Golden egg project - The presentation

In the end of mars my challenge for The Society of the Golden egg got accepted. The Society of the Golden Egg is a challenge household for the arts and sciences in the Kingdom of Drachenwald, within the Society for Creative Anachronism. The aim of the Society of the Golden Egg is to encourage artisans to increase their knowledge and skills through continuous challenges of at least intermediate difficulty, but which are a personal challenge to the person seeking to join the society. Challengers normally have up to one year to complete their challenge. Parts of my challenge is going to be presented here and therefore, as a start, I present my challenge here.

Im going to recreate a german 16th century embroidery, a headgeardecoration from 1510-15. To do so I need to learn witch fabric to work on, witch stitches to work with, witch type of yarn to use. I also want to know who was doing this type of work in 16th century Germany and who was wearing it. Since very few of these have survived my main source is paintings and artwork. I have a special one in mind and wants to recreat it as accurate as possible.
The embroidery is the one seen in this painting.

Portrait of a lady by Bernhardt Strigel 1510

To expand this project to a years work I want to do more research on the background to be able to connect the different embroidered pieces with social status. Who are these people that use this type of decorations? Is the different sizes connected to social status? What does the suptuary laws say on the mather. Materials? And so on… With all the research and an embrodery of this scale its probably going to take me a year.
I hope that I, after this callenge is over, feels comfortable in the making of embroidered pieces. The research is also importent to me. To look at an outfit, an embroidery, and be able to say what her clothes say about social status and wealth.

In paintings of women from 16th century Germany there is often an embroidery on the veil, covering the wulsthaube. The embroidery mostly cover the end of the veil but is sometimes as vide as the wearer’s head. Accoring to the art these decorations semse to be seen on wealthier merchants wifes, patricians and nobility. It seemse to be used all over Germany.
I will try to use only materials that where used in 16th century Germany. Its a part of the callenge to learn what kind of materials that was available and to use that to recreate my embroidery.
I have been doing German 16th century fashion and want to take my knowlegde and skill in crafts to the next level. For a skilled embroideress this is not a challenge, but for me, that have not been doing that much embroidery, this will be.I dont know who much information I will find, and it is difficult to say when I gattered enough information, what is enought? Enough for me might be when I feel comfortable to start doing my recreation? It might also be a callenge for me to stand up and say, I know enough to do this right…

My plan is to divide the year in three parts.
1.Research social status. Mars/April-august.
2.Research materials and methods. Juli-oktober.
3.Embroidery. September-April

I will present each part on my blog, probably with smaller bits of information in the meantime too.
To clarify my challenge at bit, its just the embroidered part on the haube that I will make, not the upper part with the pearls.

Untergollar in linen inspired by Katharina von Bora

Yesterday I finished a untergollar inspired by the lovely lady Katharina von Bora, Martin Luthers wife. 

Lucas Cranach d.Ä.

Its made in white linen and white linen waxed thread with black silk embroidery and a 4-strand braid. The braid is used for decorations at the front and neckline and to tie it together.

The embroidery is double running stitch. My plan was to be able to wear the gollar a bit open. The double running stitch makes the design appear the same on both sides. But Im not use to do embroidery and the inside does not look as good as the outside. Just need to keep practising! 

The measures are without seam allowance and is suitable for someone who is a medium.

A gollar is a 16th century German garment for women, to wear over a dress, a outerlayer, as a kind of sleeveless jacket or a collar or it can be worn almost as a shirt, covering up when wearing dresses with a low neckline. Most people makes a gollar to wear on top of their clothing,but the untergollar is as common in paintings if you start looking for it. It can be easy to assume it is the shirt. The untergollar seemse to always be in white linen while the outergollar can be in wool, silk or velvet.

Paintings showing what is probably untergollars, by Christoph Amberger, Peter Gertner and Lucas Cranach the younger

Here are exemples of the more common ones among reenactors, the one looking like a collar and the sleeveless jacket.