(Mis)Adventures With the Mustard Cotehardie

Dear Venturers,

I don’t always venture into the unknown world of medieval-y stuff, but when I do, I make the most extravagant mess of it!

 

So I made the mistake of looking at Jo Anne’s linen section and I saw mustard and maroon colored linen sitting side by side. I might have been watching too much Secrets of the Castle (a must-watch on Amazon Prime), but together  the two colors looked so 13th century that I couldn’t pass them by!

And so, after getting as little yardage as possible, I went home to start work on my new gown. Everything was going so splendidly… one might even describe it as a dreamy, movie-scene style montage…

*cue record scratch* 

…until I realized that I just spent a good deal of money on linen and I know nothing about the 13th century, excepting Ruth Goodman’s glorious dress. 

So I did some research *opens Pinterest* and ditched the Ruth idea and decided to go with a style known as the Cotehardie. A style picked by it’s unique short sleeves (ie. I didn’t have enough fabric for the other style I considered which had long sleeves, and a baggy waist held in via belt). This also allowed me to incorporate the half yard of maroon linen I bought for the sleeves. 

So as I’m researching, there are all these various online “diy draft your own pattern SUPER EASY medieval dress” type things (you know how it goes) and I’m thinking “why not not use that other dress I have that I based off that old dress that I made a long time ago” (…you know how it goes…). Long story short, I made a sort of “cheaters version” to a form-fitting cotehardie (idk if it works on someone with actual bust or hips). 

So let’s start with the historical examples…

If you bought enough linen at the Jo Ann’s… here’s the long sleeved one:

Here’s another style I came across…

If you did not, here’s the cotehardie…

My first step was to lay the fabric out, unfolded, and draft my very simple, one piece pattern using a T-shirt. 

See the pencil drawings?

After making the rough sketch with the t-shirt, I laid down on the fabric and made adjustments based on my body shape. The final pattern should be somewhat T-shaped, so that the bodice, skirt, and sleeves are all one fluid 2 dimensional shape. I also added gores for the skirt which will start just below the waist. 

Then cut a slit down the front that goes down to the fullest part of your hips (only on the front panel). 

Multiply the main t shape by two and you’ll have the full pattern!

 

Then you stick the two panels together (plus the gores) and sew it up! 

I also decided to add some pretty (not sure how accurate it is…) trim along the front where it laces up. 

Ignore the red fabric

Then we move onto the whole sleeve situation. I originally thought that the cotehardie was just a short sleeved gown that went over a long sleeved gown (which posed a problem since I only bought a half yard of the maroon fabric, not enough for a whole gown!!) … but then I looked closely and was delighted to see that, to my surprise, in some examples it appears that the cotehardie is actually being worn over some sort of white shift/chemise type thing, while the sleeves are actually detachable! Which makes sense when you think about it. If I can’t afford to buy enough fabric for a second gown, your average 13th century woman probably couldn’t have either. now of course there’s always the question of staying warm, or maybe they had the dress to begin with, or maybe I have the history all wrong! In the end, my cotehardie looks pretty similar to the paintings and this 18th century girl is  happy with that! 

The green sleeve droops a bit to reveal some white poking through, plus you can see more white near the bottom of the lacing. 

Again, the sleeve looks to be separate, also, see the white near the neckline. 

More attached sleeves, plus the white almost entirely orange visible through the lacing. 

So my plan is to wear my multi-century shift (I call it that because it has short sleeves so it works with most anything) and have separate sleeves made from the maroon linen. I have debated wearing a stomacher type thing (also maroon linen) over the lacing like in the first example (with the red cotehardie and green green sleeves). 

The detachable sleeves are just rectangular tubes that I will pin onto the main sleeve. 

And here’s another picture of it all hemmed up without trim…

This project has been entirely haphazard and spur of the moment, but fun and adventurous nonetheless! I have not yet finished it (RIP 40 eyelets), but I’ll make an update when I do! I also want to try making my own medieval hose so stay tuned for a post on that as well!

Good luck, dear Venturers!