Christine Shamblin

I am absolutely thrilled to showcase this family of fashionable Germans! The Shamblins are part of a German Landsknecht reenactment group, and Christine made all of these outfits on a very reasonable budget. All of her hard work has really paid off--this is one well-dressed family! She has also been kind enough to share wonderful detailed descriptions of all of the outfits, and you can also find links to additional pictures and their group website in the write-up below th picture. If you have any other questions or comments, you can email Christine at mshambli(at)insight.rr.com.

For our family of Landsknechte I studied German portraits (primarily Lucas Cranach the elder) and woodcuts (Jost Amman). All of the costumes are made from 100% cotton duck, broadcloth, and muslin that I purchased from bargain tables for $1.00 and $2.00 per yard. It isn't exactly authentic, but it fits my budget!

It's hard to see each individual outfit in the group photo, but individual photos can be found at www.battle.at/katzbalger in the Photos/2002 Season/Ohio Renaissance Festival section.

My gown is inspired by the garments in paintings such as Cranach's Portraits of Henry the Pious, Duke of Saxony and his wife Katharina von Mecklenburg and Portrait of a Woman 1526 (online at http://gallery.euroweb.hu/index1.html) and Hunting near Hartenfels Castle (online at http://www.clevelandart.org/Explore/work.asp?accno=1958.425). The gown has a side back spiral lacing and detachable paned sleeves. The tabbed shoulder rolls are attached to the bodice. It's easy to get into if I lace it loosely first, but I get a stiff neck unlacing! The characteristic bands of trim are made from scraps of fabric in contrasting colors. I am wearing it with a low-necked frauenhemd (chemise) with machine-embroidered blackwork cuffs, and a goller (partlet) with a blackwork neckband. The barett (hat) is an oversized Tudor flat cap made from felt and buckram. The brim is slashed and stuffed with silk scraps, and it is decorated with ostrich feathers. I am also wearing a blackworked haarhaube (coif) under the barett.

Our daughter's gown is similar to mine, without the sleeves. She is not wearing her goller and her frauenhemd has a blackworked band at the neckline. Instead of a hat (which she won't keep on), she wears a young girl's haarband which I made from a piece of purchased embroidered ribbon (since I ran out of time to do my own embroidery). There is a section on this headwear (and a lovely picture) in Textiler Hausrat (Jutta Zander-Seidel, Deutscher Kunstverlag, 1990).

My husband's outfit is drawn from parts of several Jost Amman woodcuts (293 Renaissance Woodcuts for Artists and Illustrators, Dover Publications, 1968) of Landsknechte and other military figures. The style is from late in the Landsknechte era, and features pluderhosen instead of the tighter fitting slashed pants. I had no pattern for these, so I studied the woodcuts carefully and then modified a toreador pants pattern to get the look I wanted through the seat. Several months later I got a copy of Janet Arnold's Patterns of Fashion and found that what I came up with was remarkably similar to the pluderhosen pattern from the Svante Sture suit. Go figure... I made him an "authentic" codpiece from Patterns of Fashion, but it's a little too anatomically correct for him, so the codpiece he wears is just two triangles sewn together and lightly stuffed. It is slashed with silk "bows" pulled through the slashes. The wams (doublet) is slashed all over the body so the lining shows through. This was my first attempt at slashing, and I made a facing for each slash to prevent it from raveling out. I'm not sure I'd do it that way again though. The sleeves are paned, and are stitched into tabbed rolls at the shoulder and cuff and stuffed with silks. The panes are fastened together with small bows just above the elbow. He wears a plain white hemd (shirt) with blackworked collar band and cuffs.

Both of our sons wear baggy sort of Venetian style pants (also a style from the Jost Amman woodcuts), with characteristic stripes and parti-colored legs. They are actually just elastic waist clown pants, although instead of elastic I faced the waistbands and pleated them down to the necessary size. The red leg on our older son's pants is slashed with a blue lining. This time I experimented with slashing by making extremely long machine buttonholes (I was inspired by the close up photo of the pinked doublet in Patterns of Fashion - it looks like buttonhole edging to me!)

Our older son's wams was an attempt at a more authentically constructed, early era Landsknecht doublet. I stitched together panels of yellow and blue fabric, cut and faced a neck opening, sloped the shoulder seams and stitched up the underarm seams. The paned sleeves lace onto a lacing strip inside the armhole openings.

Our younger son wears a simple wams with paned sleeves. It's actually a hand-me down from a friend, but I lined it and slashed the body. This time I painted fabric glue where I wanted to slash, let it dry and slashed away. Hmmm... no hemming needed. I think I like this method. He's outgrown it now anyway, so he gets a new outfit for next year - made using everything I've learned so far!

By the way, the slashed gauntlets on the gloves are pseudo-suede lined with cotton and attached to cheap calfskin work gloves. They were just for fun!