I made an 1860’s ballgown for a LARP event set in the Victorian era.
The event took place in 1872, so technically I should have made a so-called ‘bustle dress’: a garment that has a large puff at the back, making it look as if you have a huge bottom. Nevertheless, I chose a style that was fashionable in the 1860s. Primarily because I simply find the oval shape of those dresses more beautiful. Moreover, I am slowly but surely collecting a complete 1860s wardrobe – I already have my wool day dress, summer dress, and swimsuit – and I loved the idea of having a matching ball gown!
Luckily, a somewhat old-fashioned costume was perfectly acceptable, as the organisers allowed us to wear clothing from 1850 to 1890. It actually suited my role as well, because I was playing a girl from a somewhat lower-class family, so there wasn’t much money for dresses in the latest fashion.
Below are some authentic Victorian ball gowns that I drew my inspiration from. Naturally, I also came across many super lavishly decorated dresses during my research, but there are also many fairly simple examples to be found. Obviously, you’ll see much more extreme models on the ‘fashion plates’ than you’ll find in museums. Just compare the fashion in our glossy magazines with what we actually wear on a night out – it was no different back then.
During the LARP event a lot of photos were taken, but unfortunately I forgot to ask for a portrait photo of me in my ball gown (I also wore a day dress). *Sniff*. So you’ll have to make do with poor amateur photos of the dress on a mannequin, which means it doesn’t really come across well – after all, I can’t put a corset on the mannequin, and this bodice has boning, so it doesn’t mold to the torso at all. Also, I can’t put the costume on by myself for a photo shoot at home, because the bodice fastens on the back…
While making this dress, my feelings bounced back and forth from “Oh no, this is never going to work out!” to “Hey, this is actually turning out pretty cool!” Especially once the lace was around the neckline, it made me happy. Even though that wasn’t planned this way at all. After I had sewn the sleeves to the bodice, it only then occurred to me that I actually should have sewn lace between the fabric and the lining right away. The style of the dress had been planned in advance, but at that moment I had absolutely no idea yet on how I wanted to decorate it.
The decoration really originated organically – At first I cast the piece of lace I had initially bought aside and replaced it with new lace, but on hindsight, it turned out to fit perfectly in between the new layers. The brown pleats are made of lining fabric, as I couldn’t find ribbon in the right color.
For the bodice, I used the Truly Victorian pattern TV442. I didn’t have a pattern for the skirt; I reused and altered pattern pieces I had hand-drawn for my other two skirts. In hindsight, I should have made the skirt a bit fuller.
Although the model is entirely authentic to the 1860s, it is not a re-enactment-quality costume. The materials are too modern for that. The lace is synthetic and the taffeta silk cost only 2 euros per meter(!), so it can’t be any good… And on top of that, it has machine-stitched embroidery! But it is perfectly fine for LARP and I was able to play and dance in it without any wardrobe malfunctions.
Time spent: 73 hours and 45 minutes
Costs: €72,78 (€16 for 8 meters of taffeta silk, €3 for 1 meter of decorative lining fabric, €34,30 for lace, and €19,48 for the pattern. I already had cotton for the lining, sturdy interfacing, boning, and hooks lying in my stock.)
So it’s a relatively cheap outfit (because of the modern fabrics and because I already had many things in stock), but took quite a while to sew, due to having to make all the lining, interlining, boning, pleating, gathering, decorations, and, of course, several oopsies that had to be fixed. 😉
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