Civil War Gown Inspiration and Plannings

…oh yes, *plannings* !

I have terrible Costume A-D-D at the moment. Terrible. One of the many things I want to make *right now* is a new Civil War gown.

I can’t even remember the last time I made anything Civil War! I actually have plenty of occasions to wear such a gown, here in Nevada, so I think it’s time to work up a new one, with both a day and evening bodice.

To the Inspo!:

Day Dress, 1860s, from the Centre de Documentacio i Museu Textil de Terrassa, but the link is broken, so here it is on Fripperies & Fobs.

Carte de Visite, c. 1863 – via

Clara Barton, c. 1866 – more on her on Wikipedia

Kyoto Costume Institute – c. 1865 – via

From eBay, but no longer available

For loads more of my inspiration images, check out my Pinterest board for this project.

The fabric is decided already – a gorgeous aubergine silk I got in China – trimmed in black velvet, and paired with crisp white collar and cuffs. I have 7 yards, 60″ wide, so I should have enough to do the two bodices and a full skirt, if I cut carefully.

The purple silk – it has some very minor slubbing, so I’ll call it Dupioni.

For the day bodice, I have this pattern:

Truly Victorian TV443 – 1863 day bodice.

Originally I wanted to use this Simplicity one, but in doing a bit more research, the style seemed more late 1850s:

Simplicity 3727 – out of print, but you can get it on Amazon, Etsy, eBay, even from Simplicity’s website.

And here are my sketches for bodice ideas:

Of course, I have to *not* work on this until I’m done with the Red Russian Doll project (which is still interesting to me, at least!). So I shall just pet the purple silk, and admire it, and dream, until the time comes to start working on this. 🙂