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And finally, a couple of medieval gowns from the Boutique. I say “finally” because this is my last scheduled post, I should be able to get back to real posting tomorrow!
Poll’s still up though…
Historical
One Roman Stola and Palla from Liana’s Paperdoll Boutique
I’ve had quite enough of fantasy princesses for now, since I scheduled all the posts over the last few days at once, and so let us proceed to the “historical” category. Here’s the lone entry I did for the Roman section of the Boutique, a stola and palla set. (The stola being the yellow tunic, and the palla being the blue fabric.)
The poll is still up, in case you haven’t voted yet…
Laura’s Blue and White 1870s Victorian Day Dress from J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla
Click for larger version; click for the list of dolls.
So yesterday I did the vampire Carmilla’s bloody nightgown, and then I got to thinking how unfair it was that she got all the attention and long-suffering Laura got none. As a matter of fact, I can’t even remember Laura’s name without referring to Wikipedia or my previous entry. Face it, you really have to pile on the lace to make mild victims as interesting as seductive vampire women in bloody nightgowns. And so pile I did, and here is a dress from 1870 that Laura might have worn. To be honest, even though as near as I can tell 1870 is an accurate enough date for the book’s setting, I thought long and hard about going back a few years for inspiration. After all, Laura and her father lived in a castle in Germany in the middle of nowhere and who knows how well Laura kept up with English fashion in between vampire ravishings. But then I thought, she was still a growing girl and if her dresses were two or three years old, maybe she’d have outgrown them and wouldn’t be wearing anything that old? Maybe since her father is sort of vaguely rich, she orders a lot of new dresses? Maybe she spends a lot of time remaking her dresses referring to whatever fashion news she can get, because life in an isolated castle is so boring? So I over-thought this until I got fed up and tried to make an 1870s style day dress anyways, like I had initially planned. Since it’s not a copy of any one dress, it’s probably not historically accurate (I definitely have my misgivings about the way the overskirt turned out) but oh well, it was sure fun to draw.
New poll tomorrow, but this one will remain open for a few days yet…
Halloween Costume Series Day 17: Dorcas Snodgrass’ 1910s Light Blue Nurse Outfit with Full White Apron and Cap
Click for larger version; click for the list of dolls.
“Nurse,” of course, is one of the more popular women’s Halloween costumes but I think they’re often of the “sexy” variety; I suppose the connotation is “hot yet nurturing” but it always makes me think of things like getting blood drawn, which isn’t really the intended effect. Thinking about nurse costumes did remind me of this Metafilter article about a nurse named Dorcas Snodgrass who died under mysterious circumstances in 1912. The article links to this picture of her in the Library of Congress photostream, under which there’s a great comment that brings together some New York Times articles about her disappearance and death, officially ruled a suicide. (The Metafilter thread itself is mostly just good for theories and chatting about the name Snodgrass.) So there — not much of an elaborate costume, but a genuinely creepy nurse story for Halloween.