Blue brocade gamurra and pink silk giornea started August 10, 2026. Finished September 11, 2026
My friend Jane will be surprised with an invitation to join the Order of the Pelican at Ancient Embers (SSBB) on September 11-13, 2026. Her husband, who is coordinating all of the things, asked the Ladies of Vegas to help with her garb for the day. Her In-Case-Of-Peerage(ICOP) document specifies “Either 14th century fitted gown with gothic wings or 15th century Italian”. She has also specified that she does not want anything too tight on the chest or in the arms. We have chosen 15th century Italian.
“Birth of St. John the Baptist” is a fresco painted between 1486-1490 inside the Santa Maria Novella in Florence Italy. The gal in the center front is wearing a pink giornea over a fancy cream colored gamurra. The gal in the far background is wearing fairly plain red gamurra with contrasting green sleeves.
The Ladies of Vegas consulted on this and we will be creating the gamurra from blue brocade and the giornea from a pink silk sari (lined in beet red linen).
I will be making the gamurra. I have decided to use a modified version of one of the patterns from The Modern Maker to form the bodice. Mistress Suzanne graciously gave me a copy of her bodice and sleeve patterns. Because I’m completely comfortable drafting a bodice based on the bara method with only a few measurements from the recipient, I will be using the Modern Maker’s pattern rather than using Mistress Suzanne’s pattern. If this were not a surprise peerage and I could actually do a fitting on the recipient I would have chosen differently.
Late update. The person making the giornea ran into road blocks and asked me to pick up that piece as well.
DETAILS FOR JANE’S GAMURRA:
– gamurra will be made of blue brocade
– bodice will be lined with black linen
– edges will use bias binding in blue brocade
– center front will be closed with a black ladder lace through gold lacing rings
– sleeves will tie on
– the skirt will have an inverted box pleat at center back with knife pleats evenly on either side.
– skirt will be unlined and use French seams
– the sleeves may be decorated with black velvet
DETAILS FOR JANE’S GIORNEA:
– giornea will be made from recycled sari silk and lined in beet red linen
– the sari pallu (decorative pattern on the end) will be cannibalized to decorate the front panels of the giornea (it looks kind of like pelicans).
– the pattern for the giornea will be copied from Mistress Suzanne’s existing giornea. This will be adjusted so that it fits in the fabric available from the sari and per Jane’s request it will omit a train.
COSTS
4 yard Blue Damask ??? This has been in my stash for almost 20 years. I have NO idea how much I paid for it. Probably around .
1 yard 1C64 Luxury Black Softened – 100% Linen – Medium (5.3 oz/yd2) (purchased February 16, 2023)
Skating lace from Amazon .99 for 2 (purchased June 2016)
12 Gold lacing rings
15 yards black Double Face Satin Ribbon 3/8 inch from Amazon (purchased March 2024)
1 sari (Rikissa purchased it. I’m unsure on the cost)
5 yards IL019 All-purpose Beet Red Fs Signature Finish .95 (purchased February 2023)
2 gold buttons
gold silk thread for the giornea center-front tie
GAMURRA TODO:
- (done) Wash and iron fabric (4 yards fashion fabric, 1 yd lining necessary)
Bodice - (done) Draft a new bodice pattern (C: 38, W: 35, L: 33).
- (done) Cut out the bodice (fashion fabric and lining). Cut the fashion fabric. Then use the fashion fabric to cut out the lining.
- (done) Sew the side seams and the strap seams on the fashion fabric. Press and prick stitch the seams open.
- (done) Sew the side seams and the strap seams on the lining. Press and prick stitch the seams open.
- (done) Make bias binding 2″ wide (~110″) from the fashion fabric.
- (done) Bind the neck, armseye openings, and front opening (machine sew at 1/4″ on one side, hand finsish the other side)
- (done) Add lacing rings to the bodice.
Skirt - (done) Cut out the skirt (fashion fabric). Front should be cut on a fold to eliminate the center front seam.
- (done) Sew skirt together (French seam 1/4″+1/2″ SA). Bias-to-bias in the center back. Fold in center front, bias-to-straight on all the other seams.
- (done) Cut a ~6″ slit into the top of the center front panel of the skirt.
- (done) Attach the skirt to the bodice fashion fabric (Put a reverse box pleat at the center-back and then divide and conquer knife pleat eaither side to fit the top of the skirt evenly across the back of the bodice. It should fit pretty close on the front edge).
- (done) Hand sew the bodice lining bottom edge front and back to enclose the skirt seam (slip stitch, felling stitch or whip stitch).
- (done) Continue the bias binding from the center front edges down to enclose the slit at the top of the skirt. Reinforce the bottom of the V.
- (done) Find a lace.
- (done) Mark
and cutthe hem to desired length. - (done) Hem
Sleeves - (done) Adjust pattern
- (done) Cut out sleeves fashion fabric and lining
- (done) Sew them together
- (done) Hand finish the opening which was used to flip the sleeve inside-out
- (done) Add machine eyelets (13 on each sleeve)
- (done) Add lacings
LEARNINGS (AKA TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS)
8/10-8/18
Eckhart asked Vegas to handle Jane’s clothing. We settled on making 15th c. Italian and decided on fabrics to use. Blue damask for the gamurra (made by me), pink silk sari lined in beet linen for the giornea (made by Rikissa).
