The Tale of A Wedding: Clothing The Men

I like to think I am fully responsible for all that hotness, but lets face it...there's some good looking dudes right there...

I started with the simplest bit first. The Ties. I found the perfect for skinny tie pattern on Pinterest. Which can be found here. I used the pattern exactly as posted. But I completely scraped the instructions. Mainly because I didn't want to fully line the ties and the steps of construction just seemed plainly slow and impractical...I just lined the tips up about 2 inches, sewed it into a tube, and turned it. The only issue I had with this was the ties wanting to twist up a bit and not lay smooth and flat.
In hind sight...go with the original instructions. You'll end up with a more professional looking tie. 

For the vest we finally choose Vogue 7488, view A. We left off the upper welts and the bottom ones are actually faux. (This girl is not a fan of the things and seeing as they will likely not be worn again I didn't feel they were necessary.)

We found the vest material at Joann's. Its a Charcoal dapple suiting by Sew Classics. Got the buckles and buttons forms there as well (yay coupons). (Note to self - they don't have 1" buckles like the pattern calls for, but the 3/4" one works perfectly!)

I found it interesting to compare the construct and shape of these modern vests to the mid-nineteenth century ones I do.

The only real issue we had was with the blasted covered buttons popping apart the morning of, when the guys were getting ready...I had made several extras, but I wasn't on site when it was going on to be able to fix them so that was super stressful (^thus me arriving and kicking in to quasi freak mode. lol).

As you can probably observe the only alteration I had to make to the pattern was in a few cases adding length....Tall men...All of my guys were long distance, but one so that added a dose of fun for sure.

I was happy my work even with stood some playful, rough housing! ;)

I had all the pieces, but the grooms vest ,done about 2 weeks before the wedding. There was some complications with who was going to make the grooms vest and I ended up finishing the last half the *night before* the wedding around 11:30. Thank goodness for a helpful sister in law that could sew the buttons on while I ran off to write my maid of honor speech. I was saying never again at the time... lol I don't know when, if ever I've felt that stressed out. Definitely not a wise move waiting that last minute.

And there you have it!
All the wedding sewing completed. Next step seeing how it all came together...

What do y'all think of the more casual look for groomsmen? Is this something you would choose?

Love,
Brooke 

1860's hair style tutorial

Hey all!

 I thought I'd post a tutorial this evening. :)

Here's what I used to do the style. 1 hair band, 4 large pins, many bobby pins and fine wire ones. Of course you can modify this to your needs. :)

The Hair

This is the hair I used. Approximately 26" long. You can do it with pretty much any length. As long as you can get into a bun. Or at least a tiny ponytail upon which you will put a false chignon. :)



Separated hair.

  Step 1. Part the hair into 3 sections. (A center part is preferred for historical accuracy on the front sections. Although there is examples of side parts in CDV's.) You can make them any size depending on the look you want. Set the 2 front sections away for later. Step 2. Put the back section into a pony tail. This step is optional if you can get your hair into a bun without and it. That's great. :)

Step 3. Braid, rope, or twist the back section. Rope is shown. Securing the ends is optional. If pins hold it without it coming out that's fine.

Step 4. Coil the hair up into a chignon and secure it with pins. If you have very long or thick hair. I recommend putting pins in as you coil it up.

Step 5. Now its time to use the front section. Rope, braid, or twist the sections according to your tastes.

Step 6. Wrap them around the chignon and secure with fine pins. You can get a completely different look by putting the side sections under the chignon first rather then over...



Finished side view.



Another variation. I split the side sections in half and twisted them both.

For more elegance I draped the side sections over the chignon and curled/crimped them.

Side view of the curls...

I'm off to cleaning a freezer as well as the animal's water tank... :)

Best wishes,
Brooke