A Dedicated Follower of Fashion

An event! I took no pictures! You're all very surprised!

We met at the Village Teahouse in Lansdale - it's in a Victorian house and is very charming. The owner came out and told us how nice it was that we dressed up for tea, and she loves when people visit dressed up. Good tasty food, and we (accidentally) stayed a few minutes past closing time because they were too polite to throw us out right on the dot. Also was about $10 more expensive than the average market rate for an afternoon tea in our area. (IMO worth it, but also not necessarily my new default tea house. Well, it's also an hour-plus from me!)

I made Tom take a few pictures when I got home to prove I wore something, and bless his heart, he got the compost tumbler in all the pictures. Oh well. xD (We have a good-sized yard but every side looks like shit in some way for costume pictures background! The compost tumbler made it in frame because the kids jumping into the above-ground pool just on the other side seemed like a greater evil, I guess lol)


Mildly less dorkface pictures posted on Insta



Sunday was running around and doing errands, and acquiring more old furniture from FB Marketplace that I GUESS we didn't really need but yes, we totally did. (And now I'm really not allowed to get any more antique furniture apart from a nicer desk for the sewing room, and a bed frame, because this house is not that big.) The listing was for a china-cabinet-type thing for $50 - we've been on the lookout for one for a liquor cabinet, because Tom wanted an upgrade from the cheapass particle board microwave cart, which I felt was fair. Guy had it out for us, and then said that he had a bunch more pieces he was trying to get rid of in the garage, and did I want to look at them?

(The garage door was open and Tom was with me; this was not the beginning of a Lifetime movie plot.)

O ho ho, did I ever. They were mostly china cabinets, and we already have a china cabinet, but I spied a pretty Something, a little more fine-looking than the other pieces, and a little smaller. Hello, my pretty, you appear to be a secretary desk! I think I need you. How much, sir? $75? Negotiable?  Honeeeeeeeey...can I buy another big piece of furniture? Where am I going to put it? Who cares! In my sewing room if I have to!

Reader, I did not negotiate, I zipped right off to that Wawa ATM and gave that man $80 because the ATM only gives out 20s! (Also because he helped us transport the pieces home in his enormous Lincoln towncar trunk when the bigger bases wouldn't fit in either of our wee cars. He's only about half a mile away from us, and he offered, for $10 more. Sold, sir!)

We haven't exactly decided where to put the secretary yet - a distinct down side to a previous owner having open-concept-ed the downstairs as much as they could means there are no goddamn walls to put furniture against! - but here's one I found online. It's early-to-mid 20th-century, mahogany, Hepplewhite-style, by the Maddox furniture company, and although it's certainly not pristine, it's in nice used shape. AND it's pretty! AND it was $75!

Now I guess I have to do my lesson planning at my secretary to justify having bought it LOL.

ZOMG, an EVENT?! And a NEW OUTFIT?! It's like the Before Times!

I'll do a nice blog post at some point when I have time - probably next weekend - but let's have documentation that there was an actual event, eh?

This pose is...fairly representative of the afternoon! Definitely not a day of Serious Historical Interpretation. (Today's oddly specific query from The Public was, "Can you tell me about these houses?" Uh, that would be a no, my friend. We got that exact question from more than one person, which was funny!)



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Now I want to continue sewing ALL THE THINGS...but Monday and lesson planning calls, grumble. I did cut and start sewing together the panels for the sprigged cotton print petticoat (that will go with a matching short gown) on Friday night, because I was 100% done sewing and packed up for the next day, but still wanted to sew and was obviously in a Regency mood, but wanted something that didn't require thinking! I may continue on with that as the next project, or I might switch over to something I actually NEED for the Virginia trip, which would be smart. I'm still collecting lace for the pink peony dressing gown so it won't be that, but I could make the white Regency gown or one of the c1900 shirtwaists. Hmmm....

We had our Poe event today - we ended up doing Valley Forge rather than Laurel Hill cemetery, because the cemetery's open but the restrooms are not (which is understandable, but the idea of being in a not-great part of Philly all afternoon with nowhere to pee was a little stressful to me and other members of the party).

I'm too sleepy tonight to round up all the pics in which I look nice (and you can see my new sleeves haha), but this is a quality shot for a preview:


We had a ton of fun - many people made new things, but primarily it was just so nice to be able to hang out with people again! We're hoping that things stay okay here, pandemic-wise, and we can manage to make one of the local Christmastime events, since they're mainly outdoors...

(I was holding out for some less posed pictures from Sunday, but it looks like nobody's got any they want to share! So we'll just get a quick "I made a thing" post rather than a full-on blah-blah-blah event post! Which is okay, I guess, as I'm working every day from this past Monday through next Friday, and I doubt I'll feel inspired to spend hours and hours on a post anyway...)

robinsnest did a nice little recap already, so just to sum up: we had a good turnout and made some new friends, the weather was 90% perfect (if I were ordering weather I'd have requested more cloud cover and 5 degrees cooler, but we really lucked out for August in Philly), and we only got ticked off once by staff for being a potential nuisance. Not Bad. It's really a perfect place for a costume outing, even if we're technically a little early for it...a garden stroll and fountains feel so very turn-of-the-century! We were very decorative and several people asked us if we were going to sing. (????)

