Other goings-on, recent weekends and bits

Happily Robert has started a new job this week, with an actual office to go to - short commute by bike to Clerkenwell. This is a relief both financially, and getting out of the startup he'd been contracting for. Just listening to Robert talking to the startup boss made me realise that some grown men, even accomplished ones, cannot hear good advice when it's given them.

More pleasantly, April included a weekend chez jpgsawyer and edith_hedingham to help paint their pavilion, which promises to be splendidly medievally gaudy, and a fine couple of meals in good company with them, maryf and Fionn, and Master Paul.

In my gradual return to activity, I've been doing some modern sewing following a pattern(!) - I've made myself trousers for the first time, following a pattern, plus the advice in Pants for Real People. 

This is essentially an all-new experience for me: I took a stab at pattern-based sewing when I first got a sewing machine in university (now, effectively, a generation ago) but just couldn't get excited about it, with all the 'extra' steps I couldn't see the point to. Making medieval stuff was fun, but making work clothes was, well, work.

Now, as a more experienced sempstress, I see the value in taking 'extra' steps in setting up and finishing work; adding things like interfacing is no big deal, whereas at one time it was a saga. I also now know enough when to follow instructions, and when to ignore them. And I'm resigned to some ripping out, reworking, unpicking; it just happens as part of the creative process.

The fitting method in the book tests the pattern in tissue first carefully, then modifies the pattern, then cutting fabric, followed by testing the pinned-together trousers, before committing to sewing up, and gives a lot of tips that I wish patterns came with (ie. not just 'do this' but 'why to do this').

And the whole point of the book is to demonstrate how to tailor modern patterns to fit your shape; if the paper pattern is doing X (sagging, pulling, not covering you!) then you need to change Y to improve the fit.

It also has lots of mods: adding assorted styles of pockets (trousers without some place for your phone and pass are a PITA), changing waistband styles are just the easy ones.

And the book's models are frankly more Rubenesque and asymmetrical than me! which is heartening.

The only drawback is the plugs for the authors' proprietary products in the book - their own multisize patterns, graph pattern paper, narrow interfacing, Scotch tape, etc etc. OTOH...well, they do this for a living.

While I was laying out trouser fabric, Robert spent part of the long weekend bashing at an old steel clamshell gauntlet of mine, to make it into an absolutely bombproof C&T hand protection for a crosshilt sword (latter also bodged together with a rattan hilt on a Hanwei practical rapier). 

The gauntlet was never quite the right shape for me for armoured fighting, but looks like it will serve very well for C&T.

I was uneasy persuing C&T further than authorisation without decent hand protection - and alarmed at the crappy light hand protection other people were using for C&T at Double wars last year - basically padded gloves and prayer. I value my hands more than that.

So now I'm partway there - one hand ready, one more to go. 

Hoping to hear soon if there's to be any fencing at Coronation in Arnimetsa, and if there is, can I squeeze both my Tudor outfit and fencing kit into one suitcase?

A surprising tourist visit: foundling museum

While my mum was here Robert and I wanted to find something of interest to her to see, that was new to us too, and we settled on the Foundling Hospital, which dates from the 18th century. I hadn't realised that the organisation still existed as a modern charity called Coram, dedicated to vulnerable children, nor did I know the details of its founding patrons, Hogarth and Handel. Handel actually dedicated the fees from performances of the Messiah to the hospital. 

There's a similar foundation in Amsterdam; children taken in, given shelter, food, clothing, and trained for modest trades or for service. 

The striking difference was the dates: the orphanage in Amsterdam dates from the end of the 16th c, where it takes London (or rather a few rich Londoners) another 200 years to decide to do something about poor children.

There was also a distinction in motivations, at least as I read it: the city of Amsterdam cared for its own, and saw a responsibility as a community to care for orphans. It was a social privilege to aid them, just as it was a social privilege to be part of the city watch. There may have been a streak of piety in it, but it's rarely mentioned in the museum - it's just what you do as part of the city. (Outside the city, mind, you were probably on your own.)

For the London hospital, the founders are moved partly by Christian charity, and partly by the hatred of waste; one of the founders had lived in the American colonies, which were wide open to expansion at the time, and needed fresh young bodies to work land, build, do trades. It offended him to see London children's lives effectively wasted because of poverty and lack of opportunity. He wanted them trained so they'd be available as colonists.

So it was like a free-market version of 'doing the right thing', rather than a community commitment.

One happy addition to the hospital was an exhibit of Quentin Blake's artwork (now closed). Blake is associated with Roald Dahl's books. This display was of commissions for hospitals and institutions: one for a children's hospital, one for a treatment centre for eating disorders, one for a seniors' centre, one for a maternity ward. 

And I found there's a joyfulness in Blake's art, that is hard to resist. Generally I don't bother with art after 1600 (unless it's by friends). But his free, cheery, enthusiastic drawings made me smile just looking at them - you can't help it. 

I loved the kids' hospital series, where children were visiting planet Zog, and the Zoggians were looking after children, and equally being examined and cared for by kids - having their alien spots examined, being put to bed in a tree, reading books together. 

I knew you could make beautiful things; I didn't realise you could make things that made you feel better in this way.

If there's a display of Blake's work anywhere near you...I recommend it.