8/24/2026
Using Jane’s measurements I drafted her bodice on Christmas wrapping paper. Everything came out great. Looking over extant images of the type of dress we want to do I don’t see any guards on the bodice or on the skirt. So I’ve decided to bind the armseye and neck opening the blue damask instead of the black velvet I originally considered. Fabric is now in the wash.
8/29/2026
I cut out the blue damask bodice and skirt and skirt piecing. I also cut out the black linen lining. when I cut out one of the skirt panel I didn’t notice that the corner of the fabric had been trimmed away so I ended up pattern patching a triangle into the corner of one of the back piecing (in case someone wondered why the small triangle had an even smaller triangle in it).
I sewed together the blue damask bodice, the black linen bodice lining and most of the skirt.
8/30/2026
While at fighter practice I prick stitched all of the bodice seams open. Next up I’ll cut the bias binding out of the blue damask scraps from cutting out the bodice/skirt.
8/31/2026
I cut out all of the bias binding and attached it by machine with a 1/4″ SA on the armseyes and the front opening/neck.
9/1/2026 – 9/4/2026
I hand finished (slip stitched) the armseye and front opening.
9/5/2026
I finished the second half of the french seams on the skirt and ironed all of the seams to have a nice crisp fold.
I attached the skirt to the bodice. I came up with a BRILLIANT PLAN and marked the skirt at 2 inch increments from the center back seam out to the seams between the front and back. This made setting up the reverse box pleat and knife pleats trivial (fold on the marks and then pleat appropriately). Catastrophe was averted when I realized I had pinned the skirt to the wrong layer of the bodice BEFORE I started sewing. I re-pinned and it came together beautifully.
Finally I slip stitched the bodice lining to enclose the top of the skirt.
Lastly I added the lacing rings to the center front opening.
9/6/2026
At fighter practice I started hemming the dress. I kind of hate hemming a dress before putting it on the recipient. I’m anxious the hem will be incorrect. The skirt was not trimmed so the hem could be picked out and re-done after the ceremony if it needs to be adjusted.
Rikissa is having some LIFE and will be unable to complete the giornea so I picked it up from her and will complete it.
9/7/2026
I cut out the sleeves and lining and stitched them most of the way around the outside edge, clipped and flipped them. They just need the final opening sealed and eyelets added for the lace.
After staring at the sari for a LONG TIME I finally cut into it to make the giornea panels.
9/8/2026
At Rikissa’s suggestion I used a clear plastic shower curtain to figure out the proper cut for upper portions of the giornea and then used that on the pallu to figure out the best way to utilize the patterned pieces. I attached the cut out patterned pieces to the top front panels of the giornea. This was slip stitched onto the base silk.
9/9/2026
Working on the giornea. I sewed the panels together, attached the lining to the fashion fabric, nipped the seams, flipped it, ironed it and let it hang. I still need to add a final hem.
9/10/2026
I closed off the ends of the sleeves, added eyelets (13 eyelets per sleeve) and laces. I also attached a gold lacing ring at each shoulder for the sleeves to attach to.
9/11/2026
I hemmed the giornea. I used a blind machine hem stitch. Because I can’t measure this on Jane I wanted to leave as much fabric in place as I could in case she needed to adjust the hemline after the event. So I did not trim off the excess. This also give a bit of weight to the hem and give it a nice swing. I also added two gold buttons (with flowers on them) to the center front and did a 5-strand finger loop braid in gold silk to create a tie for the center front.
Done is beautiful.
Friday evening Their Majesties invited Jane to sit vigil for a Saturday evening ceremony. I posted a video of Jane’s invitation to sit vigil in The Merry Rose of Atlantia on Facebook.
When the Ladies of Vegas visited Jane at her vigil I showed her the outfit. In addition to the outfit I also gave her the patterns which were used to create the outfit.
9/12/2026
Saturday at 3pm The Ladies of Vegas helped Jane to dress and finally at afternoon court Jane was made a member of the Order of the Pelican. Vivat!
I posted a video of Jane’s Pelican ceremony in The Merry Rose of Atlantia on Facebook.
SOURCES
Gnagy, Mathew. The Modern Maker Vol. 2: Pattern Manual 1580-1640: Men’s and women’s drafts from the late 16th through mid 17th centuries. . Charleston SC: Printed by creativespace.com, 2018. Print.
OTHERS
Dawn’s Dress Diary https://dawnsdressdiary.wordpress.com/2017/09/23/red-gold-giornea-hsm-june-2017/
Cathelina di Alessandri https://cathelinadialessandri.wordpress.com/2015/08/08/giornea/
Aylwen Gardiner-arden https://aylwen.blogspot.com/2011/11/edhda-italian-renaissance-costume_9736.html