frualeydis | A swedish 16th century dress (Reply)

Since it's easier to make a new dress than to loose weight I have started to cut out a medium blue wool dress. I intend to make somethign that could have been worn by a lesser noblewoman from Sweden. Blue, especially if it wasn't very dark and deep, was a colour used more by the middle and lower classes at that time and I plan to trim it with bands of silk taffeta, which was one of the materials allowed for the most prominent burgher's wives in the first sumptuary law from Stockholm, should work well for this social class. I think I need to make one of the narrow pleated aprons you see in Scandinavian and German 16th century art too.
I'm thinking about making hanging sleeves like this, but I haven't made up my mind yet, it would make it harder to wear with a jacket or coat for cold weather.