Forepart

Navigation for this costume:
Introduction – Materials – Smock – Farthingale – Petticoat – Bodice – Skirtings – Rolled Sleeves – Overskirt – Forepart – Ruffs – Partlet and Sleeves – Jewelry making: Headdress; Necklace; Pelican Jewel; Sleeveband; Girdle; Wristbands; Fan – Finished gown – Funny Comments – Miss Starkie – Quiz

Forepart fabric

I started by ordering the fabric for the forepart. In the portrait, Elizabeth seems to wear a forepart made of cloth of gold decorated with what seems to be enameled Tudor Roses:

The least thing I wanted to do was having to start enameling something, but when looking at the Phoenix portrait:

I saw a forepart with a circular and cross design which much reminded me of something I had seen on Ebay:

(here is the seller, by the way – just in case that any of you didn’t know that particular Ebay store, which I almost doubt…)

So I bought two yards of that brocade. Even if I usually don’t like acetate brocades too much, but the pattern reminded me much of what can be seen of the Phoenix forepart. Plus, in this case the acetate fabric would not have any contact with my skin, so I thought I could use it.

Decoration of the forepart

(Remember? I’m making the forepart of the „Phoenix“ gown, not the actual „Pelican“ forepart. Here’s the picture again to remind you 😉 )

The joy! The joy!

In the meantime, while working on other parts of the gown, my fabric for the forepart had arrived. I have to say that I was *more* than positively surprised from the look and quality of that acetate brocade – the pictures in the auction really don’t do that fabric justice (though I still wouldn’t want to wear acetate fabric – no matter how nice it looks – right on my skin…).

Here’s a picture for you to compare the fabric with the forepart in the „Phoenix“ portrait above:

I cut a forepart and two narrow curved sleeves from the two yards I had bought, so that in case I should ever decide to wear the forepart with a different gown, I have matching sleeves.

Then I started decorating the forepart.

I used the already known filigree disks with green stones, half pearls (glued) and Swarovski topaz rhinestones (…just to add a little sparkle…) for the decoration. Due to the fact that my memory card was *still* broken at the time I received the fabric, here are just pictures of an already half decorated forepart….:

….and a full decorated forepart (here under a not-so-full-decorated overskirt, but with the girdle over it) shortly before finishing it…:

Then came the time when I discovered that I would not have enough disks with green stones for the complete gown – the rolled sleeves took up more disks than I estimated.
This is why I took the disks with green stones with which I had already decorated from the forepart to be able to attach them to the rolled sleeves.

Forepart pinned over petticoat without any disks, but with the half pearls and rhinestone decoration

So I started to re-decorated the forepart with disks with crystal stones – not a bad choice either I think because this makes the forepart (and the sleeves, which I will finish at a later point of time) better combinable with other garments that, perhaps, have no green in them at all.
However – after *starting* the decorating, it came to my mind that a forepart should be the best decorated piece of clothing. And I remember that I still had a sufficient amount of disks with *red* stones, and some golden crowns…

This was probably the moment when I got a little too excited and decorated my forepart – well, like an Elizabethan Madwoman.
*Raises brow* The Elizabethans didn’t know the saying ‚less is more‘, you know…? 😉

So this is the actually finished, sewn, decorated forepart pinned to the petticoat…:

…I can still take the golden disks with red stones off if I shouldn’t need them with another gown, right…? 😉

Now let me show you my ruffs.

Navigation for this costume:
Introduction – Materials – Smock – Farthingale – Petticoat – Bodice – Skirtings – Rolled Sleeves – Overskirt – Forepart – Ruffs – Partlet and Sleeves – Jewelry making: Headdress; Necklace; Pelican Jewel; Sleeveband; Girdle; Wristbands; Fan – Finished gown – Funny Comments – Miss Starkie – Quiz