A 16th century german gown - The planning of a Ärmelrock

While doing inventory a couple of weeks back it was obvious that I needed another gown, or rock in german. After avoiding it for a while I decided that I was going to make my new gown together with you. Taking photos of every step, even when I am cheating! I´m not a trained seamstress, just self taught, so we learn as we go, as always. 
So! We are going to make a gown, a german 16th century rock, an Ärmelrock, a sleeved dress. A layer worn on top of a kirtle, the unterrock. The everyday dress for a woman of a wealthy merchant or patrician family. But this way of making a dress would work for almost all social classes in 16th century Germany, with changing of materials and details.

The dress is not going to be a copy of a dress in any painting, but as inspiration I have looked at some paintings. As you see here. I want the squared wide neckline, the guards on the cuffs and midriff, maybe guards on the skirt too.

Joerg Breu the Elder 1515, Cristoph Amberger 1531.Peter Gertner 1525, Nicolas Neufchatel and Hans Brosarmer.

In the clothing lists, woolen dresses predominate, from high-quality cloth to locally made. According to Zander-Seidel (Textiler Hausrat) a dress like this were made out of five or six ells. And Drei Schnittbucher tells us that the ell varied from town to town and could be all from 58.6 cm (Coburg) to 100 cm (Salzburg). The ell was measured with a square wooden stick and there are some extant ell-sticks in museums. 

Ell-sticks from the museum in Marienberg fortress in southern Germany. Photo: Me.

Marlein would have lived in the area around Coburg and surrounding cities so, 58.6 cm it is! Five ells would therefor be 293 cm and six ells would be 352 cm. I have no idea if fabric for the lining and the guards are included in those five or six ells...so I decide that they are not!

I have 3,5 meters of a green wool twill, so pretty much exact six ells. How much of the green twill do I really need? Can I maximize the use of my fabric so I get under five or six ells for the total dress? 

 

Some of the ladies in my inspirational paintings are wearing dresses with guards of velvet. And I had some at home, so, why not, lets make it fancy! The black fabric in the picture above is wool, as Im sure you have seen already. My first plan was to use the green and black wool together, but Im sure I will have a good use for the black wool in another project. 

This i my blue velvet. I had this laying in a box at home for ten years, time to do something with it! And I have a lot of it. Maybee I will make a matching gollar for this dress later...

Sumptuary law regulated the material, width and colours of the trimmings approved for the different social classes. In the law from 1536 it is said that a wife in a geschlechter/patrician family could use no more than four ells of velvet for clothing trimmings. But I don´t think I will use that much. For the skirts high-quality materials, like velvet and brocades, were permitted "above the belt around the body and the ermel" and "down the front of the skirt". This information also comes from Textilier Hausrat.

I will make this into two articles, one about the skirt and one about the bodice. It will be a very long one, and take a lot of time, if I would make one post about the whole dress.

This is obviously what I´m going to do this summer. Sit at my balcony with a lot of wool in my lap...

Lets start with the skirt!