Starting a new project – male 13th century tunic for the “12th century wedding clothing project”

Today I have a new project for you – my very first 13th century male under-tunic project for my 12th century wedding clothing project. 😀

I already started this 13th century male under-tunic project several days ago. You can find a very first sneak peek at the tunic project in my recent “posting #200 since I restarted my blog…“.

Since this posting I have spent several hours working at the tunic. Though the rather thick linen fabric was rather reluctant to be hand-sewn, I just managed to finish the major seams of the tunic. 🙂

The gussets for the sleeves and the bottom gores are already sewn in. Just the sleeve ends, the neckline and the bottom are lacking a proper seam finishing. But though my fingers already start hurting from all the hand-sewing, I am not going to give up! 😉

I know, I have talked a lot about this 12th century wedding clothing project during the last year and already posted several of the awesome patches which I got per mail for my own 12th century wedding cloak project. But as the SCA event Gulf Wars (in March 2015) and our 12th century wedding is fast approaching, it is high time to start putting together the 12th century wedding clothing for me and my sweetheart.

Fortunately my awesome sister Bella is taking care of the creation of my 12th century wedding dress but putting together a 12th century wedding clothing for my sweetheart, 12th century tunics for his best men and my 12th century wedding cloak are still a demanding undertaking. 🙂

Yes, I admit it, I was procrastinating this very special project for some time now but due to running out of time soon, I decided to finally start it. Not that I didn’t use the recent time at all – I filled it with a lot of research about 12th century and 12th century clothing. All this recent research enables me now to start this 12th century clothing project for my sweetheart with much more confidence.

And now some pictures for you of the last and final fitting concerning the body part. Btw. on the picture above you can see my sweetheart kidding around during this last fitting. I am very glad that he didn’t hurt himself considering al the pins I used to hold the tunic parts together at this point. …and now to the fitting photos – enjoy! 😀

Ok, let’s start with the sneak peek of the too small version of this 13th century inspired tunic which I already posted in my recent posting “posting #200 since I restarted my blog…“.

The new and slightly bigger version of this tunic looks very alike. For the new tunic version I altered just the sleeves a little – he had far too much play at the sleeve end for my gusto. Therefore I shortened the width of the major sleeve rectangle and made the gusset a little bit bigger to substitute the reduced width.

I also had to add several inches of fabric to the body part but it payed off. The body part is now finally big enough that my sweetheart can move his arms in the tunic without any major restraints.

Still, after all the added fabric, he won’t be able to use this tunic for fighting but he is anyway not supposed to fight in it at all. *giggle* I am really glad that now it will suit him very well and fit nicely underneath every next layer which goes on top of it.

Btw. short side note – my sweetheart is not yet used to wear several layers but I hope I can get him accustomed to it. So this is not only the very first male 13th century under tunic I make, it is also the very first (hand-sewn) under tunic he gets. 😀

And though the tunic, which you can see on the picture above and underneath, is only pinned at the top where I attached the sleeves to the body part, I think that it already produces the right “wrinkles” at the shoulder and upper body part. And the further sewing process will tighten the tunic even a little bit more around his belly.

And before you ask – I already offered him to tighten the body part underneath the sleeves a little bit to make it more fitted but he refused. Well, I wonder why… *giggle*

At the picture on the right you can see the two parts of the sleeve and how great the sleeve works. When I first saw a picture of the extant tunic on which I based this project with this kind of sleeve in one of my recently acquired books, I was not really sure about what to think of it but I am very glad that I tried it out.

This very easy two part sleeve construction, which is after all so different from anything I have seen till now, works greatly and obviously allows very narrow and comfortable sleeves. This sleeves fit him greatly and I really can’t wait to also try some other sleeves styles I discovered throughout the last years for my next sewing projects.

Please excuse that I am once again using the sneak peek picture which I already posted in  “posting #200 since I restarted my blog…” but it shows the sleeves so nicely. This sleeve – as you can see on the picture above – only consists of two parts: a rectangular part on the top and a diamond shaped gusset at the bottom.

Unfortunately the picture of the extant tunic doesn’t allow a very close look at the sleeve construction and also doesn’t reveal if the gusset on the underside is one diamond shaped gusset or two triangles. Though the logic concerning fabric saving pattern construction would make me tend more towards the two triangle construction, I made the decision to go with the lazy girl inside of me and made the decision to use a diamond shape. I freely admit it.

However – triangles or diamonds – the sleeves work great! *happybounce*
…and now some additional sewing stitches and I will be able show you the tunic with the inserted side gores soon. 😀