I tie-dyed an 18th century dress (Bonus: How to sew a Chemise a la Reine!) 

I was waiting for a greatful dead comment 😂

😂😂😂

Ajxhoqfhkdbqk 😂

I don't get it but it's still a little funny...

Ok, now I get it...

That would be SO pretty! 😍

Omg yes! That'd be amazing

I had the same thought when she was lounging on the grass!

The Strawberry Dress...but make it 18th Century.

The only word that came to mind when I read this comment was “delicious”. That garment sounds delightful 🥰😍

Yes. Perfect description.

Yes. Exactly this feeling. Nothing more relatable than staring at an art project or sewing thing and going "enhh... Okay it's not the plan but it's fine. We'll make it work".

Question; what is soda ash?

@@damariszapata017 Google it! (This isn't meant to be mean, I'm just saying Google has good info on it)

​@Damaris Zapata it's the fixative when dying cotton type fabrics. It comes in all the pre-packaged tie dye kits.

Same.

10/10 here for the puns.

My husband would totally be with you, here!

I was totally nodding too!

saaame

lmao same 😅

I sort of feel like it might be the point. The mistakes weren't seen by Morgan, a highly experienced seamstress, until later. When she highlights those mistakes, its already that she has seen the effect of the mistake. No-one, no matter how long you've been sewing is immune to mistakes. And showing the mistakes when they are made, and explaining the effects that the particular mistake caused, and how the plans had to be adapted afterwards, can be very helpful, to inexperienced dressmaker, cause they can avoid those pitfalls, knowing that these are the places Morgan made her mistakes.

Look at many classical female portraits of the era, 1789 and earlier, since the French Revolution happened then and sort of curtailed this type of extravagant fashion. That's where the ideas come from. Morgan's version is the best way to make these dresses that I've seen so far. Many I have seen look to be a tad over complicated. Perhaps that's just my perception of them. Anyway, when you make yours, just have fun. I know I will!

Honestly I thought a lot like her when I was 8 ^u^ I loved old fashioned dresses too, and I was really into fashion as a kid, and I still am. In fact, I wanted to be a designer for dress up games but with flash going away it kind of ruined my chance

Make your own! My mother's standard play dress for all her daughters (raised in the era when girls wore dresses to play in, not shorts & t-shirts) was very similar without the ruffled neckline or ruffled sleeves. Just 2 lengths of white cotton seersucker, hemmed up the sides with adequate for that child "armhole" openings in side seam, seamed across top for shoulders about the distance from shoulder to side of neck, hem bottom, bind neck edge with colorful bias tape & insert 1/4" elastic - try on child & draw up elastic to make appropriate size neck opening, while on child, mark for waistline, sew colorful (maybe different color) bias tape on outside at marked waistline, insert more 1/4" elastic and draw up to fit. Make it a bit long so that as child grows over the summer, mom could add another line of bias tape/elastic to waist. White can be bleached clean when tomboys like me get it filthy and good quality bias tape doesn't lose its color in the process. Great play dresses! She bought that white seersucker by the bolt. NO sleeves ... just press the selvedge back & stitch it down at the armhole.

@@derrith1877 I love that story! I'm interested to compare it to my own family experience, because I am not young, and my mother is even not-younger (in her 80s), and she and her sisters wore jeans and pedal-pushers and bermuda shorts to play in as kids in the late 40s/early 50s. Those playdresses sound super comfortable though; I'd like to make one now!

Yeah! And in those days, purple dye is soooooo expensive, since synthetic purple dye doesn't exist yet. This could've been the next historical fashion fad.

Yes!! It's not about historical details accuracy, it's about historical mindset accuracy lololol

Ofc they would. Have you SEEN some of the colour combinations used historically? And remember, mostly those pieces have faded substantially since they were made. They'd have loved tie dye back in the day and frankly, had they had access to today's bright dyes, I'm pretty sure they'd have had great fun, tastefulness be damnned lol

catz Keet ofc I’ve SEEN and I LOVED it. 😂

@@Cationna I LOVE that|! Not historically accurate, but accurately historically spirited

an English lady living in Japan and making her clothes with whats available. Or an Indian Gentleman in London.....🤯

Probably, especially those of them who moved into the court fashion business. You know a few aristocratic ladies, maybe starting with MA herself would love some of our modern techniques.

