I recently began working on a project to pattern and digitize larger antique garments. Every once in a while I find something in my price range on eBay or Etsy, and now you get to benefit! In 2021 I produced several patterns for the MFIT exhibit The Roaring Twenties and the Swinging Sixties (which are free and accessible online here, hopefully in perpetuity), the largest of which was a 54″/137cm-bust wash dress from the late 1920s. The quality of the digitization was a little iffy, but it was satisfying work and very fulfilling to see people using the patterns. In December 2023, with 2+ addit ..read more

This is a simple camisole pattern (or brassiere/binder pattern, if you wear it tight) suitable for the mid-to-late 1920s. It is patterned from an antique garment in my collection with a 47.5” bust that was probably home-made. This pattern is free for personal use (not commercial) as long as you credit me or link back to this page when posting. If you are interested in supporting my work and want to see future projects like this, please feel free to use the donation button beneath the pattern. Feel free to tag me on social media if you make it – I enjoy seeing these get used! I am @kenna.sews ..read more

I was updating my dress list and realized that I’d never bothered to post about a lot of my recent projects. Oops. I don’t tend to post about smaller projects or ones that I didn’t consider interestingly challenging, and as I get more familiar with sewing techniques and eras, there are fewer ensembles I consider worth writing big posts about. But it’s nice to have a record of completion, so here’s an overview post! I’m going to go chronologically by era here rather than by when I started/finished each: 1490s Florentine gown (May/October 2023) I made the gamurra and shift pretty quickly for a f ..read more

I added an 1890s corset to my personal collection a few months back, bought from a dealer in Europe. The reason I couldn’t pass it up was that it has a 33″ waist! It’s in pristine condition, and I sent it off to Michelle at Clockwork Faerie, who does amazing work drafting, digitizing, and sewing bespoke corsetry. She promptly took a pattern and digitized it, and we agreed that I’d be able to make the original size available for free here while she works on grading the pattern up and creating a larger size range, which will be up for sale on her site and Etsy in the future. This pattern is fr ..read more

As I work on my dissertation about fat fashion history, I’ve been collecting antique photographs of women who were larger than the ideal (as well as a few disabled women, but that’s another post). Time to share some of my favorites with you all! The entire album can be accessed here, though I’m working on getting it up on some kind of more efficient database with tags and filters. Please link back to this page or the album if you share these images. Do not share these without the source. Do not repost without credit. I post more images like these on Instagram at @stoutstylehistory and on Faceb ..read more

Finally – a new project! I’ve wanted to try 1630s for a while (ever since I completed my 1660s project and enjoyed it so much) and I finally stocked up on some fabric and the Seventeenth Century Women’s Dress Patterns book. I’m aiming to use the cream slashed-satin bodice in the V&A collection as a reference. I don’t want to recreate it exactly, but I’ll be trying to follow its example in terms of construction. (I don’t particularly want to make a pair of bodies to go under it, and the authors note that due to the internal stiffening it may not have been worn over a support garment. I’ll ..read more

I’m delighted to announce the opening today of an exhibition I worked on this year at the Museum at FIT: The Roaring Twenties and the Swinging Sixties. I developed the public programming for the exhibition along with Becca Carr, and you can see this content through the Extras tab on the site. What I’d like to talk about today is the Plus Pattern Project – a series of patterns we took from extant 1920s plus-size (contemporarily, ‘stout’) garments, which are available for free download. This project was inspired by the LACMA Undertaking the Making pattern project developed alongside the Fashio ..read more

I’m back! Corona-ennui has done a number on me, but I recovered my sewing motivation upon seeing the Mimic of Modes announcement asking for pattern testers. Cassidy is working on a pattern taken from an extant 1870 bodice, and I loved the shapes; fortunately, she said yes to me testing it! (2022 UPDATE: The pattern is now available here on Etsy!) If you’ll recall, I created a yellow satin evening gown with black velvet accents (read about it here) inspired by an 1871 fashion plate for Costume College 2019. I had some satin left over afterwards, and fantasized about creating a day bodice for th ..read more

I thought I would post today about the project that you may have seen a few hints of on my social media, which was a week of sewing with Abby Cox that produced two full nineteen-teens-era suits and an additional skirt. (Video forthcoming.) We worked with five patterns in order to create the set, and I thought I would discuss my experiences with four of them – the fifth is one Abby drafted from an original garment and is not currently commercially available. All of these patterns are either reproductions from original 1910s-era patterns or they are modernized versions of original patterns. (A ..read more

Time to talk a little about a project I worked on last summer – a coral and purple wool walking suit for Not Your Momma’s History! 1915 fashion plate Cheyney knew exactly what she wanted, and we tweaked the design of a Le Style Parisienne fashion plate from 1915. The white suit in the center of the plate has a high-low peplum, a contrasting wide collar and set of double belts, and a very fun overlapping button front detail to play with. I widened it and added another overlapping tab to suit Cheyney’s proportions and also added additional double-belt details to the wrists. We considered doing ..read more