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abendgulesThe Tudor Child, written by Jane Huggett and Ninya Mikhaila, ed Jane Malcolm-Davies, is a delight. My copy arrived this week because I ordered in advance for a small discount. What a treat!
The same careful research, beautiful photos and well chosen examples go into this book as the previous ones, with a quick review of techniques familiar from the Tudor Tailor and the servants' books. It's the same page count and size as the Tudor Tailor - apparently it grew in the writing, from a small book to a sturdy one and took longer to assemble than planned.
Some highlights:
- photos of Ninya in two different high-Elizabethan outfits, non-pregnant and then at 7 months pregnant, to illustrate how existing outfits were modified to accommodate pregnancy (looser lacing, new plackets and stomachers) - she looks just like the portraits of pregnant women.
- photo series illustrating how to swaddle an infant (under 3 months) and the result is exactly as shown in portraits, with the baby looking eerily like a lifesize doll. Beautiful. The discussion of swaddling and of toilet training, is intriguing. Great outline of a 16th c layette set.
- wonderfully thorough study of surviving portraiture and accounts, to support their discussion of what you dressed children in - what was considered the minimum requirements for even the poorest children. They now divide the discussion into lower, middle, and elite class needs. When you dress boys and girls the same, you can only distinguish them in portraits by their accessories - hats, belts, swords, and kerchiefs. For some portraits w/out named sitters, they just describe the figures as 'infant' or 'child', because there's no real telling them apart.
- Great quotes from the Lisle letters, of the 'tween' daughter (around 13) being fostered in Paris, writing to ask for money for 'things that you just don't need when living in England, but you, like, *totally* need if you're living in France'.
- pictures illustrating all the sets of clothes, including Master Paul's love-child! a boy dressed in tweedy breeches, woolly hose, a blue doublet and a flat cap. All he needs is a high-pitched giggle.
- knitting patterns! for hose with garter-stitch heels, a shirt (like the one in MoL, or in the painting of the Madonna knitting in the round), caps and mittens - a different mitten than the one in MoL! I was thrilled to see a different mitten option for knitters. All the items are very fine-gauge. I haven't read the patterns closely yet but am looking forward to doing so, because I have acres of double-knitting yarn to use up.
The patterns and line drawings look familiar from previous books (hose, doublets, gowns, kirtles) but are new - scaled to childrens' bodies and shapes.
The elite clothing patterns includes two of the best known Elizabethan child outfits: Edward Tudor as a boy, and Elizabeth Tudor as a teenager, in their respective finery.
And for those in the costume and filk-fan-con world - Teddy has a credit, as he and Ninya designed the fashion doll on the cover. I saw the doll, in fact, at Teddy and Tom's place, not realising it would be so prominent in the book. And there's a pattern for it.
Overall, the pictures of children in the reconstructions are a delight - a balance between careful sober portraits, imitating the originals, and children laughing and being children. The back cover shows a detail of a beautiful bodice and skirt on a child...who has her thumb in her mouth.
My only reservations - and these are quite small, given how much I like the book:
- the authors cite the 1560 Breugel painting 'children's games' several times - I wish there'd been one, single illustration of the whole painting. There are detail pics of different figures, but I'd love to see the whole.
- I've love a list of suppliers, to find out who provided what materials. The silks, brocades and velvets are just sumptuous, and I don't think I've ever seen the equivalent, so I'd love to know where to find them. Presumeably if you're a Tudor Tailor follower you know a lot of suppliers already, but I almost want cites at the bottom of the picture like in fashion magazines: Silk by Chatelaine silks, linen by Classic Textiles, hair model's own...
If you like clothes, knitting, or children, or some combination of these - it's worth the price of the book to have for yourself.
The same careful research, beautiful photos and well chosen examples go into this book as the previous ones, with a quick review of techniques familiar from the Tudor Tailor and the servants' books. It's the same page count and size as the Tudor Tailor - apparently it grew in the writing, from a small book to a sturdy one and took longer to assemble than planned.
Some highlights:
- photos of Ninya in two different high-Elizabethan outfits, non-pregnant and then at 7 months pregnant, to illustrate how existing outfits were modified to accommodate pregnancy (looser lacing, new plackets and stomachers) - she looks just like the portraits of pregnant women.
- photo series illustrating how to swaddle an infant (under 3 months) and the result is exactly as shown in portraits, with the baby looking eerily like a lifesize doll. Beautiful. The discussion of swaddling and of toilet training, is intriguing. Great outline of a 16th c layette set.
- wonderfully thorough study of surviving portraiture and accounts, to support their discussion of what you dressed children in - what was considered the minimum requirements for even the poorest children. They now divide the discussion into lower, middle, and elite class needs. When you dress boys and girls the same, you can only distinguish them in portraits by their accessories - hats, belts, swords, and kerchiefs. For some portraits w/out named sitters, they just describe the figures as 'infant' or 'child', because there's no real telling them apart.
- Great quotes from the Lisle letters, of the 'tween' daughter (around 13) being fostered in Paris, writing to ask for money for 'things that you just don't need when living in England, but you, like, *totally* need if you're living in France'.
- pictures illustrating all the sets of clothes, including Master Paul's love-child! a boy dressed in tweedy breeches, woolly hose, a blue doublet and a flat cap. All he needs is a high-pitched giggle.
- knitting patterns! for hose with garter-stitch heels, a shirt (like the one in MoL, or in the painting of the Madonna knitting in the round), caps and mittens - a different mitten than the one in MoL! I was thrilled to see a different mitten option for knitters. All the items are very fine-gauge. I haven't read the patterns closely yet but am looking forward to doing so, because I have acres of double-knitting yarn to use up.
The patterns and line drawings look familiar from previous books (hose, doublets, gowns, kirtles) but are new - scaled to childrens' bodies and shapes.
The elite clothing patterns includes two of the best known Elizabethan child outfits: Edward Tudor as a boy, and Elizabeth Tudor as a teenager, in their respective finery.
And for those in the costume and filk-fan-con world - Teddy has a credit, as he and Ninya designed the fashion doll on the cover. I saw the doll, in fact, at Teddy and Tom's place, not realising it would be so prominent in the book. And there's a pattern for it.
Overall, the pictures of children in the reconstructions are a delight - a balance between careful sober portraits, imitating the originals, and children laughing and being children. The back cover shows a detail of a beautiful bodice and skirt on a child...who has her thumb in her mouth.
My only reservations - and these are quite small, given how much I like the book:
- the authors cite the 1560 Breugel painting 'children's games' several times - I wish there'd been one, single illustration of the whole painting. There are detail pics of different figures, but I'd love to see the whole.
- I've love a list of suppliers, to find out who provided what materials. The silks, brocades and velvets are just sumptuous, and I don't think I've ever seen the equivalent, so I'd love to know where to find them. Presumeably if you're a Tudor Tailor follower you know a lot of suppliers already, but I almost want cites at the bottom of the picture like in fashion magazines: Silk by Chatelaine silks, linen by Classic Textiles, hair model's own...
If you like clothes, knitting, or children, or some combination of these - it's worth the price of the book to have for yourself.
