At Her Leisure

I finished my knitted corset. It's knit from a pattern printed in Harper's Bazar in 1868. Here's the Ravelry page.

It wound up something of a loser. Not really knowing how it was supposed to come out, I went ahead and knitted the whole thing as given. I chose my gauge based on the length of my mid-19th century corset, which is about 13" long at the center front. This ended up just a little shorter, but that doesn't seem to have been quite the right method of selecting a gauge. While the waist fits round me reasonably well with some tension on the buttons, I think the whole thing was supposed to be longer. The straps make for a snug armhole, which is right for the period and is how the picture on the pattern looks, but it means that the whole thing is pulled up so that the waist is on my rib cage. It flares for the hips above my actual waist so it gets pretty loose there and ends just below my natural waist, which is admittedly rather high. I went ahead and took a dart in it that eliminated the center back gore entirely, which made it better through the waist/high hip.

From walking around it in for about a quarter-hour yesterday, it seemed somewhat supportive, but I didn't wear it all that long and didn't do anything even remotely energetic. This evening I wore it for a couple of hours, and it wasn't uncomfortable, but it didn't really serve its purpose either. Here are pictures:



( More pictures... )

Had I to do it over again, I would gauge for a 16" center front length and reduce the rows rather substantially to compensate for the added breadth that would give. I'm unlikely to make another one since I never did know what I was going to do with it. Oh, well, at least the dress I finished early this week was a success. You can't win them all.

I finished knitting the body and straps of my 1868 corset. I need to sew the buttons on to see exactly what I need to do to it, but I can definitely say that it's too big and that it's very high-waisted. I know that the fashionable waist in 1868 was slightly above the natural waist, but think this takes it a little further than that. After I have buttons on it, I'll decide whether the straps need to be lengthened and where it needs to be taken in. I'm not going to knit the edging around the neck until that point.

In the meantime, here's a picture laid flat because the dummy is inaccessible. My tape measure is also inaccessible so I can't get measurements just yet.

I did a lot more knitting over the weekend than I would have expected and now only have twenty rows left to finish the body of my 1868 knitted corset. Barring anything unexpected, I'll be finished with the body and into the straps this week. With only eleven stitches to a row in the straps, they should go fairly quickly. On the other hand, the neck edging will probably be a pain because I don't think 300+ stitches will fit on one 10" needle. It was hard enough to keep 127 from sliding off the needle.

I'm still working exclusively on my 1868 knitted corset, but I made good progress this week. I'm through the first hip gore on the second half of the corset. Those eighty plain rows seemed interminable, but they did terminate. My longest plain stretch now is only thirty-one rows, and I'm a third of the way through that.

I'm halfway around the body of my 1868 knitted corset. The back gores are finished and now I have the monotony of eighty plain rows ahead of me. Two down, seventy-eight to go!

It's very depressing ripping out 150 out of 360 rows of knitting. My stocking got much shorter.

On the other hand, I got the the first bust gore on the current iteration of my 1868 knitted corset today. So far it looks like #3 thread on size 0 needles will work. At least the length seems right. The breadth is yet to be determined.

We should be finished with the house by this time next month, and then I'll have free time again. I hope!

I worked a little bit on a few things this week. I am about a third of the way through knitting my 1877 blue (or green) bag and got far enough in my 1849 stockings to determine that small woman though I may be, I'm not quite small enough for Esther Copley's "small-sized stocking." I've started over with the "full-sized stocking with widening for the calf," though I strongly suspect I won't be doing any widening. Actually, I think I'll wind up somewhere between the small size and the full size. Anyway, I'm still in the ribbing so it'll be awhile before I have enough to tell. Still, it's started, and that's the important thing.

Then I finished knitting the swatches for a knitted corset from an 1868 pattern. Once I finish the blue bag and fanchon hood, I intend to start knitting that. Of course, knitting plans do have a tendancy to change by the time I'm actually ready for a new project!

I also sewed this week. I worked on my 1868 green silk dress for a few evenings. I think the bodice is ready for piping and checking my sleeve pattern again. Plus the waist on the skirt is set. I think I'll do the faced hem on it this week and have finished with the skirt construction. After the bodice is put together, I'll start the miles of trim.

Finally, I worked on my cross-stitch garters. They're slow, but they move along.