I 100% agree with you

WITH A VIOLET BROOCH.

Thats adorable and I love it. Yes.

Puffed sleeves!❤️

YESSSs

You know, if you combined Bernadette Banner's recent 18th century "pirate" shirt with Morgan's tie dye concept, you could end up with a fun project to do with your son.

Hes already asking about a "Sheesh ala rainbow" (hes 4). Im just not super confident in my skills to make one. But the pirate shirt might be an option.

@@Fireflyhaven It's just a bunch of rectangles sewn together with some gathers. It's supposed to be somewhat big and puffy so it may fit him for awhile. I'm not super confident in my sewing either so I'm making my first skirt out of an old bedsheet just to figure out what I'm doing. That's always an option as bedding can go for 1-5 dollars at thrift stores (and the cheap crap at walmart is really good for mock ups if your thrift stores are closed, nice sheets are slippery and hard to work with).

@@Fireflyhaven You could also make such a victorian children frock for him and then dye it together with him. Would be a nice light garment for play. www.victorianlondon.org/cassells/cassells-15.htm

@@carmenclemons2556 a good lesson for kids im told, is never be afraid to try to do or make something new, something your not sure of....and we learn from our trials and mistakes....

YES!!!

You got that one! Too many people have lost their whimsey and sense of fun! This is a time to step outside the box and take a deep breath. We will come back with a deeper appreciation of LIFE!

+

Apple Pie I will as soon as I’m finished working through the panic attack I had after reading the title. 🥴

Yum, Rainbow Sherbet deliciousness!

Autocorrect changed cloud to could....😳

Funtastic, if you will

That’s a lovely idea!!! I might make one in green myself. I think making it a fun color (or tie-dye) is a great way to wear something you love from the past while adding a personal flair.

While the vast majority shifts, smocks, chemises and shirts have been plain white, dyed ones did exist in the past as well. For example, of the two linen shifts found in medieval graves in Uvdal stave church in Norway, at least one of them had been dyed red. The context of the find (the cut and quality of the other garments on the body as well as the fact that it was buried under the church floor rather than in the cemetery outside it) indicates that this was someone of fairly high status.

They would make °o° and then ask you where you got all those amazing colours from.

Scandalous!! YES!!!

I just pictured that in my head, and it was absolutely hilarious...

Well considering the Chinese have been tie-dying since about the 10th century for royality. You could claim to have encountered a Royal entourage from China in your travels and were intrigued by the style .

@@angeliquephillips8746 if i ever time travel i will keep this in mind

Oooo, that would be fantastic! Tie-dye or not, I can't wait to see!

@@MorganDonner ....it might be a good way to use a wearable mock-up for the first 18th century shirt I make, that way I won't sweat any minor mess ups. Thanks for the inspiration! :D

Who else has been doing it? I may need to binge a bunch of videos

Glad I'm not the only one! I was also thinking of maybe trying this out with a waistcoat!

I think it sounds like a great use for wearable mockups!

Omg thats such a good idea!

Absolutely! Didn't even think of it, now I have a new project :D

A pride parade? What is that and for what?

@@amalieshelby a pride parade is a celebration parade most cities hold in pride month

@@myfirstgirlfriendturnedint2524 wtf is a pride month?

I'm tempted to send it to Amber Butchard in Twitter. She's a fashion historian who made a show about Marie Antoinette's Chemise portrait.

10/10 CHEMISE A LA REINBOW, 200% ACCURACY

Bernadette Banner i love this

SHE ACTUALLY REPLIED HAHAHA

Maybe it's an unpopular opinion but I feel historical dress is plenty eye-catching as it is, and today's fashion to be more bland and uninspiring. If you ask me, the "modern eye" is lacking in a lot

serendipidus1 I don’t know what a cocoon dress was so I googled it and I don’t really like it at all. It just looks careless and sloppy and has no silhouette whatsoever. I like something with a cinched waist, for a start.

Amanda Leigh Bump - I have shibori-ed scarves already - doing a Chemise or Chemise á la Reine is a superb idea!!

