and not with modern dressmaking:
Cloth is woven, but back in ye olde days the looms came up to a certain size. Pieced pattern pieces were not unheard of. The mantua pattern said so too, speaking of the width silk came in.
This is how I came to cut my side gore into two pieces, after first having taped the turning gore to it in the proper place. You could argue my turning gore just became really big too, if you like.

*sigh*
I will now continue sewing and probably making mistakes and blogging about it to entertain the masses. To be continued, no doubt.