Catherine the Great - Riding Habit

Here is my view of the "Russia and Catherine the Great" theme for Venice Carnival 2013.


I was looking for some uniform style, as I know that Catherine the Great loved this kind of dresses.
I found a "Catherine II's Uniform Dress Modelled after the Uniform of the Life-Guards Cavalry Regiment" picture on the State Hermitage Museum website.

Catherine II's uniform from the "State Hermitage Museum"

I really like : - the blue and red blending - the golden ribbons ornements - the colar

I dislike : - the length of the waistcoat - the overdress (on the right picture)

I found the perfect matching color for the skirt, and 2 different shades of blue for the waiscoat :
- a coton steel blue (??) fabric (on the left)
- a watered dark blue fabric (Prussian blue I guess) , used on the wrong side (on the right)

The watered fabric should have been the main fabric and the coton, the lining.

But after I've sewn the waistcoat bodice in both fabrics, I finaly decided to switch.

After searching for hours at the flea market, I found a beautiful golden metallic ribbon and I tried differents patterns to match the quantity I bought (How mindless I was to bought only 5 meters... :x)










Nevertheless, I had a big problem with the skirt pattern. I don't know why I didn't make it with the pattern I usually use. The (bad) result is : the skirt is too short on the back (really !! the petticoat is visible) and the front pleats don't fall gracefully :/

Here, a picture from Venice to show you the completed project :

 





The beautiful lace jabot was made by Evelyne Bouchard (her blog in french : http://evelynebouchard.e-monsite.com)


You will find more pictures here : Clic !

Arlecchina - Hand-painted Riding habit

Here is my view of the "Commedia dell'arte" theme for Venice Carnival 2013.

The first step was to choose a charater between all these women :

Main "Commedia dell'arte" female characters

Since the 1st time I went to Venice in 2010, I was dreaming of Arlecchina, the look of her costume and the colors.

In 2012, I bought a beautiful venitian mask, expecting that 2013 would be THE year for this costume.











I didn't want to patchwork the dress, I thought it was too long, too complicated for me so I decided... to paint it, how mad of me... !

Color testing

It took me one year to think about it, trying to find the best way to do and to think up the design (I didn't want to recreate the one on the picture but to make my personal interpretation)












About the pattern, first I wanted to use my usual JPRyan Ladies'Jacket with a laced up stomacher ; but after all I choose a Riding Habit shape and used the Rocking Horse Farm pattern.


On the waistcoat, I painted each color following 3 steps : securing the borders with removable adhesive tape, painting and removing tape.
I was terribly stressed at the first brushstroke because I don't have a gift for manual stuffs (except maybe for sewing... maybe)

Differents steps

On the skirt, the design was bigger so I used removable adhesive tape width as spacing between lines and triangles.

Before / After

Here, 2 pictures from Venice to show you the completed project :

© Novita Chondro Beytrison

© Luc Morel