The
time for the new stays came actually quite soon, as some
time before Christmas the same year I realized that I didn't
have any hand sewing project for the holidays. I had
already bought a pretty rose pink cotton twill with
the stays in mind, and as I also had coutil in my stash I
decided I could as well begin the new stays now, as I would
have to get to them eventually after all. I could then work
on them whenever I had time from more pressing stuff with no
deadline. I was also very happy to realize that I had
learned something during the past few years: Making a pair
of stays is no longer necessarily a terrifying challenge,
but can also be an easy, relaxing project that doesn't need
very much planning before beginning.
I was also going to make this pair the easiest way possible.
Obsessing over the light blue stays was rewarding, but at
the moment I didn't want to put nearly as much time and
effort into these practical stays. They should be durable,
of course, but I gave myself leave to take some shortcuts
when it came to how they looked out.
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Hidden
boning channels were the most obvious time-economical design
choice now that I knew how much work would go into visible
ones. I had also chosen the plain cotton twill for the top
material with practicality in mind. I decided to bind the
edges on bias tape, though it's not period correct at all.
While the straight non elastic tape was not impossible to
work with, bias tape is faster to get neatly. I cut the bias
tape from an old but very sturdy cotton bedsheet. For the
lining I used thin linen.
I wanted basically to make another copy of the red stays,
but I did change a few little things I had learned. The red
stays were very scantily boned, so I added some more boning
to support the fabric. The boning still remained very light.
As the added horizontal bones had worked so well on the
light blue stays I added them also on this pair on the top
of the stomacher piece and the side-front pieces. On the
stomacher I also added a few horizontal bones lower to
prevent it from wrinling when laced, as the stomacher on the
red stays with only vertical boning was wont to do. I also
made the stomacher narrower at the bottom, as in the red
stays it tends to peek out between the front tabs when laced
a bit tighter.
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I also
drafted the underarm a few centimeters higher so that the
bust would get more support, but left the boning end lower.
On the side piece I added shorter boning channels on the
tabs which crossed the long vertical boning like in the
light blue stays. For the boning I used 7mm wide cable tie,
apart from the horizontal boning which was 5mm wide.
I wanted to keep both the front- and the back lacing, as
they give so much fitting allowance, and for a moment
considered metal eyelets for the total 62 of them. In the
end my period self got the better of me, as I might some day
use the stays visibly too, and hand sewing projects small
enough to carry in handbag tend to get finished sooner or
later anyway. I'm also hopeless on putting on metal eyelets
and always get half of them crooked, and custom made this
number of them would cost considerably more than just some
thread, so hand bound they would be. As another improvement
on the red stays I also made the lacing a proper off set one
this time. Apart from being period correct, it's also much
easier to lace by oneself.
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I
begun, as usual, buy drawing the pieces with their boning
channels on coutil. Compared to the visible boning channels
stitching the hidden ones on machine with back stitch
finishing happened on dizzying speed. An unwelcome surprise
was awaiting me, however: I had somehow managed to draw all
the pieces similar, not mirror-image right and left ones, so
I had to draw the edge lines anew on the other side on half
of them.
But that was not the end of it. When I began covering the
pieces with the pink cotton twill I noticed that the pencil
lines on the top side of the other half showed through the
thin fashion fabric. My furious scrubbing with an eraser
proved futile as I had done my stitching so precisely that
the pencil was securely under the stitches. I did not want
to try to wash them, as I had not prewased the coutil and
knew from experience it might size a bit. Happily I had
bought a lot of the cotton twill with the plan to use it for
something else too, so I ended up putting a double top
layer. In the end it was not a bad choise, as the pink color
looks more fresh and saturated, and as the material is thin
it doesn't create too much bulk either.
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In
finished the lacing edges with bag lining the pieces with
top material. I covered the side-front and back pieces first
so that I could work on the eyelets when the pieces were
still separate, but in the end I didn't finish even half of
them in time for Christmas. So I hurriedly closed the seams
and secured the seam allowances by hand, pinned on the
lining and stitched it on the edges before jumping in car.
During the holidays I sewed the lining on the lacing edges,
cut the lower edge to shape and reinforced it with blanket
stitch before binding it with the bias tape.
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After
finishing the lower edge on both sides I made the rest of
the lacing eyelets so that I could try the stays on with the
still uncovered stomacher. The stays looked great, well
fitting with a little stretching allowance still left. The
only thing I had to fix was to shorten the shoulder straps a
bit, as I had left some extra allowance on them.
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I
finished the stomacher by turning the seam allowances on the
wrong side, stitiching them on and them mounting the top
fabric. I turned it's seam allowances also on the wrong side
and secured them by hand. Then I pinned on the lining and
sewed it on the side edges. The top and bottom edges were
finished with blanked stitch and bias tape.
The bias tape on stomacher and the top edge of the stays
could well have been sewn on by machine, but at this point
my perfection got the better of me and I decided to bind
them by hand to look similar to the lower edge.
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The
finished stays are quite okay. They have some cosmetic
flaws, like the top material wrinkling on the side-front
piece and the not very neat eyelets, which are really below
my standard ones. On the other hand I made some extra
handsewing which could have been replaced my machine, like
the edge reinforning and bias binding. But as I didn't have
any other hand sewing project at the time due to failed
organizing, I had hand-sewing time I decided to put into
this.
As the stays were in the beginning mainly a practical,
sorely needed garment rather than a new challenge I can live
with the less-than-perfect finishing. The main thing is that
the stays give a nice shape and are very comfortable.
I wore the stays for the first time in a masked ball
organized by the L'Amusette, and they were even visible in
my costume. When I wondered what to wear, as I wouldn't have
time to create anything very elaborate, I realized that the
new stays looked adorable with my green taffeta petticoat.
I only had to make a mask and a wreath for a pastoral
costume inspired by the "Spring" theme of the masquerade.
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