More Italian Renaissance with Sapphire

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So, when I do historical clothing sets, I’ve learned drawing two takes about the same amount of time as drawing one. Of course, the downside is that I always worry if I make a mistake then I’m likely to repeat it. I’m not 100% sure about the waist lines on these, but that’s okay.

The paper doll is wearing a shift with a gathered neckline which seems to be the style in Italy. It’s a lot more fitted than these would have been for layering reasons. There’s some debate from my research in what women wore under these gowns. There’s not a lot of evidence for stays, but there’s no way to get the smooth line shown on the bust in these portraits without some sort of support either built into the bodice or underneath the bodice. If you look closely at side of the pink gown, you’ll see there’s a fold between where the armpit meets the shoulder and that suggests there is something under the bodice; however, I have not been able to find any evidence on what that undergarment might have looked like.

Later, there’s this Venetian Woman with Moveable Skirt from the 1560s and there might be a set of stays there or it might be an artistic choice to continue the bodice after the skirt is lifted. It’s tough to know. I tend to think it’s likely stays, because the work is erotic art and there’s nothing erotic about a bodice (or is there?). When I do a Venetian set (and I plan to do that someday) I’ll use that as my base design I suspect. However, we’re not working on Venetian clothing today. Today, we are in Florence.

Both of these dresses are again based on portraits. Both sitters are probably from Florence, based on professional folk’s assessments of the paintings. Lucrezia Panciatichi, for example, was the wife of Bartolomeo Panciatichi, a Florentine humanist and politician. The other sitter there’s some debate over, but her clothing does look like that which was worn in Florence according to folks who know more about this than I do which isn’t I grant you a high standard at this point.

Despite the few small changes I might make to these in the future (and my annoyance that I couldn’t seem to track down a full length portrait to get skirt shapes right), I’m super proud that I did these despite feeling like I don’t “know enough” to do them well.

I will say that I want to do something later in the 1500s from Venice, as I mentioned, because the Venetians had these wild shoes called chopines which were platform shoes so high that women needed help walking in them. They’re so strange and I want to draw them, but I need to do more research on the clothing that would have gone with them. More research!

So, if you want to get to vote in my next paper doll content poll, join us on Patreon.

Early Italian Renaissance Dress with Topaz

An Italian Renaissance paper doll with two dresses from the 1530s to color and play with.
An Italian Renaissance paper doll with two dresses from the 1530s based on paintings of the time period.

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I have a pretty bad tendency to get super tangled up in myself. For the last few years, my Patrons have been requesting two historical time periods in every poll- the 1980s and Italian Renaissance. In my whole costume book collection, I only own one book on Italian Renaissance clothing and it’s a translation of a 1590s text, so not the most useful when trying to do overview research.

What became abundantly clear to me as I did my digging into the topic was that styles in Italy were not standardized across the entire country, as we know it today. At the time, Italy was a collection of city-states (it remained this way until it unified around the 1870s), so every area had its own fashion which makes things super confusing.

Plus, since most of these are taken from portraits of the period and the identify of the sitters isn’t always known, it’s nigh impossible to be certain where the paintings were painted. Is that lady wearing Naples fashions or those from Rome? Who knows?

Anyway, I got myself all wrapped up in my worry about not being “right” that I avoided drawing anything claiming to be Italian Renaissance for two years. Finally, I realized I was being ridiculous. So, I looked through all the paintings I had collected on my Pinterest Board devoted to Italy. I read what I could find and then I set to work. Here’s what I know- These dresses are based on those in two portraits.

The dress on the left is based on Portrait of a Lady by Pier Francesco Foschi. Dress on the right is based on La Bella by Titian. Both painting date from the 1530s.

Pier Francesco Foschi (1502–1567) was an Italian painter active in Florence. It’s possible the lady in this painting is also from Florence. There are other examples of this dress style here and here. Since those are also unidentified, it’s impossible to know exactly where this combination was being worn. The fur trimmed sleeves, black trimmed bodices, raised waists, long gridles, and high collared camisoles seem to be the common elements.

Meanwhile, on the right, Titian was a Venetian painter whose work is well regarded. The person in this painting is unknown, so the area this style of dress was worn is also unknown. Titian worked all over Italy, which adds to the confusion. The low neckline seems to be somewhat unusual for this period, as most dresses I saw had something filling in that space. In my rendition, I think I made the waist too high, but that’s neither here nor there.

A few things I noticed generally, unlike Tudor dress which is super stiff, the sleeves and skirts of these gowns fall more softly. I wasn’t able to find any full length portraits of these dresses, so I am guessing they fell to the floor without knowing for sure.

There’s some debate if these dresses were worn over some sort of stays. I have no idea, but I do know the flattened bust of these dresses wouldn’t have been possible without either some sort of support in the bodice of the dresses or underneath them. It does seem like wide open necked shifts were often worn and are referenced in several books I have.

Anyway, shoes were snagged from a few different places like here and my favorite- Stepping Through Time by Olaf Goubitz. Of course, from Stepping Through Time focuses on Netherlands and this is Italian, so… mileage may vary.

All in all, while there’s things I would change for next time, I’m okay with that. I have one more Italian renaissance foray to share and I just got a few books on order about the period from the library so… there may yet be more of this to come. I’m sure after I’ve done more research, I’ll approach it differently, but I didn’t want my own need to “be sure” get too much in the way of finishing some new paper dolls.

And if you’d like to get to vote on future polls about “what I should draw next” join us on Patreon.