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[melligator.livejournal.com]

Anybody remember my shenanigans with the Victorian pattern that made up incredibly tiny?!
http://community.livejournal.com/craftgrrl/12192232.html

Well I has an update and a few questions you guys might be able to help with :)

trip_tych was right on the money with the suggestion that the diagrams were in an esoteric system that was not cm or inches, they are from a proprietary system that required a set of rulers, distributed by the makers, to draft them to your size. The more I read and thought about it, this system is actually genius. It enabled the pattern makers to print one, single, scaled down diagram in their regular sized magazine, that with the rulers, anybody could easily draft to their own size. I don't even want to think about the math involved, suffice to say it works and it is quite simple once you stop overthinking it and just do as they say.

It enabled them to be able to print the patterns in any scale they wanted, and even to distort the pattern as printed for ease of reading, or clarity of small detail pieces. This may well explain how my jacket came to be distorted, as apparently differences in scale within one pattern piece are quite common. When you work with their rulers in drafting up, your piece might look a bit different in shape than the diagram but it will be real-world accurate.

The rulers (or "scales") are many, and are labelled in various measurements. e.g. there is a 28" ruler, a 29", 30" and so on. Basically you take the critical measurement for whichever piece you are working on (for a shirt that would be the bust, for a skirt, the waist) and if you measure, as I do, 40" around the bust, you select the ruler marked 40". You then draw a right angle a the top right of your large page, which will be point A, the point all things emanate from, and working right to left, and top to bottom, use the numbers on your selected ruler to transfer all the diagram's measurements and lines. Et voila, you-sized pattern.


from Authentic Victorian Fashion Patterns, Harris


from The Voice of Fashion, Grimble



Now Harris's book has reprinted some lovely patterns and pictures, but it is incredibly negligent as far as any information that might be useful in actually doing something with the designs, other than admiring them in a book as a sort of academic exercise. It is Grimble's book that illuminates every confusing thing about the Harris book. Harris's patterns are from the same sources as those in Grimble's book, and so you can use all of Grimble's excellent information and advice for them both - very fortunate, as otherwise I suspect Harris's book would be completely useless. It mentions nothing about the Diamond Cutting System, and in the intro even suggests ways to draft up the patterns that would produce nothing usable, given what we now know about the diagrams.

So anyway, I managed to mock up the jacket and basque parts to me-size, yay!


No sleeves yet - jacket part. The jacket pattern has no darting in front, so I pinched these ones in, otherwise it would make no sense at all:




Jacket with basque piece:





So it is looking more realistic but I still have a lot of bits I am fuzzy on.

A basque, in Victorian fashion, was an overlay, correct? I've look up a few pictures and it seems to be a sleeveless piece that goes over and augments another. The picture of the pattern I am working from would support this but as you can see, when made up, looks not a whole lot like you'd think :D In my scan you can barely see the basque in full black over the jacket - its neck and hemline are nothing alike. I'm starting to think that all length, finishing, hems and necklines are deliberately left to the user, just because of how very different this jacket/basque is looking to the artist's version. I appreciate there is some artistic license, but these could almost be different items entirely.

Does anyone know what "full" means in the sense that when, for one outfit, two front jacket pieces may be given - one is labelled 'front' and another 'full front' (or similarly, back and full back). Are they both supposed to be incorporated somehow, or is this a fit/preference option? It is almost impossible to tell from the artist renderings.

Sorry this turned into the longest, rambly entry ever, but I'm a bit excited about this whole thing :D I've no idea what I will do with this once I conquer it, I am just really enjoying it!