Please join us in welcoming Twig + Tale Customer Care team member Lindsey Foster to the blog. Lindsey is a historian and experimental archaeologist who completely immerses herself in the fascinating world of historical people and their stories. This includes studying, sewing, and wearing historical clothing.
This is part 1 of a series in which Lindsey will use T+T patterns as a base for creating a historically-inspired outfit. Here, she shares a little bit of her story, as well as her plans for transforming a selection of beautiful op-shop textile finds into something new (and old!). Be sure to follow along to see the final look.
Dear Reader;
A few years ago, I left my home country and moved with my Beloved to the opposite side of the planet. I had to make hard decisions about what possessions I would keep, and what I would let go of. I carefully selected the things I could not live without, and packed and repacked them into suitcases as the day of my departure drew nearer. A few treasures were non-negotiable: a blue and yellow patchwork quilt lovingly crafted for me by my beloved paternal grandmother, Jecquita. We call her Grandma Sugar, but that’s another story for another time. There’s a belt buckle shaped like an eagle, a tiny watercolour of an eighteenth-century storehouse. Carefully wrapped in tissue paper was a porcelain trinket dish and hand-tatted doilies that had once belonged to my maternal Great-Grandmother Nelle, who had begun her life traveling across the United States via covered wagon in the late nineteenth century.
As a very small child, I grew up in a world of the Great Plains, with countless fields of wheat and corn spreading just outside city limits. My kin were from the Ozarks, and I had grown up loving the rolling farmland, the clear rivers and hollers and hills, daydreaming always about what it was like to arrive to the valley like great-grandma Nelle in a covered wagon, what it felt like for her to be a girl my same age. My fascination with the history of normal people began to take root. That seedling of imagination and curiosity was cherished and cultivated by teachers and mentors. I grew into a storyteller, an experimental archaeologist, and a historian.
I’m not a names-and-dates historian. I like stuff and things, people and choices, causes and consequences. I have literally immersed myself in the world of the historical past, working for years in museums as an interpreter and educator, studying and constructing and wearing historical clothing, portraying historical people with as much fidelity and nuance as possible. I am interested in whole-person historical studies. I pay attention to archival silences, and note whose voices are telling the story, and whose voices are absent from the narrative. And as I learn, I find that the written and oral stories of historical people reveal them to be just as observant, clever, witty, poignant, hilarious, cruel, wry, and human as we ourselves are.
Since arriving in Aotearoa (New Zealand), I find myself following in the footsteps of countless people who have come before me, tasked with making home in a new place. I carefully unpacked the treasures I brought with me, treasuring the women who made me who I am. I began to adjust to the pace of life in my new home, but I felt somehow out of step. I felt torn between my new home and my old haunts. I decided that one way to find myself in a place that was entirely new to me was to turn to the historical archives and find how others have answered this same question.
I thumbed through a series of letters written by female emigrants in the nineteenth century. They were incredible correspondents, and wrote candidly about their journeys and experiences. I paused in my research when I spotted a familiar name. An excerpt from a letter written by Mary Taylor in Wellington, New Zealand, to her dear friend, Charlotte Brontë, residing in England, in July of 1848:
I can hardly explain to you the queer feeling of living as I do in 2 places at once. One world containing books, England, and all the people with who I can exchange an idea; the other all that I actually see and hear and speak to. The separation is as complete as between the things in a picture and the things in the room. The puzzle is that both move and act, and I must say my say as one of each. The result is that one world at least must think me crazy.
I couldn’t help but smile. My experience and Mary Taylor’s seemed to resonate: to feel torn between Home and Home, to struggle to reconcile one’s place in the world. I read more letters. I found more examples. I found an intangible yet sincere community – a chorus of other women across time who had made similar journeys, asked similar questions, and made similar adjustments. One woman writes anxiously to her sister, demanding to know what style of bonnet is most fashionable in her hometown, so that she could keep up with the trend. Another grumbles that the most recent shipment of newly printed cottons for dressmaking did not yet arrive. Another describes refashioning a dress in order to suit a newly modish silhouette, another details the mountain of mending she had been putting off. One woman writes about the secondhand clothing arriving in the harbour, and mentions her plans to put these garments to new and wholesome use.