So, I did in fact finish a thing! And looking back at pics I may actually leave it untrimmed. I know that the fashion ideal would have this trimmed, but we can't all be trimmed, eh? Or, put it this way: if I'm struck with a burst of inspiration for this I may trim it, but if I never get around to it that's fine too.

( A few peektures )
So, what's up next? Well...probably sending the sewing machine to get cleaned, actually. It's VERY squeaky! And I've either never gotten it cleaned, or gotten it cleaned once, in 15 years of having it. Ahem. It might be time...as it's got a fair amount of sewing to do for Gettysburg and it would be very unfortunate for it to poop out suddenly on me. That definitely should happen within the next couple of weeks.

Other than Gettysburg, I don't think there's much of anything planned for fall? There is Belvidere, which I usually do enjoy but am feeling meh about this year. There's been no talk of fancy dinner yet, and the shopping has gotten pretty lacklustre. I think I'm going to give it a miss in favor of Opera on the Mall with the Imaginary Boyfriend (who actually voluntarily downloaded Don Giovanni after I took him to see it last year, and has requested Moar Opera) - it's a free broadcast on Independence Mall of an opera put on by Opera Philadephia, and it makes for a nice date night. We have seriously conflicting schedules these days so there hasn't been time for many date nights.

(There has been some talk of another Edwardian event, in dinner dress this time, but as I'm not sure when that will be, it's going on the post-Gettysburg back burner mentally.)

First on the docket for Gettysburg will be two things, I think: finish up my Rational dress outfit, and figure out exactly what I'm going to do for my new ballgown. I'm 90% decided on fabric, finally (unless I find a fashion plate or something I really want to copy) - after getting a million swatches I think I'm going to just buy more of the taffeta I already had - the darker of the yard each of two purples I bought for my late 1830s bonnet this spring. I decided to go with the pastel one and just hung on to the darker one, since it's a lovely color and I knew I'd use it for something. Apparently, a belt to go with my 1898 outfit was "something"! It's maybe a few shades darker than is advisable if you want to be able to see details of your dress in a poorly-lit ballroom...but the satin monster is very light-colored so I guess I want something in contrast to that! So within the next week or so I need to decide on a design, decide if I want to make both a ball and dinner bodice for this dress (other option is possibly the horrible chartreuse silk if I have enough of that? Still haven't looked), and order the fabric.

And...yeah, I'm apparently on a purple kick this year! Which is funny, as I own exactly zero things that are purple in my real-life wardrobe, but hey, I'm enjoying it.

Robin's already done a post that sums it up, but I shall write a gratuitous event post anyway! And a blog post on the striped dress if I'm feeling super industrious, and the tea supply holds out. (ETA: Yes, and an even wordier post than this one! Woo.)

The five Usual Suspects met up athiraimi 's house to carpool down to Carolyn's fabulous house in D.C. for a 12th Night fancy dress-themed party this past Saturday.blackcat452  is in possession of a vehicle large enough to take 5 costumers and their crap down to an event, and very kindly volunteered to do so. Which was very much appreciated, especially considering the valet parking fee *which was the only option for parking at the hotel)! Ahh, D.C.prices...

Some of us decided to wear 1860s fancy dress that had been made for last Gettysburg; the rest of us poked our closets and said, "hmm, what Victorian dresses do I have that I can make into fancy dress with minimal effort?" Which is entirely a period-correct approach, so. I wanted to get another wearing of the ivory and black striped natural form, and figured I could stick stars all over it and be Starry Night or something. Alice had the same idea with her natural form dinner dress, and I thought we made a fab counterpoint, with me in black and ivory and silver, and her in yellow and gold.

(Properly Victorian miserable, we were. In this picture anyway...)

Carolyn's house is gorgeous, the food was delicious (so much CHEESE OMG), and the company was lovely. We showed up around 5, and got back to the hotel a little after 10:30. A very satisfactory showing! And we very much puzzled two Lyft drivers. The one on the way back was taciturn, but the one on the ride out was chatty, and he asked us if we were connected to the people he'd dropped off on U Street wearing pajamas earlier. Ah...no?

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Well, I meant to write this up a week ago...details, details. But I'm trying to write more, because I like writing, and I'm always better when I do it consistently!

(Also, when I fail microeconomics this summer, maybe I can somehow figure out how to get someone to pay me for writing something instead of teaching. Certainly not here, but...)

Robin's already done her very timely writeup, but I think we looked very nice and had a lot of fun, even if it wasn't as flashy and scenic as the airshow! (I stole all these pictures from Robin so if they look familiar...that's why.)

