The Duchess of Devonshire Tiffany blue and silver muff - December 'Special Occasion' HSM Challenge

For December's 'Special Occasion' challenge I made a special occasion muff - light Tiffany blue silk taffeta hand-painted with metallic silver paint, leaf design on both ends and a fleur-de-lis design in the center. Finished with a Duchess of Devonshire fabric portrait, trimmed in platinum silk ribbon, with platinum silk ribbon ties and a white muff insides (pillow) with 100% white goose down inside. During the late 18th century, a muff of this style and design, material, would have been used for special occasions!

The Duchess of Devonshire tiffany blue and silver Silk 'special occasion' muff

Close-up of The Duchess of Devonshire

            Historical Sew Monthly 
           DECEMBER challenge:

http://thedreamstress.com/the-historical-sew-monthly-2016/

The Challenge: Special Occasion: make something for a special event or a specific occasion, or that would have been worn to special event of specific occasion historically.

Material: Light Tiffany blue silk taffeta, hand-painted with metallic silver paint

Pattern: The Lady Detalle muff pattern on Etsy

Year: late 18th century

Notions: fabric portrait, platinum silk ribbon for the portrait and ties

How historically accurate is it? All hand-sewn. They had portrait muffs during this time, made with silk, trimmed and with down, wool or other natural fibers inside, and they had hand-stamped, hand-painted fabric at the time, so pretty close!

Hours to complete: A decent amount! Some time to paint, sew it all together, add the fabric portrait, ribbon trim and whew, creating the white goose down muff insides is, um, rather messy, LOL. So, a decent bit of time!

First worn: Not yet worn, this one's going here.

Total cost: Hard to find light aqua tiffany blue silk taffeta, 100% white goose down, silk ribbon and silver metallic paint. All stash.

A few more pics!


 

Etsy Shop update - portrait muffs for warm hands this cold winter!

Update: Well, I've been spending a lot of my sewing time lately working on things for my Etsy shop, TheLadyDetalle: I'm having a lot of fun designing and sewing these fabric portrait muffs. They are fun to create and be creative with, and require such a small amount of fabric. I've been able to pick up some really lovely designer silk sample remnants that I can sometimes get enough to make a muff!

Etsy shop muffs

More muffs for the shop - Marie Antoinette
Bee muffs and Duchess of Devonshire

I use this muff pattern, and/or this muff tutorial to create these muffs, and then add trim design, painted design, fabric portraits or some of each to create the finished muffs!

When it gets COLD out like it is now in much of the world, I start dreaming of more outerwear, more muffs to keep hands warm, more capes or cloaks, more fluffy marabou, more hoods.

My next project is this, a late 18th century pelisse!

I'm using Tiffany blue silk taffeta and some lovely vintage fur - there's no pattern for this garment available, so I'll be drafting this myself, wish me luck!

Here's my Pinterest board on muffs. And here are some images of some extant portrait version!