Golden egg project - The veil

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. Im going to recreate a german 16th century embroidery, a headgeardecoration from 1510-15. To read more about my challenge look here. I have also written about my pattern, here, about tools and materials, here, and the makers and the wearers, here.

During the renaissance it was common in Germany to cover embroidered headwear with a thin veil. Like the woman in my chosen painting, Portrait of a woman by Bernhard Strigel. Probably to protect an embroidery consisting of expensive threads of gold, silver and silk. And as a fashionable detail. They are made both as long veils and small caps, covering only the embroidered cap underneath.

The Fuggerchildren by Jakob Seisenegger, Portrait of a woman by Master of the monogram and

Portrait of a lady by Circle of Peter Gartner

In these paintings we see examples of embroidery covered with a veil.

Portrait of a 34 year old woman by Hans Holbein the older, Anna Scheit by Bartel Beham,

Portrait of Clara Burckhart by Conrad Faber von Creuznach and Potrait of Maria Kitscher by Hans Mielich

I made my veil in thin silk with a rolled hem. I wanted the hem to be as small as possible but it will still be a little more visible than in the paintings. Its made by hand with white silk thread. 

It is going to look much better when its on top of the embroidery later. And on my head, the manikin is a bit small. The veil is 82 cm wide and 210 cm long. I hope it will look the same as in the painting when I can try the veil and embroidery together.

I tried it with my sampler, and I think it is going to look right when it is all done!