kass

Next year we will have to make it a point to do so!

I didn't really get to meet anyone from the Pyracy Pub. I've been in the process of relocating and haven't been online much. I was lucky to meet up with my own group to be quite honest!

Oh thanks, Constance! I'm sorry I didn't know that at the time. I would have loved to have met you!

We're a little overexposed but here is one of me and Captain Merrick at the MD Ren Fest last weekend.

Blackjohn, I have to say that Lisa is about the most lovely lady I have ever seen wear 18th century kit. She really looks like a porcelline (sp?) doll!

What Hurricane said is not only logical and timeless, it's documentable historically. I've been reading a book called "1700 -- Scenes of London Life" and there are quotes in there complaining about how you can't tell who is the maid and who is the mistress because servants are starving themselves in order to dress above their station. Instead of buying functional clothing that will last, they are spending their meat money on imported silks and the latest fashions. Of course then the fashionable upper class are changing fashions as quickly as they can in an effort to stay "ahead" of the lower orders.

For me, damn right I'd dress above my station! My character is a procuress. The better I look, the better I can tempt the young country girls to come work for me. The better we dress, the higher-class clientelle we attract.

But personally, for me it's all about the clothes. Always. I do lower class in alot of different time periods. But when I can justify dressing above my station (and I can afford the materials to do it well and not look like your grandmother's old couch), I do it in spades!

Kass

Oh that's cute! I like that one...

I seem to be doing less and less and spend most of my energy trying to put a correct kit together and find kindred spirits to discuss the minutia with.

You know, Greg, a few years ago, I craved sitting around and discussing minutia with kindred spirits. But I have to admit that there aren't a lot of kindred spirts out there and most people don't want to discuss what's right; they want to complain about what's wrong. And after a season of sitting around with those negative chumps, I gave up.

At the MD Ren Fest last weekend, I really found what I'd be missing. Yes, people come to see (and be) the fantasy pirates. But as I walked are the Faire and tried to offer my young apprentices for sale or rent to passing men in the crowd, I realized something. You can teach anywhere. Some of it was just good natured goofing around. But I found myself lecturing a couple guys on the reality of prostitution in late 17th century London and the general acceptance of a lady of questionable virtue in society in that time period. We talked about the coffee houses of Covent Garden, the famous mistresses of the aristocracy and all kinds of stuff. And it was fun for me.

I've found that as much as I love hanging out with my fellow reenactors, what I really crave now is chatting with the public. And that can mean portraying a persona in the first person or just answering questions as the modern me. It's all fun.

Yes indeed! Nice to meet you, Stinky, however briefly! I don't think I got to meet the rest of you lot.

Kass

And I am lucky to have bumped into you with my swollen elbow all those years ago! Thank you for letting me play with you guys, even though I am useless with practical things like work...

Demon Cat, yes. The Hunting Outfit will be included. I promise to post a link here on the forum as soon as I have cover art to show.

I think it's gorgeous. Matter of fact, I think there's an apron or a kerchief in the Chester County (PA) Historical Society's collection that is very similar in pattern to that. Nice...

Oh, yes I see. The only place I've heard of finding shagg is in England. I have never seen it here at all. Sorry.

I do, in fact, Deadeye. I sell patterns for the stuff I make for myself (I wear the prototypes) and my sizes run to 26 for ladies (48" bust) and include instructions for modifying them for larger sizes. You can see our current selection by clicking the link in my signature.

We don't current produce pirate patterns, but we do Elizabethan and Jacobean patterns that she might like. We have a number of Full Figured customers. And the new "Golden Age of Piracy" will debut next Feburary.

Hi Josh. Yes it is! Of course we're closing on our house on the 4th, so I am expecting that all I'm getting for my birthday this year is a mortgage.

Thanks for the refs, Greg. I appreciate that! Now I know that checked shirts go that far back. Cool!

Kersey... I'll keep my eyes peeled, but I haven't found it for any cheaper than that either.

Wool Duffel? Never heard of it.

Ah ha! I see!

It's hard to tell from a picture, Greg. I could tell you if it were hemp rather than jute or sisal if I could touch it or smell it. But photos are tough.

Hemp rope isn't impossible to get over here, though. If you really want some, I could probably track it down for you.

