Of the pondering of early corsets...

Part 1

'Surely there must be something at the V&A Museum?', ask my parents. Well in the world of post-1500 AD, yes. However if there were evidence of early corsets pre-1500 AD stashed somewhere in the V&A, my bones have a funny feeling many historical re-enactor women would be rabbiting on about it by now. There is little doubt from the multitude of images of women with unnatural figures that the corset probably started in its infancy as early as the 1400's at least. As i shall demonstrate below:

Medieval silk weaver

There is very little way this neckline and waistline could be achieved without the aid of a bodice.

The Romans de la Rose (Romance of the Rose)

The lady dancing in the bottom left hand corner was inspiration for a noble lady's dress a couple of years ago. I struggled to find affordable rose pink velvet for it, so i substituted it with a gorgeously light-weight red velvet (see below). If you look carefully at the ladies above however they all have a poise that is difficult to attain without further support, for to dance with good balance requires the upper body to lean forward slightly with the weight on the toes, rather than backwards with the weight on the heels. Their stomachs/hips appear to extend forwards distinctly as they stand in an odd posture, though whether this is a desired attribute of fertility with broad hips shown through artistic licence, the use of petticoats or the effect of a bodice it is not clear. 

I've seen other front lacing dresses with very flat, taught stomachers; flatter than i can achieve without a firm frame underneath. There is something that has not been quite right about my dress, so i think it needs a little boost...

Corsets of some shape or form have been around for thousands of years. According to my research by the 1500's this would have been referred to as a 'pair of bodies', mostly at this point worn not with the aim of displaying a slim waist, but to keep an even, flat-fronted, round shape. The below website seemed the most informative on this matter:

http://www.elizabethancostume.net/corsets/history.html#pictures

It is my suspicion that corsets, just like the suggestion that Henry VIII's rather protruding codpiece fashion being the result of having to hide syphilis and the development of mending scarred skin tissue to casual cosmetic surgery, are rooted in a desire to correct medical problems. When tailored clothes came into being between 1300-1500, so did the exposure of physical human imperfection become highlighted.
When a mother is expected to bring up marriageable daughters who have grace, eloquence and poise, the choice of nagging them not to slouch is not attractive. Why not stick them in a bodice so graceful posture becomes habit and their spines grow straight? If you have given birth to one or more children, you figure may not be what it once was, so why not give it a little boost? If you have a diet that does not encourage the ideal figure, why not give it a bit of a leg-up?

So how were they made? Most assumptions i've heard are that buckram and some kind of glue, for it has been documented. But that's not to say that it was the only way. This first method has complications, for the buckram they used then i have heard is different from the 'buckram' we know now; the glue could be messy to make and use. So in this knowledge i gave up the hunt for an alternative solution for a few years... Until i found this recently:

 http://www.festiveattyre.com/research/cording/cord.html

Yup. The alternative possibility is Hemp Cording. Which would back up my 'seam strength' theory. It would be slightly softer to the body form and truer to early paintings than the Tudor shape using buckram. For those like the silk worker (at the top), a bodice would require all materials they could get their hands on to create the desired finish. Since my medieval roles now stretch from merchant and armourer's wife to nobility, i must strive to craft a bodice that could have been created by middle classes with limited materials, yet look like a piece worthy of a Knight's Lady. My Mum said 'why bother putting so much effort into something no-one will see?'. My response is that unless it is tried, it will never be unravelled - this is an adventure of self-satisfaction and experimental fiddlings...

My initial ideas have been to use two layers of cotton or linen for the cording, using either rolled scraps or string. For additional shape some twisted wire inserted in major cord seams. On the back, a simple lining, on the front a wooden busk placed down the centre between the cording, covered with silk or fine leather (which my mum suggested) to hide the bumps. These developed, for if i found a busk too uncomfortable then the plan B was to try couching wire of experimental thicknesses in an opposite direction to the cording on the back. So if cording were vertical, wire would be horizontal and vice versa.

Food for Thought:

Triptych of the Family Moreel, 1484

Portrait of a Young Woman by Domenico Ghirlandaio, 1485

Giovanna Tornabuoni, ca.1488

The Lady with an Ermine - Cecilia Gallerani, 1489

Margaret of Austria, 1490
















Part 2 to come, with drawings and deliberation on the shape of the pattern i could use....

