As a hand sewer, seeing the work of other hand sewers is very helpful. It keeps me going and reminds me how good and accurate a hand sewn garment can look.

Here are a few links to sites and the work of people I've admired for some time. I hope they are as interesting to you as they are to me.

The first stop is Britain's Tudor Group, which reconstructs domestic life in the late Tudor Era, from sheep shearing on up to an entire upper class household. The Tudor Group is the very best at what it does and maintains a strict, hand stitched policy for all clothing worn by its members. They have long been known for their lower class reconstructions, and have worked up the ladder to upper class, with Sutcliff Manor in 2004, and for the past two years, Haddon Hall. Their over-the-top blue silk suit is probably the finest reconstruction of its type today.

Members of the group have also contributed to the BBC series "Tales of the Green Valley," and "The Victorian Farm," and consult with the Globe Theater. Other members are active with the Mary Rose Trust and operate a reconstruction of the warship's brick stove, demonstrating how food was cooked for several hundred men at once in the bowels of a Tudor ship.

This weekend they are showing off several months of hard work with "My Lord and Lady's Chambers," which shows how upper class people dressed and lived. Its held at Haddon Hall again, and should be spectacular.

www.tudorgroup.co.uk/

The next few sites show the work of various individuals and groups in Europe, focusing primarily on the Medieval period. Diu Minnezit is in Germany, and focuses on the 1250-1475 period, with garments for men and women rigorously documented, and fabrics (like the Tudor Group) often dyed using correct period methods.

www.diu-minnezit.de/

A directly link to the clothes if you cant wait:

www.diu-minnezit.de/realien_...gorie.php

Next, a series of Swedish reconstructions, including a Landsknecht. Each has a separate section detailing the various components that make up the clothes and with close up images of the garments directly:

histvarld.historiska.se/histva...er.html

Here is another site, where they not only make their own clothes, but everything else by hand, including the scissors. Check out the hand-sewn linen tent, and play around in the links.

kurage.wordpress.com/

A big group isn't necessary, and here is the page of a guy who does his own stuff.

historiskdrakt.blogspot.com/2008....html

I hope this is as helps,

H