FOUNDATIONS REVEALED COMPETITION ENTRY
Repress’d Tess d’Urberville
Content Warning: Mentions Rape
(click images to to enlarge)
Other Credits
Thanks to dad for the last-minute photos :)
Outline the story …
Tess is the complex titular character of Hardy's "Tess of the d'Urbervilles", whose story confronts late Victorian sexual morality with female agency of the educated middle class. Raped by Alec, loving and marrying Angel but guilty of her impure status, Angel abandons her. She becomes the Alec's mistress, and kills him. Her clothing chosen here reflects the 1891 publishing in The Graphic, in morose blacks with a white linen shirt, juxtaposing her “Pure Woman Faithfully Represented” subtitle with the hamartia of her actions and those done unto her.
This historically inspired depiction was influenced by the CosTube community, namely the 1890s videos à la renaissance thru 2018 to present, especially from Costuming Drama, Bernadette Banner, and Enchanted Rose Costumes. The black items were worked from patterns. The Keystone Cutter's Guide for Dressmaking (1895) and Bertha Banner's Household Sewing with Home Dressmaking (1898) were consulted for context.
The ensemble consists of three pieces. Fabrics and decoration are restrained as Tess is a working-class woman of the 1890s. The five-gored pleated skirt, a necessity of standard women's attire in the increasingly athletic late-Victorian decade, was chosen for its ubiquity, and the black in respect to the social custom of extended mourning—Tess does, after all, commit murder, and witnesses her own fall from grace. The waistcoat is a masculine nod to her unfeminine approach to her own autonomy. A contemporary shirtwaist was foregone for an old-fashioned gathered shirt, as a hint of the suspension of disbelief inherent in novels.
Outline the construction…
The white linen shirt, based on 18th century sewing techniques courtesy of Bernadette Banner's September 2020 video and museum originals, was chosen for the development of my sewing techniques—worked entirely by hand with waxed thread, faux shell buttons, and felled seams. Admittedly early chronologically, the personal gain offset strict adherence to temporal limitations. A gusset at the top of the shoulder and cotton tape rectified armscye miscalculations and shifted gathered volume to the top of the shoulder in keeping with an early 1890's silhouette.
The Dreamstress' Historical Fantail Skirt was made of a lightweight black wool with a blue pinstripe. Worked by straight machine stitching, as was available on an 1891 domestic sewing machine, the long French seams and topstitching at the waistband enclosed seam allowances neatly. This skirt is a favourite daily wardrobe piece, as it was hemmed short enough to traverse stairs without lifting up! A small bustle pad (Bernadette Banner, June, 2019) and other skirts held the weight of the back pleats.
Black Snail Pattern's 1890's Ladies Vests View B was used for the waistcoat, and adjusted for winging scapulae with a shoulder dart. The waistcoat material was the same as the skirt, and fully lined with yellow crane-and-sakura cotton. The front lining was cut short, and required black piecing above the bottom front facing. I enclosed all seams so the waistcoat is fully reversible. Buttonholes were over-worked by hand, and the loose weave proved impossible for self-covered buttonholes, so these were replaced with black shanked buttons.
This is amazing, such a great job! I’d wear this regularly!
Oh the cut of this is just perfect!
Having adjective issues because I like it so much! Very lovely work.
This silhouette fits you very well! Love the vest shape♡
Looks really sharp and graceful! Well done!
The dress is lovely. It suits you very well.
I love Tess of the D’urbavilles in that way that you only can if you studied a book for English literature, I love your interpretation of her.
That waistcoat is everything! The shape and fit of it is awesome 🤩