Emily Harris

Emily is a costumer from Essex, England, who made this beautiful Elizabethan gown to wear at various reenactment and dance events. This is her very first costuming project, and the most amazing thing to me is that she made the entire gown by hand! I'm always blown away by these dedicated hand-sewers! I also love the subdued colors she chose for the gown, and the dainty embellishments on the neckline and hat add such a pretty touch. Emily sent a wonderful description of how she became involved in costuming and how the dress was made, and you can also find links to two more pictures by reading the passage below. If you would like to contact Emily, you can reach her at emilyjharris(at)blueyonder(dot)co(dot)uk.

I got into the whole Tudor-dress-up thing about this time last year when I took part in an educational reconstruction at my local Tudor manor, Ingatestone Hall. Local school children are invited in dress up and come along to take part in the workings of the house for a day, learning about cooking, rabbit-catching, sword-fighting and (for the lucky girls who get to be in the Lady's Maid group) costumes and make-up. We also throw in a bit of the actual history of the house, it being the chief residence of trusted advisor to Elizabeth II, Lord William Petre. It was also the house where the queen held Lady Catherine Grey under house arrest due to her disobedience in getting married without the Queen's consent, and also her being a dangerous rival to the thrown, as the younger sister of 9-day queen Jane.

I started by playing the part of Lady Catherine Grey for 2 weeks and immediately got the bug and went looking for the opportunity for more. Unfortunately we don't seem to have the whole "ren-faire" phenomenon very much over here in the UK, but after asking around a bit I found a group called "Dance Royal" who travel round the South East area of England, performing historical dance at halls and manor houses when open to the public. I started by borrowing costumes from other members but almost instantly wanted to create one of my own.

Having had practically no dress-making experience, I thought it best to start with an evening class and, upon showing my somewhat bemused teacher some initial sketches of what I wanted to do, she advised that I start by using a pattern rather than trying to draft my own immediately. You can see the finished results in the attached photos, of which I'm incredibly proud. The bottom half of the dress uses the Simplicity "Shakespeare in Love" pattern but, after doing a bit of research I realized that the shape of the top half of the pattern was completely wrong for the period and so, with the help of Drea Leed's corset Pattern Generator, set about creating my own corset and bodice. I cheated a bit by using a machine for the undergarments, but everything you see on the outside is completely hand sewn.

For the dress design I used loads of ideas that I picked up from your Featured Attyre site and the final product has, consequently turned to be a bit of a pan-euro mix of styles. The shape of the farthingale is Spanish, the sleeves loosely based on the French/Italian style and the overall look is one of around the 1560's. From starting research to completion of the gown it has taken me almost exactly a year.

The photos which you see attached are of the dress's debut last weekend at a place called Otley Hall in Suffolk. I have also included some of the other members of Dance Royal so that you can see the other exquisite costumes. Unfortunately my chief photographer on the day (aka my Mum) didn't manage to get a good close up of the back of the dress so I've added one from its half-completed stage, showing the side-lacing that I used for both reasons of vanity and practicality. I'd noticed by watching the film "Elizabeth" that this lacing technique gives a much nicer fit, but also that, not having a maid, I'd need to be able to get into the dress myself. I found the task much easier if I could actually reach the laces myself without contortions worthy of a circus performer.