Project: Polonaise- Part 6, The Petticoat

During the 1700's women would wear quilted petticoats in order to smooth out their silhouette over the false rump or panniers. This was also a sign of status, earlier in the century rich, fashionable women would sometimes wear their gowns with a visible petticoat (as in the picture below) and so they were often made of silk. As the character for my polonaise costume was a rich lady I decided that I too had to make the petticoat out of silk.

I based the pattern for the petticoat on several historical examples including one from the Kelingrove museum in Glasgow and another from the Killerton Fashion Collection. The fabric I chose was silk backed satin from Beckford Silk in Duck Egg Blue. The petticoat would be quilted with wadding and backed with calico that had been used to make a mock-up of the petticoat. This helped economically as I didn't have to buy lining fabric as well as helping me time-wise during the run up to Christmas.

Petticoat From The Kelingrove Museum in Glasgow

Petticoat From The Killerton Fashion Collection

As the costume was being made as if it was for a film set I was able to quilt the petticoat on the machine instead of by hand as would have been done historically. At first I pinned the layers together and, following the outline I had drawn on the calico lining, began to quilt. Unfortunately I found that due to the weight of the panels the teeth of the machine were leaving marks on the fabric. This meant I had to tack the quilting pattern onto the silk before it could be quilted. As there were six panels this took an annoyingly long time.

The panels were quilted using a walking foot and the front and back sections stitched together. It was essentially like making a couple of blankets.

The side seams were stitched together, leaving  gap for the pocket slits which were then bound.

The side seams were pressed open and the raw edges bound with tape. The covered edges were then slip stitched to the inside of the petticoat so they would lie flat.

The petticoat was then pleated up and the waistband stitched on and hemmed.

At that point I though I was done with this garment and was all ready to move onto the dress...My tutor thought otherwise, she thought that that the petticoat was to full at the front and would have ruined the appearance of the over-petticoat. In order to solve this problem some of the excess fabric was removed by taking width from the centre front and side panels. Darts were also added into the side panels (please don't kill me) which were then hidden when the front half of the petticoat was re-pleated with slightly larger pleats in order to further smooth out the centre front section of the silhouette. Darts are 100% NOT historically accurate and it killed me slightly to put them in. However as the pleating hides them quite nicely I sometimes forget they are there and, as the purpose of the costume was for a film, not a museum re-enactment I don't think it's too great a crime.

Altering the side seams

Adding the darts (sob!)

The petticoat did look a lot neater once this was done.

So that's all of the underpinnings posted! next up is the wig for part 7