{"id":5970,"date":"2018-02-10T15:49:07","date_gmt":"2018-02-10T23:49:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/?p=5970"},"modified":"2018-02-10T15:49:07","modified_gmt":"2018-02-10T23:49:07","slug":"costume-inspiration-lily-elsies-merry-widow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/2018\/02\/costume-inspiration-lily-elsies-merry-widow\/","title":{"rendered":"Costume Inspiration: Lily Elsie’s “Merry Widow” Assiut Corset"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"I just love the costume worn by actress Lily Elsie in the 1907\/8 theatrical production of The Merry Widow in London. This amazing ensemble was created by Lady Lucy Duff-Gordon working under her professional design name Lucile.\u00a0 She was one of the first British high fashion designers and was quite a character in her own right. Here’s a link to a blog post where you can\u00a0<\/span>read more<\/a>\u00a0details about Lily Elsie, Lucile, and the Merry Widow costume.<\/span><\/p>\n

For this project, my goal was to create a Merry Widow inspired costume in the style and flavor of the image below. To catch the essence of Lily Elsie’s look, we started with a ready-made corset-style top.\u00a0The assiut covered corset was the only part of my ensemble that we stitched for this look. The corset-top was a previously owned costume piece, but you can find similar items on Amazon. If I were going to make another one of these today, I would start with a\u00a0style that’s currently available.<\/a><\/p>\n

The Inspiration<\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"Lily<\/p>\n

Postcard of Lily Elsie as the Merry Widow by Foulsham & Banfield,
\npublished by Rotary Photographic Co Ltd, bromide postcard print, 1907<\/h5>\n

I worked with my friend, costume maker Misia Rockte\u00a0and together we strategically place assiut motifs between the bones of the corset.\u00a0 Most of the motifs were scraps and leftover pieces from a variety of projects I was building for my book, The Cloth of Egypt: All About Assiut<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 Available on Amazon<\/a> and Etsy<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Although I don’t have any images of the corset embellishments during construction, we used standard thread and simple hand sewing applique techniques to apply the assiut motifs. Using a ready-made corset as the foundation made this project quick and affordable.\u00a0 I was very happy to use up a bunch of scraps, but if you needed to purchase assiut for a similar project, plan on using half of an assiut shawl to get this level of motif coverage.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Completing the Look<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Once the corset was completed, three uncut assiut pieces finished the look.\u00a0 Under everything, I’m wearing a simple black skirt and tank-top. Around my hips, I draped a large ornate modern assiut shawl and pinned it into place. To capture the essence of Lily Elsie’s large double-brooches, we added a bracelet and a necklace that gave the same shape and visual weight.<\/p>\n

For sleeves, we used an assiut shawl in the lantern style.\u00a0 I quickly tacked this shawl in four places to create a tube. It was tucked at the tops of my shoulders to keep the sleeves in place.\u00a0 Over my chest, I tucked a white assiut triangle and let the beaded embellished edge drape over the top of the corset.\u00a0 This echoed the white lace top that Lily wore under her corselette.\u00a0 If I were going to wear this garment for a long period of time, I would hand stitch these pieces into place, using sturdy thread and big stitches that are easy to remove.\u00a0 Since we were just staging a photo, tucking was perfectly fine.<\/p>\n

The final step was to load up with rhinestone jewelry.\u00a0 Earrings, three necklaces and a pair of bracelets complete the look.\u00a0 Ultimately, the corset wasn’t REALLY my size, so there are no back shots and it went on to another home.\u00a0 Someday, I hope to get a corset-top that really fits me well to create a full ensemble to really wear.\u00a0 I’m keeping my eyes peeled for better jewelry to capture the Edwardian theater look.<\/span><\/p>\n

I really enjoyed using assiut scraps to create a new look. I currently have a fairly good-sized bin of scraps.\u00a0 Perhaps I’ll get one whipped up before the end of the year!<\/p>\n

Happy Costuming!<\/em><\/strong>
\nDawn Devine ~ Davina<\/em><\/strong>
\nFebruary 10, 2018<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"<\/a>

I just love the costume worn by actress Lily Elsie in the 1907\/8 theatrical production of The Merry Widow in London. This amazing ensemble was created by Lady Lucy Duff-Gordon working under her professional design name Lucile.\u00a0 She was one of the first British high fashion designers and was quite a character in her own […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5980,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/Dawn-LilyElsie-Detail-WEB-1.jpg?fit=504%2C762&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2YZtR-1yi","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5970"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5970\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6001,"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5970\/revisions\/6001"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5980"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.davina.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}