A new project: An early 19th-century peasant dress aka a Finnish National costume from Askola

I have been dreaming of making myself a national costume that is closely based on the historical record. Now that I have got some experience in weaving this kind of a huge project suddenly didn’t seem impossible anymore. The hand-woven fabrics are expensive but if I could just weave my own fabrics the costume would be even more special!

I went through several different options. There isn’t any costume that really corresponds to my birthplace and the nearest ones look a bit boring to me. So, I widened my research. I wanted a costume that has a good base in historical evidence, that has a fitted vest and a jacket. Finally, I chose the costume from Askola, mainly because I like red.

Here is a video that gives some background on Finnish national costumes and goes through the costume I’ve chosen and its historical background. I will be making videos out of each piece of this costume and this is just an introduction to this series.

This project requires me to learn many interesting skills from weaving the fabrics by hand to making Finnish folk embroidery and bobbin lace. I have enrolled in a course to help me get the advice I may need. I will be using early 19th-century methods and sewing everything by hand.

In actuality, I already started this project some weeks ago and it is progressing nicely. If you follow my instagram, you can keep up to date on how the project progresses but everything will be posted here as well as soon as I can get everything edited.

I hope you will follow along and see you soon! Happy sewing!

Katja