Of all the places, what’s my inspiration for a 16th Century dress? Florence! More specifically, the closet of Eleanor of Toledo. After a whole college semester complaining about how much I hated the Medicis and their convoluted intrigues, I’d never have dreamed I’d willingly go back to studying that period.

But it turns out that everything I disliked about the idea of wearing Elizabethan clothing with it’s stiff bodices, fussy farthingales, and starched collars gets set on its ear in Florence. It seems that when she married into the Medici clan in 1539, Eleanor brought her easier moda alla spagnola to court and maintained aspects of that style dress for decades.* And while the clothing in her portraits was by no means casual, the style doesn’t give me the impression I’ll feel confined, as so much of the fashion in portraits from the Elizabethan Court does. Most notably, the long pointed waistline on the Elizabethan bodice and the farthingdale didn’t catch on in the same way through Florence yet in that period. Yay!

And as a wonderful coincidence, not only are there extant tailor manuals from late 16th C & early 17th C in Spain**, the doublet that Brian loves was patterned by Duchess Sibilla Daine, whose Laurel was Master Jose de Madrid***, who literally wrote the book on working from those Spanish manuals. I intend to work from her pattern, drafted in 2021 for his Pelican elevation garments, to make the arming doublet he’s requested for his elevation to the Order of Defense. I feel reasonably assured that following Master Jose’s guidance to create Brian’s coat will help prepare me for the new tailoring skills I’ll need to build a fitted bodice for myself based from those Spanish manuals.

*COX-REARICK, JANET. “Power-Dressing at the Courts of Cosimo de’ Medici and François I: The ‘Moda Alla Spagnola’ of Spanish Consorts Eléonore d’Autriche and Eleonora Di Toledo.” Artibus et Historiae, vol. 30, no. 60, 2009, pp. 39–69. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25702881. Accessed 23 Dec. 2023.

** Alderondo, Abner. “A Master Tailor’s Manual.” Folger Shakespeare Library, 10 Jan. 2023, www.folger.edu/blogs/collation/a-master-tailors-manual/. Accessed 23 Dec. 2023

** Master Jose de Madrid is better known as Mathew Gnagy, a fashion professional who publishes instructional materials as The Modern Maker (https://www.themodernmaker.co/)