As I believe Bambi said earlier, these issues wouldn't necessarily be
a problem if they were made clear in the description of the item -
whether in a catalog, website, or whatever. If someone knows that
there are no instructions, or it's not graded, etc., then they can
determine for themselves if they have the time/knowledge/skill to
deal with it. Trying to guess from a picture and limited
descriptions can be very frustrating.
Sandy
At 01:18 PM 3/23/2011, you wrote:
As someone who replicates historic sewing patterns, this discussion has been
of great interest to me.
When producing patterns for the public from original source material, there
are a lot of decisions to be made. How true to stay to the original,
whether to draft pieces for parts that weren't originally included - such as
facings and trims, to grade or not to grade . . . the list is endless, and
doesn't stop at merely what to do with the pattern pieces. There are the
often the so-called instructions (sometimes only three lines long!) to
consider as well. Someone also brought up the issue of sewing a pattern to
test it before publishing.
Part of the problem with many replicated patterns, is not only that they
are not well produced (hand drawn tracings), poorly documented (information
missing), unedited (markings missing or incorrect), but that the buyer's
expectation of what they are getting is mis-matched with what the seller is
offering. Unfortunately that is not discovered until after the purchase, or
while trying to construct the garment.
Many of these companies stay in business, because there are few sources for
patterns from these eras. Despite being well-known for offering
an inaccurate product.
I was very lucky to recently acquire many years worth of Harper's and La
Mode Illustree's, with pattern sheets from 1863 through 1901. They are
currently in the process of being electronically digitized, and should be
available soon.
Regards
Janyce Hill
www.vpll.org
International Costumers' Guild Archivist
http://www.costume.org/gallery2/main.php
"Those Who Fail to Learn History
Are Doomed to Repeat It;
Those Who Fail To Learn History Correctly -
Why They Are Simply Doomed."
Achemdro'hm
"The Illusion of Historical Fact"
-- C. Y. 4971
Andromeda
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