Kass

You're like a proud papa, aren't ye, Blackjohn.

Deadeye,

My husband has the weirdest feet on the planet -- size 12 wide on the "flipper" and narrow on the heel. He walks out of most of his shoes.

I know you're probably not looking to break the bank, but this lady makes excellent shoes and they're all custom so you can get a really good fit: Sarah Juniper

Kass

Yeah I'd like to get myself some checked linen too.

Never fear, my birthday bro'! I am here!

Seriously, my favourite source for linen often has checked linen for sale. It's really just the right stuff and no more than $6 a yard!

Here's the link: Checked linen

You'll have to search for it. Click on "Fabrics". Put "linen" in fabric content and "yarn dye" under type and you'll find some.

I don't know how early we start seeing checked shirts, though. I make them for Rev War, but I don't recall seeing them in any GAoP illustrations. Of course, I haven't specifically looked either...

Kass

Would Raw Silk have been common enough during the GAoP to be made into a shirt for reenacting?

No... But let me explain why.

The silk called "raw silk" by modern fabric stores and clothiers is really a fabric called silk noil. Silk noil is made from the refuse left over after all the really good silk has been reeled off the cocoons and whatever is left has been spun. Call it "bottom quality silk" if you like. It is called "raw" because it doesn't have the sericin (silkworm goo) removed from it. Smell it sometime. It smells like bug guts. That smell never goes away.

In other words, it's junk. It's modern junk. It's $2 a yard and they have to add chemicals to it to make it stick together when they spin it. It shrinks like mad and falls apart faster than cheap cotton.

Modern costumers make shirts out of silk noil ("raw silk") because they think it looks like linen, and it's a lot cheaper than linen. And after all "silk is period".

But this silk isn't period. Period.

Hi friends!

I just wanted to share some new pictures of the hunting outfit I've been raving about. You can find them at the bottom of this page:

1693 Lady's Hunting Outfit

Cheers!

Kass

Kit is my term of choice. But sometimes I call it "my pirate clothing" or "my 1690s outfit".

Tee hee! Oh Maria! What an image!!!

Interesting idea, Studley, and one to ponder.

I suppose the only way to prove it is to find a pirate's journal wherein he talks about dressing flashy so as to be noticed.

We have to be kind of careful about putting out modern ideas onto people 300 years ago without some kind of substantiation. As I think Foxe said in another thread, today we strive for individuality, but back then, you strove to fit in.

But I'd buy it if someone of the time wrote that this was their intention, to be flashy and get noticed.

Kass, assuming you're talking about the buccaneer pictures from Esquemeling and the French map I'm not convinced that those are men in their shirts either. I wonder whether they are long over-shirts, ie a sort of Caribbean hunter's equivalent to a coat. If you look carefully at the man from van Keulen's sea atlas it looks like he's got a second shirt on underneath which can be seen just poking out from under his left cuff. Even if they are just shirts, those men are clearly not in typical clothing, some have got no breeches on! I think they are wearing specific working clothes and when they went back to Port Royal or wherever they probably got into their normal togs.

I'm in complete agreement with you there, Foxe! Whether they are wearing shirts only or long over-shirts, they weren't something they would be seen wearing in "town". We have to always remind ourselves that our modern tendency to start discarding clothing when we're hot was just not done. Doesn't matter if you were an outlaw or a poor man or a respectable gentleman.

Huge, great, sweeping generalizations here, Das: men were thought of as "undressed" when they had their coats off. All men. Slaves up to gentlemen. You simply weren't decently clothed.

Even around his own home, a gentleman wore his waistcoat, shirt and cravat, though he usually substituted a banyan for his frock coat for comfort. Men wearing shirts and wasitcoats alone are still not fully dressed -- like modern men going shirtless. It doesn't break any laws, but it's still not dressed enough to enter a convenience store. It was a different idea of what was acceptable and what was not.

Now that being said, Foxe has posted a number of pictures of men in their shirts. These are not "decent" men.

I guess the question you have to ask yourself is "where am I?" Are you in port? Put on your coat. Are you on board, working, or digging to burry that treasure , strip down all you like.

Not sure. Is it by any chance not a static image? Can you copy it from the site it's on and upload it to your personal webspace and try from there?

Or you could send me the URL of the image as text and I will try. I have some super sneak powers here...