Our Historical Sew & Eat Retreat theme last year was ‘18th century, but with dinosaurs‘
So what did I wear?
Well, I was inspired by fashion plates like this one from 1789, showing figures taken from Ancient Greek red-figured pottery:
And extant examples of similar styles like the one in the John Bright Collection.
I thought, what if, instead of Pompeii and Herculaneum being excavated and creating a craze for classicism, enough dinosaur fossils were excavated to make a dinosaur craze? Then there would be dinosaur sashes!
I’m an OK artist, but my friend Jenni is an AMAZING artist, so I asked for her help. And she made me the most phenomenal black-figure dinosaur sash!
Look at it!
She used the design of the fashion plate as inspiration for the motifs, and was trying to figure out what to put on the sash ends. Being the pterrible person that I am, I said “what about an asteroid?”
I wore the sash over my black linen Aidah Gown. I’ve altered the sleeves to be 3/4 length since it was originally made.
There is a theme to my costume beyond the dino sash, and I’ll reveal that in a future post…
If I look a little wide, it’s because I’d injured my back quite badly, and am wearing stays 2 sizes larger than normal because of that.
An injured back didn’t stop me from frolicking with dinosaurs and generally having a delightful time though!
Very pleased with my dinosaur sash, and looking forward to lots of silly excuses to use it in future costumes!
