April 2017

S M T W T F S
      1
2345678
910111213 1415
16171819 2021 22
23242526272829
30      

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
marcmagus: Me playing cribbage in regency attire (Default)
Tuesday, February 8th, 2011 12:39 pm

Anybody have good images showing closeups of a men's Regency shirt, preferably without a cravat covering them, preferably from multiple angles? I'm having trouble finding what I'm looking for.

Images of a well-sourced pattern would probably work as well.

I'm hoping to make a detachable collar which can button over a modern formal shirt of the sort typically worn with tuxedos. If I get this working, I'll make up instructions/a pattern and post it somewhere.

I think I can make up something functional if I know what I'm trying to accomplish.

In my dreams I will have a working prototype to wear this weekend.

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

[Sorry for the multiple post to people who look at facebook too, but I realized my audience of potential contributors is split.]

marcmagus: Me playing cribbage in regency attire (Default)
Wednesday, April 28th, 2010 11:40 pm
Sailing Masters Regency Ball
Essex, CT
May 8, 2010, 8-11 PM
$15/person

I'll be driving down. Anybody want a ride?

There's a parade at 2 in the afternoon, and some other fun-sounding activities to follow. There was some discussion of a group attending that stuff in costume. I'm currently undecided as to whether I'll be driving down for that or just the ball.

Tags:
marcmagus: Me playing cribbage in regency attire (Default)
Thursday, February 11th, 2010 10:30 am

[Written 2010-02-04, but delayed due to difficulty with jlj; sorry for the resulting late warning.]

I have two events that are important to me on the same weekend. I hate when that happens. This year:

NonCon is 2010-02-19/2010-02-21.

The Regency Tea Dance in Boston is 2010-02-21. [Note the new location convenient to the red line]

I haven't decided what I'm going to do about this, although I think I'm leaning toward the dance.

In any case, consider this a reminder to those of you interested in either event that they'll be occurring.

marcmagus: Me playing cribbage in regency attire (Default)
Monday, December 21st, 2009 01:30 pm

For the years I've been involved in re-enactment of the English Regency, I have been frustrated by the absolute dearth of information on what seems to be one of the defining features of Regency menswear: the cravat. Given this problem, I've taken it upon myself to do some research on the topic, with limited success. I'd like to put together a good resource so men getting into Regency reenactment have somewhere to turn to learn more about neckwear, but I'm not yet satisfied with the quality of the information I have.

I have a lot of historian-type friends, and I think it's time to turn to you all for help. If anybody can provide any of the following, I would appreciate it greatly:

  • Access to or measurements of primary sources [material, thickness, and particularly dimensions of existing neckcloths in archives, preferably with information on when, where, and in what context they were worn]

  • Leads to non-satirical contemporary secondary sources describing details of the construction of neckcloths and their manner of tying. White/Le Blanc's "The Art of Tying the Cravat" is useful, but a work of satire, and thus teasing out what's exaggerated is tricky. The popular-on-the-web "Neckclothitania" is a parody of that.

  • Links to any treatment of the subject I may have missed thus far. I seem to get a lot of fashion plates and portraits and the like, which are great, but rarely any instructions, let alone instructions with accompanying documentation.

Note that at present I'm looking for about two generations worth of the beginning of the 19th century; if I get enough information to distill it into an instructional form I'll be careful to be clear about likely dates for things. I'd be happy to have sources outside the target date range as well, as I might eventually branch out depending on how this goes.

marcmagus: Me playing cribbage in regency attire (Default)
Wednesday, December 9th, 2009 06:07 pm

Jane Austen's Birthday Dance in Rehoboth, MA. This Sunday, 2009-12-13, 13:00-16:00. I'm told Rehoboth is near Providence, and about an hour from the Boston area.

I'm planning to go. I'll hopefully be sporting my new breeches, which will hopefully be the first time I've ever worn a finished pair of breeches at an event. There's emphatically no costume requirement for this event.

This is Regency English country dance. As I keep saying, it's trivially accessible to people who do SCD, and skills in contra, modern ECD, and Victorian contras all apply. The event is beginner friendly, and everything will be taught.

I encourage other people to come. There's currently space in my car if anybody wants to carpool.

Disabling comments on LiveJournal to centralize responses in case there's carpooling discussion, and also so I'm sure I'll see any replies.