In summary: the weather forecast sucked, and then it sucked a bit less, but all of us besides hiraimi  are wimpy and didn't especially want to go and spend $30 admission plus an hour-and-fifteen driving time to hang out on an airfield in the chilly, possibly rainy weather. Alice was gracious about us wimping out the night before and still showed up to tea, though. ;) Plus, everyone besides me had finished something new for the air show, so the new things needed to be worn Out, even if not to an air show!



And honestly...this picture says all you need to know about us. Can't behave ourselves and have lots of fun doing so!

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And it seems nobody took any pictures of anything, oops. (Well, I took six. They're all of us on the carousel in the City Hall square, and they're all horrible, so. Except I think this one of Robin's kind of adorable!)

We ended up being able to squeak into a last-minute reservation at the much-more-atmospheric-than-the-alternate-option Dandelion Pub (it's easier to make a reservation for 5 people than 8 or 9, who knew?), where we happened to be at a table in the middle of the room, and got stared at by what felt like several dozen people. Come on, vintage isn't THAT WEIRD, people! Must be the hats. Hats freak people out.

The extremely-festive snow did make the walk from the restaurant a bit of a trek; it's impressive how the snow was blowing directly into our faces while we headed both north and then turned east. I think I'd have been happy to do a little more browsing in the Christmas market if there hadn't been quite so much snow... But we did take a ride on aforementioned carousel, since we are all only about ten years old, and then picked our way over to Macy's to see the (slightly creepy animatronic) Dickens Village, the Very Famous Light Show (which was advertised as having the organist play live at that hour but it was all FILTHY LIES, as there was an organist but all he did was sit on the damn bench and take pictures with his lady friend. Well, f you, sir), and for me to wax poetical about the Wanamaker building, because I've been going there my whole life and I love that damn thing.

A full third of the Christmas tree had its blue and green lightbulbs out, though. Ooops. Also, John Wanamaker's meditation room, which has what I suspect are Tiffany glass windows, and which he originally built for his employees to have a space for quiet time to themselves (religious man, but wanted all faiths to be welcome, which is Not Bad for a 19th/20thc rich white dude) was filled with Christmas merchandise. It's on the walk-through to the space where the Dickens Village lives and is usually closed up. Nice for everyone to be able to see the stained glass panels, but...yeesh. (I am not religious, but I do have sensibilities, and crass materialistic bullshit kind of offends them.)

Unless it's a commentary on this country's real religion...but I cannot imagine Macy's having that kind of motivation. LOL.

Aaaanyway. We packed it up after the light show, since everybody but me had a fairly long train ride home (hah! tables are turned this time! usually that's my job). Not the world's most thrilling event, but I hope everybody had a decent time! And the walrus skirt was a hit - I wore it again today and got an amusingly gushy compliment from a lady at the train station.

Stolen from Robin on IG:


(And yes, I still intend to finish up the Horrible Plaid Dress, and either 1/ see if I can make it less horrible, or 2/ write out a very informative post for the general public as to why it's horrible.)

Second Boer War, to be specific.

(The Facebook event just said "Boer War", mind you, with no dates. Apparently this is colloquial for the second war...but as 1/ we didn't know this til yesterday as that's when the park put up the event description, and 2/ none of us have c.1900 summer dresses anyway...we cheerfully assumed it was the first war in the early 1880s, as that's what we have clothes for. As assumed...nobody cared. *grin*)

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Robin's flickr album here

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That's the mid-Atlantic air museum, to you - and we only went Sunday! Next year we really ought to go Saturday, just because the regiments have to start packing up at 5 on Sunday, so it's not really a full day. There's also a dance Saturday night but I don't care as much about that because I'm a horrible dancer (it's a good thing I didn't actually live in Ye Oldey Timey Times in the past couple of hundred years when dances were such an important part of socializing...).

( Pictures! Yapping! )
So...we're definitely going back next year, and we're definitely going Saturday, and I am definitely going to make it a point to have a couple of Reading-appropriate dresses in different weights in my closet!

(Photobucket album)

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Obviously I had an amazing time, as the White House is pretty much incapable of throwing a lackluster party! And all attendees really brought their A-game, too; every single person looked smashing, in my opinion. Well done, ladies!

(You know this is the kind of party that ten years ago I'd have been reading about online, and wishing I was cool enough to know all these cool people and their cool parties! Koshka-the-cat, Jenny laFleur...I still kind of think I was invited accidentally as I'm not actually cool, but shhh, nobody blow my cover. ;) )

I mean, LOOK AT THIS AWESOMENESS.


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(Photobucket album, some of my own pictures, more of ones I've pilfered)

Can't afford to get complacent with my sewing, as there's stuff coming up quick...but I'm taking a couple days off to read books, and plot. Plotting is always fun.

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