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LaraCorsets

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About LaraCorsets

  • Birthday March 1

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    Female
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    Northern New Jersey (by NYC)
  1. On lacing... (again, keeping in mind that most all of my info is based on 18th century reasearch & stays I have studied & owned) I believe that most...(I want to say all but hate being so definate).... most stays were spiral laced with a single lace throughout the 18th century and a bit into the 19th cen. It is in the regency period where you see modern cross lacing come into use. So it would seem to me that since spiral lacing was in common use in the 15th, 16th, 17th and 18th centuries in the closures of most women's clothing that likely it was also how the earlier stays were laced as well. In spiral lacing it matters not which end you start or finish at. If the garment is cut to fit correctly then you have an even distance between the edges regardless of lacing direction or tension.
  2. Yeup.... the busk is usually placed center front in place of other bones when you want the front especailly rigid (like in formal stays). If the boning you have done works for you there is no need to add more. Not all stays had an actual busk. Many were all regular size bones, especially stays for a regular person's every day wear.
  3. Mother Rose ~ Is there any chance you might have a width dimension for the baleen? I would be most obliged for any images on stays boned with baleen. YHS, MD The sizes varied greatly since the staymaker cut each frond by hand. I did a whole pasta comparison in another post but do not know how to link to it. I have seen huge wide chunks as large as 15mm wide and 3mm thick on occasion but most common are the finer slivers averaging between 2-5mm wide and 1-2 mm thick. As for photos I am sure I can find some where I can zoom in enough to see the baleen poking through. I do find it so interesting how many shades of beige to dark brown baleen comes in. Give me a bit of time to get photos.
  4. Grrrrrr... I had typed a long response, was distracted by a phone call and then the computer froze and I lost the post. So frustrating. I am way to tired to go that into detail again so here is the short answer: No.... (insert routine disclaimer about my not knowing everything... having personally examined only about 30 or so antique 18th cen stays...and who is to say with any absolute certainty what was or was not). I say no because I have not yet seen or heard of a stay of the period (or any period) which uses cane/reed as well as baleen. I am sure somewhere out there is an exception, there always is something. But it makes no sense for it to have been a preference or deliberate choice to combine cane/reed with baleen or to even choose use of cane/reed over baleen. All staymakers used baleen. It was common and accessible to most. (confirmations or corrections from any out there with historical knowledge of the whaling industry are encouraged.) From my research to date all the 18th cen stays I have personally examined were boned with baleen. You find occasional additions of carved wood, shaped metal or carved bone all usually used to encourage or reinforce some exageration of silhouette (such as the ridge sometimes found on the center front or the extra roundness of later 18th cen stays' busts). It seems to me that reed/cane would be used by someone who could not get or afford baleen in their stay. This would probably be someone living far from any main urban locations. Probably someone who has to make her own stay and had to pick the grass in the field to use as she could afford nothing more, not even a previously owned stay. But maybe ...just maybe she did purchase or inherit a used stay and needed to replace a bone or five? Perhaps there is no local town to get a bit of baleen from the staymaker for repairs. Perhaps that poor country lass might stuff some reed into the channels of her old baleen boned stay out of desperation? So I guess it is ...possible.... but not likely. (in my opinion... ;-) Lara
  5. Who? Me? Start trouble? Never! I just manage...to ahem... um... find myself in the mix..And my dear Sister, just who are ye calling a foo ..... did ye say new Lass? Ripe? Yes my pet, you'll really enjoy this one. Stop by when next in port...as always. You'll see fer yourself.
  6. Lady B, Stop by one afternoon and we can disguss your needs. This young Miss in particular seems to have been brought to the right house. It would seem that despite her angelic face and proven innocence she is quite excited to .... ahem.... "learn the ropes" as one might say. Oh yes, I will be keeping this one. Rose
  7. Oh Lilly they look great! Show us pics of you in them!!!
  8. If you were here I would smack you in the head for starting trouble like you do. I know my Brother to be a fool, but stupid....no. Marriage is for the getting of heirs.... think on that when you look into the eyes of any would be future wives. Besides you will tire of her as you do with all of hem. I have a lovely new Lass fresh from Derbyshire with rosy cheeks and hair like silk. Her father gave her to settle a bill and she is ripe for the plucking. Shall I save her for you dear?
  9. She had better well damned be after all the years I spent teaching the chit!
  10. Hmmm ye wouldn't want to take on the role of a Bawdy house "Mother" now would ye? We could do with someone who would beat a little sense and respect into some of these whor.... ahem... courtesans... Yes, Brother dear... I am here to remind my doxys of their place. ermine... indeed. Thinks she's as good as the Queen of France does she? Nothing but trouble that girl. I should have left her groveling in the filth where I found her. Mother Rose
  11. That is exactly what I was planning to do first. Heat and steam does wonders for so many things.
  12. Kate, tell me more about the benefits of soaking and how it becomes easier to work with please. Is it simply to remove the curve from it being coiled or is there another benefit? I have been looking at my pile of reed with scepticism (I got a coil of each size to play with). I tend to be set in my ways and the stuff is completely alien to me.
  13. Animal...you have NO idea! Mother Rose and Mistress Lilly have alot of history and unfinished business (Lara and Lisa are good friends) I would LOVE to go to PIP but from what I understand this year it is the same wekend as RF Philidelphia. That is a big problem, for many of us.
  14. The 5mm, it is the smallest and close in size to the baleen strips in many of my antiques. You could even cut those down the center for even thinner strips if you really want to go crazy. Baleen was purchased as a chunk and stay makers cut off long strips by hand. This resulted in strips which were inconsistent in size and often no two were alike. In my antique 18th cen stays (where the boning is poking through) you can see a substantial difference in the diameter of one baleen frond compared to it's neighbor. To use pasta as a demonstration tool (hey it works).... Some are like linguini where it's neighbor may be more like a squared off spaghetti followed by a fettucini. The most commonly used size is like the linguini. (ironicly, old dry baleen is brittle like dry pasta and breaks as easily) (hmmmm.....linguini with meat sauce...yes, that is what I will have for dinner...)
  15. http://www.farthingalesla.com/plastic_bones.php
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