I felt inspired. In all my historical clothing pursuits, I strive for authenticity. You can never truly be historically accurate, but you can be historically adequate, and I find that pursuit to be rewarding and revealing. But that often means trawling through charity shops for vintage materials to either repair or repurpose. It’s an unpredictable practice, buying a few metres of fabric here, a scrap of lace there. I have found some incredible treasures over the years, and am honoured to give these materials new life. It’s what our forbears did: making do, mending, repurposing, and revitalizing. This committed practice is also one of the things that drew me to Twig + Tale. I love the way this community embraces slow sewing and upcycling. I love the encouragement and creativity that folks pour into their projects. And I love the designs! I love the classic and cozy silhouettes of Twig +Tale patterns; they’re whimsical and imaginative and romantic, but also sincere and practical and useful.
I decided to follow the example of the women whose letters I have been reading. I would make do, mend, refashion, and revive some pre-loved materials into a new T+T outfit that gave a nod to the past. Over the past few weeks I visited secondhand stores and collected materials that already had a life before me: a single-size polycotton duvet cover trimmed with broderie anglaise, a few metres of tartan cotton shirting, a length of royal blue wool from a now-defunct textile mill. I found scraps of leather, a roll of narrow black cotton tape, a packet of antique-looking buttons. I found a few fat quarters of reproduction quilting cotton. I found a linen flat sheet with a small stain on one corner. All of these things were otherwise destined for the landfill. By repurposing them, I would let them have another chapter. I’d continue their story. They’d continue mine.
As I have been reading the letters and diaries primarily of European women arriving in Aotearoa New Zealand in the span of 1840-1870. I decided that my time traveling outfit would draw from this time span. I want to only use the materials I have found at charity shops, which narrows my focus to a look I know can achieve: the fashionable bodice-and-skirt combination of the 1860s.
I like to sketch my designs before I start my projects. I sat down and did some doodles until I had my past-meets-present outfit planned out!
I’ll sew a Scenic Top out of part of the white linen sheet, using the Sprig Sleeve Add-On to achieve that blousewaist look. I’ll play around with cotton tape applique to evoke the trimmings on the bodice of this fashionable midcentury style! And while I’ll keep the more open neckline of the Scenic to make this comfortable to wear during the summer months, I think this look wouldn’t be complete without a neckbow, so I’ll add the Serendipity Bow. I haven’t decided which fabric to use for the bow yet. A lot of the Victorian originals are really loud or garish to the modern eye, so I’ll have to decide if I’ll go historical or modern with this accessory. Next, I plan to make the side-laced version of the Lorien Skirt. I’m torn between using the green tartan cotton, or perhaps the royal blue wool. I’ll have a play with it and see which looks best. Regardless of the material, I know that I want this skirt to look very full, so I intend to add a second “petticoat” layer. I’ll make that out of my thrifted, embroidered duvet cover. I’ll also make the Skirt Hikes, so I can show off my fancy petticoat, just like these ensembles from the 1860s.
I feel really good about my plans. I’m excited to have this outfit to wear that intentionally blends the old and new. As I wash and iron and deconstruct these materials to prepare them for their new lives, I am mindful of those women who have come before me. Women like Mary Taylor who also arrived in Aotearoa to make a home far away from their homeland. But also women like my Grandma Sugar, Jecquita, who has all her life crafted beautiful quilts out of fabric scraps and off-cuts. Women like my Great-Grandmother Nelle, whose tenacity and strength and sense of adventure continue to resonate decades beyond her time. I think of those unnamed hands that have touched the materials I find in op shops. Their fingerprints linger on the cloth, the lace, the buttons. They embroidered the motifs. They stitched the hems. They’re with us as we find new life for these old, precious things, as we bring them into our homes and transform them into something new and unique and special.
That’s the gorgeous thing about history. It’s not a finished story told about other people. It’s our story, too. It’s them, and it’s us, and it’s those who will come after us. It’s every thread in a tapestry, every tear and every patch and darn. We get to weave it. We get to write it. It’s an honor to hold the pen.
Until next time.
Xoxo,
Lindsey
Read part 2 of Lindsey's story here: An historically-inspired ensemble in progress
Read part 3 here: The grand reveal of the final outfit
Find all of the patterns that Lindsey uses to create her historically inspired outfit here.