I've "played" with natural pigments and I'd love to experiment with indigo but I don't know where to start. Any tips on resources (ingredients + info)? Much appreciated. ❤️

@@mariagmartinho The Jacquard Ingigo tie-dye kit is great. It comes with everything you need for a small vat. I used the kit to dye shirts for my class, plus some wool yarn to knit a scarf!

serendipidus1 I’m not an expert on this, but I wouldn’t say so. I wore gloves, but still got some on my skin without any issue, and you can dispose of an exhausted vat by pouring down the drain. But I wouldn’t drink it. 😉

Ohmygod please do. I've gotten back into shibori and sashiko. And I would loveeeeeeeee to see this 😭😭😭 please make this dream come true because I can't make these historical garments and damn it looks beautiful in my mind also. A sashiko dyed chemise yes

YES you have now inspired my next fantasy fair outfit even more. I wanted to go for flowers. Maybe I'll still go for flowers and I'll try to convince a friend to go as a historically inspired rainbow fairy. We could be historically inspired nature fairies together.

do you even need a front seam if it's all draw strings 🤷‍♀️

I imagine they’d have had garden parties with dye makers filling small decanters and servants helping them twist and tie the chemises into bundles. I think they’d have been all over that! I can hear them squealing with delight as they all unfurl their gowns and admire the pretty colors.

Oh, they would absolutely love it! I know I do.

I’d unapologetically wear it everywhere! I’d have at least 2, maybe one done in just the “cool” end of the spectrum (greens, blues...ooh teal!).

A multilingual pun, no less. Ever the best of puns.

Honestly same

To be honest, it didn't even occur to me! I guess I am so used to seeing tie-dye done on completed garments that I just automatically went that direction 😂

@@MorganDonner if you dye the fabric before making the dress, the tie dye pattern would be choppier and not flow together as nicely as it did.

@@MorganDonner it looks so much better in the end the way you dyed it than if you'd dyed the fabric separately. So lovely really, I was surprised as I don't usually like tie dying.

@@MorganDonner The type of modern multicolor tie-dye you did was specifically invented to be done on finished pieces, with modern cold-process dyes and modern plastic squirt bottles, not on yardage to be sewn up. The pinching and swirling, integration of the sleeves, etc. are a modern folk art that uses primarily ready-to-wear t-shirts, and other finished white textile items, as its canvas--unlike more ancient resist dying techniques which are done on yardage or rectangles to be sewn up later, using natural dye processes such as indigo vats or mordanting.

I have only won the battle - the war rages on.

I've never really had trouble with sleeves. Or zippers, which I hear a lot of other people find difficult as well, especially the invisible zippers. Maybe it's because my mom explained sleeves to me when I first started sewing my own costumes, and she didn't make a fuss about them. Just like sideseams they're just another part of the garment to me :)

Morgan Donner i bow to thine heroism.

Bellaen I just find that somehow, something always goes wrong. Like sewing it on rotated a bit, or the sleeve not fitting right...

The first rule of sleevils is never sew tired- if it's past your bedtime sleevils will win! The second rule is basting before you stitch- pins won't let you try it on to make sure everything fits and you didn't sew it inside out. The third rule is never show fear- they can smell it in the water.

Bernadette Banner just did a tutorial on how to sew a pirate shirt, if you're looking for inspo.

@@rebekahrhodes9512 I was just wondering if I could combine the two and make a pirate shirt a la reine...

@@lyreparadox 🤔 that's an interesting thought. What would you do to it?

@@lyreparadox YES! Seems a simple concept - make the pirate shirt, then add the tapes for making the chemise style? (Says the person who has only hand sewn marks...)

This lol

It turned out so great!

Yeah, I realized way too late that the color was spreading into the yellow, but it ended up dyeing ok, thank goodness!

You probably could have stuck with the primary colors and let them bleed into each other to create the secondary colors. But heck, it doesn't matter a bit since it turned out so nicely. If I were doing a project like this, I likely would have tested and sampled to the nth degree and still wouldn't have a finished garment for at least a month. Well done!

Sewing a tartan skirt also :-)

Will I be making one of these for pride next year? It is VERY possible

@@Betsyschugar you should! It's amazing and you'd look so good in it! Plus imagine how fun it would be to swish as you dance.

Pi for breakfast and it would work well as a maternity and non-maternity dress, too! You maybe didn't mean to, but I needed this idea for when I have babies.

@@AllThePeppermint that too. My concern is that my waistline changes by 4 inches when I get bloated. I hate having two sets of clothes: one for when I’m super slim before my period, and the other for when my period reeks havoc on my body.