Tags:
marcmagus: Me playing cribbage in regency attire (Default)
Sunday, February 8th, 2009 11:45 pm

The tea dance was a lot of fun. It looked like we had a couple dozen dancers, and the quality of dancers was quite high. This was certainly aided by three friends of mine from the Scottish Country Dance community allowing me to badger them into coming. All of my friends who came tell me they enjoyed themselves, so I count this as a success.

Dances included a few country dances, a Swedish dance, four figures of the famous Caledonian Quadrille, the Country Bumpkin (for 9 dancers and a hat!), and Moneymusk.

The other day I talked about facial hair in a Regency context and quoted Beau Brummell on the topic. I had been planning to go in with a more normal beard + mustache combination, but was convinced to go ahead and attempt to duplicate the style he was describing. I'm not sure my facial hair grows in in the correct pattern to do it justice, but I tried. Further research is probably called for if I ever decide to attempt this again, which I probably won't.

I hope people appreciate that I signed up for Flickr just so I'd have a place to upload these pictures, and also the effort [livejournal.com profile] kdsorceress and I went through to take them. We took a few before the dance, but the memory card in my camera failed and we had to try again afterward. This explains any imperfections in my hair.

Enjoy the photos of me looking silly at regency 2009-02-08

With any luck, photos will become available of people dancing at the event, but I didn't get any.

Tags:
marcmagus: Me playing cribbage in regency attire (Default)
Thursday, February 5th, 2009 06:43 pm

Some people have observed that I am growing in a beard at the moment, and I have responded that I am doing so partly because I was lazy a couple weeks ago, and partly in preparation for the tea dance on Sunday, after which I shall probably remove it again. I explain that Beau Brummell himself felt strongly that men should not go clean-shaven.

I here offer the Beau's remarks on the topic, from his unpublished manuscript "Male Costume", dated 1822, published in Male and Female Costume by Beau Brummell, Arno Press, 1978, pp. 128-129.

It is remarkable that, with a looser costume, more or less of the beard has generally been suffered to grow in every age; and, in perfect consistency with this fact, many of those gentlemen who contemn the remarks of the vulgar, now suffer the hair to grow on the upper lip.

This habit is a manly and noble one. God and nature made it distinctive of the male and female; and its abandonment has commonly been accompanied with periods of general effeminacy, and even with the decline and fall of states. They were bearded Romans who conquered the then beardless Greeks; they were bearded Goths who vanquished the then beardless Romans; and they are bearded Tartars who now promise once more to inundate the shaven and effeminate people of Western Europe.

In further illustration of the manliness of this habit, we may observe, that, throughout Europe, wars have generally led to its temporary introduction.

It assuredly looks best when it is not too finically adjusted, as by leaving a distinct lock on each half of the upper lip and another on the chin, but when, on the contrary, the mustachio on the upper lip runs on each side into the whisker continuously and unbroken; while the hair is removed only whence it can be best spared; namely from below the line of the mouth.

Those assuredly completely blunder, who ridicule mustachios and whiskers as a piece of puppyism. The silly affectation lies, on the contrary, entirely with those who, by removing all the beard, take the trouble so far to emasculate themselves! and who think themselves prettyfied by a painful and ridiculous imitation of the smoother face of women!

Tags:
marcmagus: Me playing cribbage in regency attire (Default)
Wednesday, February 4th, 2009 03:20 pm

Quick announcement: Once again, the Vintage Tea Dance series returns to Regency England this Sunday, 8 February, 2009. The dance will be taught/prompted by Susan de Guardiola.

The tea dance series aims to be light on teaching/heavy on dancing, but there will be enough instruction to make it accessible to beginners. Regency dance is primarily set dances (in longways sets and quadrilles) with figures and footwork. For those who know Scottish Country Dancing, it's astonishingly similar, though there are recognizable style differences. Historical costume is welcome if you have it and enjoy it, but not at all required--expect to see a handful of people in period formal and a lot of people in comfortable modern clothes.

We had an amazing turnout last year, and everybody had a great time. I hope some more of you will decide to join us this time.

In short: come if you think this is something you'd enjoy. If you like this sort of thing, you probably will. Don't stress about lack of experience or costume. More info at the website.

Tags: