Manual Shifting

Dear Friends
Why make a garment, that is rarely seen, by hand? Good question.  It would be faster maybe even easier.  So why bother?

Lots of reasons, but the most important is the interpretive value that the garment has when made by hand. As I mentioned in my last post, nothing makes more of an impression than the words,  "I made it myself, all by hand".  This phrase opens the doors to the most interesting and educational conversations! Try it -- you'll be surprised.

The other equally important reason is that it's the proper way to make the garment. It is impossible to make most 18th century garments correctly by machine.  Machine sewn seams look like machine sewn seams. In addition, lots of the work can't be done by your sewing machine -- like stroke gathers, flat felling, etc.  Yes, there are ways of "cheating" but it's just not the same.

Many would argue that most people just don't have the time to do it by hand.  Wrong!  Think of all the time you spend with idle hands -- watching tv, waiting at the doctor's office, waiting for your kid at soccer practice, town meeting, taking the train to work.  Hand sewing is portable, you can take it anywhere and make progress. Try that with your sewing machine!

Finally to those who physically can't hand sew due to a condition like carpal tunnel or arthritis or bad eyesight -- why not consider an 18th century custom -- bartering.  Is there something you can do for someone else? -- perhaps buy some fabric for them, give someone a ride to an event,  swap your modern expertise for some sewing time,  offer an item you are no longer using - be creative - it worked then, it can work now.

Back stitch

Finally, I know I've been doing a lot of babbling lately and you are wondering where my shift is -- I confess, I took a diversion -- I'm working on a gown for an event a few weeks from now and will probably jump to finishing my quilted petticoat this week, but if you see me sitting around someplace in the near future, trust me, I'll be working on that shift.

YH&OS,

Mrs. S

Shifts, Selvages and Interpretive Tool

Dearest Friends,
As I mentioned in my last post, when it comes to making shifts it's all about the selvage! The vintage linen that I'm using for my shift is 36" wide,  so cutting out a 30" wide shift leaves a long 6" strip with a wonderful selvage.  I guess I could use the entire 36" width for my shift, but it would really be too big for me.  But what I can do, is use the 6" strip for its selvage so all my gores will have selvage on one edge, making flat felling the intersection of side seams and the top of the gores less of a mess.

So what makes a good selvage? Hard to find these days.  Here are two from vintage linens and here is one that is typical of most of the on-line linen available. As you can see, the on-line linen has holes in it and has a frayed edge.  This is pretty typical, unfortunately, and sometimes when you find a clean edge, it has a colored thread through it.  Aaargh! But don't give up, there are good sources out there, but they are not cheap.  Don't be afraid to spend a couple extra bucks on a garment that will get lots of wear. It will pay you back.

Close-up of selvage from vintage linen

Close-up of selvage from vintage linen - this one is gorgeous!

Close-up of selvage from linen purchased from a popular on-line store

Because this is an undergarment, shifts are usually not an item that reenactresses like to spend lots of time on.  Many women end up buying very coarse linen or cotton shifts with ill-fitting necks and sleeves from sutlers, and this is reasonable when you are getting started.

However, if you are serious about this hobby, I would encourage you to make your first shift. It's a wonderful practice piece for learning basic hand sewing techniques, it will fit better than anything you can buy from one of the large sutlers, but most of all, it's a great interpretive tool. Even if you don't have the confidence to talk to a tourist about a battle, for example, you can always talk to them about how you hand sewed your shift, how your stitches got better over time, how long it took, how you pulled a thread to cut your linen.  You'd be surprised how a newbie can impress just about any tourist with that information!  This is an item you will wear every time you put on your 18th century kit, so make a good shift, it will serve you well in more ways than one!

Your humble and obedient servant,
Mrs. S

P.S. At some point you will forget to pack your shift.  Don't panic, find a tee shift (that you don't mind sacrificing) cut out the neck - since it is a knit, it won't unravel and .... Voila! Emergency shift stand-in.

Locating Shifty Linen

Mrs. S was very fortunate to have in her stash a hunk of linen ready to be cut out into a shift. Most of us have to go shopping!  Finding the right linen for a shift is not that difficult.

Our regular suppliers are a great place to start.

Follow the link, this is the linen that I would choose for a shift from Burnley and Trowbridge.

The  3.7 oz linen is a good choice from Wm Booth Draper.

The main chain store remaining to us, Jo-Anns Fabrics, also carries linen, but the selection is limited.

Still and always some of the best linens come from Ireland and Ulster Linen sells many weights and varieties.  The down side is the cost, the linen is expensive, and there is a 30 yard minimum order to avoid a cutting fee.  If an entire unit or group were to do an order, that would be achievable.  

 Online the best place to shop for linen is the Fabrics Store.   Avoid the softened linen if you can, it has been processed and is not as crisp as regular linens. 

My personal preference is for the lightest finest linen that I can find, my skin is very unhappy with coarse fabrics.  The weight and quality of the linen you buy and use for your shift should reflect the persona you portray.  A poor camp follower would have coarse, sometimes even unbleached (brown) linen for her shift.  A Boston fine lady would have a much finer, lighter linen for under her silk gowns, so keep that in mind when shopping.

Mrs. Peabody

It's All About the Selvage

Dearest Friends,
When our 18th century foremothers cut out their shifts, they were doing so on 3/4 or 7/8 yard wide linen - in other words 27" or 31 1/2" wide material.  Today our linen fabric is 54" or 60" wide.  So isn't wider better?  Not when it comes to laying out fabric for a shift.  Why?  In one word: SELVAGE!

When making a shift, a good selvage means there's no need to finish an edge of a seam because it won't unravel during washing and wearing, so the more edges that fall along selvages the better off you are - less seams to flat fell. The linen widths sold in the 18th century allowed the maker to to maximize her selvages and not end up with that crazy mish-mash you get when you try flat felling all the seams that end up at that nexus at the top of the gores and side seam -- the bugaboo of every modern shift maker!

Here's an advertisement typical of ads for linen in the 18th century.  This one is from the Massachusetts Spy from June of 1773, advertising 3/4, 7/8 and yard wide linen.

So why can't we get linen in those widths?  Because fabric in the 18th century was woven specifically for how it was going to be used.  It's that way today too, but nowadays most people aren't using linen to make shifts -- linen is primarily used for home decoration where wider is better - think curtains, bed spreads, furniture, etc.  Plus it's more efficient to weave wider, which is another reason our linen isn't as good, but that's a discussion for another day. So if you are lucky enough to find a good piece of 3/4 or 7/8 wide linen with a decent selvage - do not pass go, do not collect $200, buy it!

YH&OS,
Mrs. S.

N.B. Sometimes you can find vintage sheets in narrower widths.  If they are not too old and not too heavy, they will work.  However, sometimes they are just plain old and you end up with a shift that you've spent all kinds of time to make, only to end up with holes in it after a few washings, so be careful when buying vintage textiles for shifts.

The Fabulous Fiber Flax

Dearest Friends,

As I was cutting out my shift, I was thinking about the first ancient people who figured out how to process flax for cloth.  It would hardly seem intuitive to take a plant, beat it, comb it, spin it and weave it into fabric, but thank goodness they did.  So today I sing the praises of "Linum usitatissimum".   From the Egyptians to it's numerous Biblical references, to the legacy of Irish linen, it is a cloth that has been held in high regard for centuries.


And what a perfect fabric for a shift - it's soft on the skin, it absorbs lots of moisture before feeling damp, it can withstand repeated washings,  and unlike some fabrics remains strong when it is wet.  It's the natural version of polypropylene -- absorbing water and wicking it away!

But one of my favorite qualities of linen is that it is so easy to cut it straight as well as to sew a straight line on it. For you readers who have not worked with linen before, it's tabby weave (simple up and down and back and forth pattern) makes it a joy to work with.  To create a guide for cutting, merely pull a thread in the direction you want to cut.

Close up view of pulled thread showing cutting line

Then cut along that line and voila -- perfectly straight!

So now I'll cut out the pieces I need for my shift, which I'll show you in my next post.  Very ingenious geometry!  But in the meantime, thank you humble flax plant for producing such a wonderfully practical fabric.

