For this 22nd day of #historyinherhands , I offer this delicately inked fish pin keep. This silk over card fish exemplifies how nature was incorporated into women’s fancy work in the Victorian era. Padded with batting inside, this small fish accepts pins into its perimeter for use as needed.
There are two factors for finding a comfortable fit: Size and shape.
Size
The difference in wear or placement means we measure for a mid-nineteenth century had differently than we do for a twentieth or twenty-first century hat. The modern hat is measured just above the eyebrow. (This is also where many of us measure for bonnets. We want to keep you on your toes.) For mid-nineteenth century, we measure higher, at the hair line. In this illustration, we can see the difference between where the two measurements would be.
These higher, hairline measurements are often smaller than those taken at the eyebrow. A hat worn at this point can be slightly smaller to slightly larger for comfort. So, add and subtract an inch to your hairline measure.
For example: I am 22.5″ around at my eyebrows and 21.5″ at my hairline. The vast land of the internet tells me that the average woman’s head measures 22.5″ to 22 5/8″ around at the modern measuring point. So, I am about average. I comfortably wear a mid-nineteenth century hat that is 19.5″ to 21.5″
Here is my head with the tape showing where to measure. This is where I wear most CW era hats. This is the circumference of my head. My measurement is 21 1/2″. (Note: this is a full inch smaller than the modern measurement take lower.)
General guidelines I use:
Shape
It is helpful to know whether your head is more round or more oval.When looking from above, some people have rounder heads while other have more oval heads. I have an average oval head. Very round hats don’t work for me without adding to the lining.
Hat blocks can be more round or more oval with the same circumference. To illustrate: Both of these shapes to the right can have a circumference of 22.5″. Yet, the same hat would fit each head differently.
For this 18th day of #historyinherhands , I offer this assortment of sewing tools in light of change. Looking at these bone tools, one can not help but see how materials have changed from one century to the next. Now, each of these has been replaced by variations of plastic in common use.
This survey looks at 4 larger projects I have rolling around in my head. Please take a moment to answer the questions to help me plan.
For this seventeenth day of #historyinherhands , I offer this collection of antique straw motifs. While in the latter twentieth and twenty-first centuries straw worked into figures such as these has become an art and craft in itself, many of these motifs were used in nineteenth century millinery. Straw leaves were worked separately and added to bonnets or hats as well as being worked directly on a piece. Straw balls and baubles were created over wooden and cotton bead-like cores.
On this 16th day of #historyinherhands , I offer this assortment of stereoviews. Each dual images offered a story as it was viewed. Some told stories familiar. Some told stories of far away.
On this 15th day of #historyinherhands , I offer one of the many crafts of paper. This mid-twentith century box was constructed by hand of card stock and covered in paper inside and out. The pages of children’s books and ladies’ magazines were filled with useful and playful crafts made with paper.
On this 14th day of #historyinherhands , I offer this blue silk sewing case. This excellent piece is both an example of how women organized their sewing tools and organization in construction as this is made almost entirely from a length of ribbon.
On the thirteenth day of #historyinherhands , I offer bonnet veils. Lace worked on delicate silk net, can make bonnet veils quite fragile as a decade and a half passes.
On my much neglected to-do list is to re-roll the modest assortment of veils I have in archival paper.
If I Had My Own Blue Box: 