mme_du_jard

Living history 1804

2009-06-17T07:09:55Z

This weekend I was in the Museum of Kiekeberg where we had a living history- event set in 1804. It was great fun :) My dear husband and I did portray showmen, we had a paper-theater with us and told some dances to the peasants.
By the way, this is the only museum in Germany with own living-history-interpreters! (We were only there as guests)
I made this little Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MD30gy1k4HA
And a friend of mine this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5QHVCRKAi-0

Nightmare...

2009-03-21T20:45:01Z

I don't like to use lj for personal complainments, but in this case I just have to write this....

Since threequarters a year we are waiting for some rebuildings in our flat (the house belongs to my father and his brother and sister) , my uncle promised us to join our tiny flat with the other one on the floor which is abandoned since threequarters a year.
We were fed up and started to seach for a bigger flat, which we found some month ago. We will move at the 4th of april.
My super-duper-uncle who waited such a long time and put us off again and again did call my father this morning that we have to prepare our flat for building workers today that they will come in half an hour.
Since it was abandoned my father had allowed me to use the flat next to ours as a provisional atelier and now I had to take out everything I had in there! Our flat is very small and it was nearly impossible to get all this stuff in...

Ok, that was the first nice surpirse. The next was, that this workes would make the breaktrough the wall TODAY. My uncle told me that we just had to push the couch aside, and they would attach a foil on the wall, that there would be no dirt in our flat.
I was alerted and did not only push the couch aside but also did take most of our book from the shelf besides the couch and laid them on the couch putting the plaid over it.
My parents did collect us to take us with them that we didn't have to stay in all that mess and noise, I took some stuff with me including my last two comissened dresses to store them at my parent's.

When we came home this evening I though this must be a bad nightmare!
All our flat was covered with a coat of white dust *scream* I was so angry I could have choked my uncle. I called him emediately, nearly screaming in the phone...

What does he think??? Couldn't he wait with this just two weeks??? Than we would have been out of there and no problems would have happened.

We now stay at my parents for the night, tomorrow our sunday will be very funny... we have to clean EVERYTHING we have.

I'm so angry! I hoped so much, that I would wake up the next moment and see that everything is just a nightmare...

mme_du_jard @ 2009-03-15T12:42:00

2009-03-15T11:38:52Z

Happy belated birthday, lisotchka :o)

(Sorry, I'm infamous for forgetting birthdays....)

Robe à la francaise

2009-03-13T13:14:42Z

I recently finished a robe à la francaise with XXL-Pannier for a customer (she is much smaller than the dress-stand, she will be as high as broad...)

Recent Projects

2009-02-01T15:13:15Z

I have neglected LG too much the last time, I know.
So here is a summery of my recent projects.
I have begun to knit again - my husband says it's wool-madness.... but he benefits from it, I made a pair of 18th century stockings for christmas for him.
I also knitted a pair for my self. I'm not quite contend with them, as the clock turned out very strange...

I also began to practice embroidery again, I embroidered two drawstringbags, and began to embroider a waistcoat:

And at last, my homepage is ready, it was made by a friend of mine - I'm totally untalented in this subject ;)
By now it's in german only, sorry:
www.au-trait-galant.de

Living-History event

2008-10-30T20:41:45Z

I wasn't online the last days, so this posting is a bit late. Fiofiorina already mentioned our 18th century weekend in Zeilitzheim ( www.barockschloss.de )
I have uploaded some pics and videos:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8666432@N04/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6gNx9392tk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbGEgtV-yrY

Waistcoat

2008-09-04T07:23:58Z

This morning I finished the waistcoat for which I made the deathheadbuttons some time ago:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3174/2826658785_e7ee2b12b2.jpg?v=0
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3063/2827495890_1eaa9a6e4b.jpg?v=0
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3033/2827495984_8c6d41643e.jpg?v=0

Living-History-Video

2008-09-03T06:36:29Z

A fellow-reenactor made a little video of your event in Kommern this spring:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8W9qm3PMTo " A prussian village in 1814" (you won't see me, but you will hear me singing ;)

Robe à la francaise

2008-08-30T10:01:23Z

Yesterday I finished the new Robe à la francaise for de_montsoreau. She had given me a francaise which she had begun to sew herself but didn't had the time to finish it and had some difficulties with the fitting.

Here is the result:
[IMG]http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3252/2808484683_965fa603fe.jpg?v=0[/IMG]
and without flash:
[IMG]http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3143/2809333656_6f418ff7f6.jpg?v=0[/IMG]

Millinery in Williamsbourgh

2008-08-27T10:39:45Z

A film about the milliners shop in colonial Williamsbourgh:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_ILQunru60&feature=related

Deathheadbuttons

2008-08-13T06:53:10Z

One of my recent comissions is a sleeved waistcoat for a friend. He did chose a creamcoloured taffeta for it, the same as my new Francaise. I promised him to make something special out of it and so I tried to make deathheadbuttons. They were very popular in the 18th century, but I have never seen that anyone has recreated them, so I think he will be the first reenactor in Germany to wear them!
I bought this booklet http://wmboothdraper.com/Books/death_head_sm.gif and I have to say, that the instructions are very good and much better than these which I read on a german webpage.
In the beginning I thought I was crazy to make such buttons and that it would take me years to make them, but it is less work than I thought, I need aproximately 10 min. for one button.