Field of flax

YH&OS,

Mrs. S

Shifting Back to Shift Sleeves

Since I am cutting out two shifts today, a fine one to wear as Mrs Skinner, the other, a more utilitarian one, I figured we should take a look at how the lower sorts wore their shift sleeves during the early 1770's.  Since these folks weren't sitting for portraits with Mr Copley, let's look to the period prints for guidance. The examples I will show are from 1770-74, all from the Lewis Walpole collection.

This print of the girl with the candle shows a very similar shift sleeve treatment as Mrs Skinner's -- a small ruffle with the shift sleeve just past the elbow. And if you will humor me and allow me to go off on a tangent for a moment. Check out the pin keeping her handkerchief closed.  Cool detail huh?

Ok, back to shift sleeves. Take a look at the nosegay seller. I love using her as an example of a classic middlin' type. Check out her shift - again same treatment but displayed below a gown cuff.  So let's look at another, "The Enraged Macaroni" - same type of gown, this time no ruffle.

Let's look at one more -"Piety in Pattens" -- Little ruffle peeking out from a gown cuff

So, for my everyday shift, I will opt for the same sleeve treatment as Mrs. Skinner, though with probably not as fine a linen ruffle. But that's another post for another day.

Back to cutting out linen,

Mrs. S.

Your Underwear Is Showing!

Dearest Friends, 

When I was growing up, it was a social disgrace to let your bra straps show. I even sewed those little ribbons with the snaps into my sleeveless dresses to prevent that kind of fashion faux pas! Times change and fashion changes. And so it appears was the case in the 18th century with regards to shifts.

Detail from Smock Race by John Collet (Lewis Walpole Library)

Located next to your skin, and under your stays, by mere proximity alone, a shift is "underwear". so one would assume that this garment would only be seen hanging on the line after being laundered.  Not so - at least where the sleeve of the shift is concerned.  Underwear is worn as a fashion accessory!

Mrs Daniel Hubbard by Copley

In portraits, for a good part of the century, you frequently see a rather long shift sleeve sticking out below the outer gown sleeve, and often with an elaborate ruffle attached at the cuff of the shift. In the portrait at the left, you see an example from the 1760's showing a positively gorgeous ruffle and puffy shift sleeve displayed below the wide full cuff of her silk gown.  And there is no attempt to hide the lower part of the shift sleeve just above the ruffles.

Mrs. Ezekiel Goldthwait - Copley 1771

As the fashion changes from cuffs to tiers of sleeve ruffles and flounces, the now shorter shift sleeve is largely hidden making a super fancy shift sleeve ruffle superfluous. However, a peek of the shift sleeve does not morph into a "Glamour don't".  It's there and should the arm be in a position to show it, the wearer does not attempt to hide it.


 Thus is the case with my model Mrs. Skinner.

Mrs Skinner, shows off a diminutive shift ruffle, presumably of fine linen, attached to her shift cuff, which falls just beyond her elbow -- a detail to keep in mind when I measure for the length of the sleeves for my new shift. This is just the kind of detail we want to pay attention to when trying to assemble a really accurate look -- particularly connecting these details to time frame.   They seem, at first, incidental, but when put all together they truly help to create a much more accurate impression.

Mrs. Skinner's sleeve detail by Copley (1772)

Over the years I've become less hung up about the occasional bra strap offense, but I will gladly show off the lovely cuff and ruffle of my new shift's sleeves - but only when I bend my arm and my sleeve flounces fall away to expose it!  Underwear as a fashion statement - some things never change.

Yours truly,
Mrs. S.

Down Shift

Dearest Friends:

Diagram in hand, I head for the vault, yes, that super secret place where I keep my vintage linen stash.  I buy it whenever I find it and this particular bolt was a find! 10 yards of 18" wide, very white,  tightly woven linen from Ireland still on the bolt. My receipt is still attached -- ouch! I guess buying fabric is like childbirth, one develops a case of amnesia about the pain ;) But the Copp Family shift is worth it.

Cut off enough for the shift and throw in in a good hot wash. Iron while damp.  Linen is ready.  Now to find the huge spool of very fine wet spun linen thread I bought years ago on eBay and I'm good to go.
 

Yours,
Mrs. S.