Of the tortoise and the hare...

Yup, as per Squiggle usual, I'm up writing at an ever-so-student and insane hour. The time is 01:41am, the place is my cluttered room, littered with the haunts and shadows of an incomplete and uninspired degree dissertation. To those of my current course, this will be familiar and almost comforting to read! ;-)


Q. So what does a Squiggle do, when all energy has run its course and the once tearing stride of a hare grinds to a halt? When the well of academic ingenuity dries up? A. The Squiggle realises that perhaps the mistake was to be a hare in the first place. Secondly the Squiggle tries and fails to imitate a tortoise and simply ends up staring blankly at a screen for half an hour. In a third attempt, the Squiggle tries to return to something different that usually produces satisfying and confidence boosting results....


.... and so within minutes the Squiggle can be seen heaving her fifty year old sewing machine onto her desk and the room rapidly evolves into a swirling soup of red linen and pins! Yes, this was the moment for the meditative creation of a 15th century dress. I learnt the hard way over six years that to hare through a dress is not ideal if you still want to love the result two years later. So the two tortoise p's; patience and precision! With a lack of suitable costume fitting that of a medieval armourer's wife (to be able to do re-enactments with the fiancé), I relished the opportunity to breach the gap between the simple Medieval patterns I have known for ages and the more tailored, Tudor styles that we are accustomed to today. Tailoring clothes to fit the female form was a growing feature in the fifteenth century, particularly in the later half - in fact just starting with a pre-tudor underdress has been a revelation experience in itself! It does not conform to casually quartering the measurements of garments; there are front panels, straps and side panels, not to mention the back panels! In fact it is more a test of mathematics and mental judgement than anything else which makes a vast contrast. We have more physical and artistic evidence for the construction of such garments, so thus i have less room to make guesses or self-inventions. Which leads me onto the subject that many women ponder:


Corsets. When did they start? How were they made, and why? In so far as we can tell, there was no use for them until clothes begin to fit in the fourteenth century onwards, though this is assumed, for we have no remaining evidence. And why should we? If they were purely functional, there should be no reason why they would last until today.
Be it a means of correcting posture, hiding a gluttonous diet or disguising the bodily dis-figuration from bearing so many children, there is little doubt that there must have been an origin to the advantageous Tudor 'bodiced look'. Some have suggested that strips of cloth may have bound stomachs, others have considered the use of whale bone, reeds and willow among other forms of support. In discussion with other costume enthusiasts, we have debated the use of feather or fish glue as a stiffener. This is not as ridiculous as it may appear; some Ancient Greek re-enactors have tried and tested fish glue to set layers of linen in order to form their body armour - and it works! However in attempting to re-create my own Medieval to Tudor transition garments, it has become apparent that it must have something to do with the placing of seams. A greater number of component segments results in many vertical seams, of which there are many seam edges with a chance of fraying. In providing enough material for future alteration and being able to 'double over' the edges at the back, they automatically produce a combined strength and stiff quality to the fabric, as well as ensuring that the garment lasts whole. Inside such seam folds, one might be able to insert an extra rod of some description. This is just a personal theory, and the general consensus seems to be that it most likely started as a whole dress with some minimal stiffening around the upper body, which went from there. I'm always trying to test the boundaries on this topic, so watch this space for many more crazy theories!


Thanks to Caroline for the following image of Maria Portinari, see how her dress has odd angles at the hips and the bodice of the girl behind her has a shape that only something stiff would achieve:

Because I have no wench-like bosom, any further support in my bodices risks only flattening myself further, so i shall settle this time for thick, flat seams. My current underdress has used about five-six metres of linen, for though it has a fitted top, the skirt is extremely full (photos to follow!) It already bears great weight, so it's becoming increasingly tricky to imagine the weight once i have a similar pink-linen-lined, green wool overdress on, with equal quantities of fabric! The neckline is Tudor square to suit the turn of the century, but it will have no hooped skirt, being based on some paintings from the time.


I considered hand sewing the entire thing, which i did for the bodice, but now the weighty Singer sewing machine is a true blessing.... Squiggle would have gone truly nuts without it! :-D