http://i516.photobucket.com/albums/u327/Mme-du-Jard/Sewing/IMG_0672.jpg
http://i516.photobucket.com/albums/u327/Mme-du-Jard/Sewing/IMG_0673.jpg

Regency Bonnet

2008-07-30T10:38:24Z

A silly cap needs a silly bonnet :o)

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3194/2713393863_a7bde8d990.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3202/2713393553_2b2ec0dbce.jpg?v=0

Master Craftwoman's Diploma

2008-07-15T07:58:30Z

Dear friends,
I coulnd't post this ealier, because I didn't had any computer until now.
I passed my master's diploma!!!
Now I am officially "Mistress of Dressmaking" or whatever the word is in English ;)
(I asked my model if I may post pics of her in the dress and jacket I made as my masterpiece but I don't have an answer yet)
I hope I will soon manage to get internet at home, and I hope I will be able to post more frequently about my projects.

Elisabeth Vigée Lebrun

2008-06-28T10:24:41Z

This might be interesting for some of you:
The memoirs of Elisabeth Vigée Lebrun:
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/lebrun/memoirs/memoirs.html

Journal des Luxus und der Moden

2008-05-12T16:27:30Z

This link might be interessting for some of you:
http://zs.thulb.uni-jena.de/content/main/journals/jlm.xml?XSL.lastPage.SESSION=/content/main/journals/jlm.xml
This are almost all volumes of the "Journal des Luxus und der Moden" (1786 to 1827), you can seach in "Suche" or just thumb through in "blättern" there a of course fashionplates which might also be interesting for all who don't understand german.

Some new living-history-stuff

2008-05-12T16:22:17Z

I recently finished my new living-history-stuff for this year's regency-events:

I also have a new Robe à la francaise. I originally didn't made this for myself, but for a customer, but this girl couldn't pay it, and because it fitted me too, and I liked it, I took it back. If I had made this for me, I would have made it entirely by hand, but as it was a comission I made the inner seams by machine.
I made the decoration according to a original specimin in the book "Modes en mirroir"

(Sorry for the chaos in the backround ;)

Ordinary people 1808

2008-04-18T10:24:48Z

In a german massage-board somebody posted this link, which I think is very interesting, as there are contemporary pictures showing ordinary people from the regency-era.

http://mall.craftech.com/hollinbooks/product_info.php/cPath/6/products_id/24

Coiffe

2008-04-18T10:21:20Z

My newest "coiffe ridicule" ;)
@Fiofiorina: I think this time mine is more ridiciulous...

Wanted : a name for my atelier!!

2008-04-10T17:45:13Z

Hello all together!
As some of you know, I will pas my master's diploma in july and afterwards I want to start my own business. My dormitory neighbour is a webdesigner and she makes a website for me, I already have my first comissions, but I have a problem: I still have no name for my atelier! Has anyone of you an idea??? I would be gratefull for every tip!

Fans

2008-01-26T14:59:00Z

At last I have now two fans for reenactment with which I am really content:
First, I got my fan from www.chenillesetpapillons.com , it was custom made specially for me and the "skelleton" (I don't know the proper word) is antique.

And I have made a fan for the late 18th century myself. I found exampels of brisé-fans with prints glued on in a book about fans André presented to me some weeks ago, and I straightly went to the asia-shop and bought a brisé-fan for 1,99€ , I rubbed away the kitschy padabeas with sandpaper and copied conteporary portraits on authentic paper cut them apart and glued them on the fan.

Voltaire on one side...

And emperor Joseph II on the other side.

1770 Hairstyles

2007-12-18T19:05:31Z

Has anyone of you ever heared of that book????

1770, Peter Gilchrist : "A treatise on hair or every lady her own hairdresser"

I found this titel in a catalogue about a exhibition about the history of wigs and I think it sounds very, very interesting. I googled for it, but couldn't find anything.... Maybe it is possble to get a copy from a library? I once ordered a copy of the german version of "l'art du tailleur" from an old university-library, are there such services at librarys in Britain or the US?

Photos

2007-12-03T11:28:44Z

I have just uploaded some photos from our trip to Bruchsal this weekend http://www.flickr.com/photos/8666432@N04/?saved=1

We started in Mannheim (where photographing was forbidden...) and visited the castle there. It was re-opened this year, most of the schloss had been destroyed in world war II and now they had restrored some of the representational rooms (don't know if this is the right word...). But we were all a little bit dissapointed after all the ballyhoo in the local press we did expect something more spectacular...
But one room was a real treasure: the library of the electress. A rococo-room par excellence the theme was a garden.

After that we went to Bruchsal, this schloss was also restored some years ago and so it had a very fresh look as if it had just been built. Although there was no furnishing left the rooms there were much more impressing and looked much more authentic. The staff was very friendly and one of them insisted of making a photo of all of us.
In the schloss they had also a small historicall museum about the city (not very exciting) and a museum with automatic music instruments. Of course the department with the early items from the 17th and 18th centruy was closed... but it was fun anyway.

Hello!

2007-12-03T10:43:59Z

This weekend Alessandra convinced me to subscribe here and voila, I'm here.
For all who don't know me yet: I'm a dressmaker, and do sew historical clothes since six years starting as a hobby and after my apprenticeship as a professional at "La reine des centfeuilles" where I worked for half a year, now I'm back at school and preparing for my examinations to get the master's diploma