When I first began my 18th century costuming journey, I of course heard a lot about the costumes in Outlander. With Scottish heritage myself, these costumes have continued to provide a lot of inspiration. One of my first introductions to historical costuming also came from a performance by Atlanta Historic Dance, at the Fort Yargo Market Faire. So I of course looked up their Facebook page and discovered their videos from the 2020 Outlander Ball Atlanta.
I've since picked up Scottish Country Dance and attended the Tartan Ball at the Stone Mountain Highland Games, but as a kid who grew up on Disney princesses and American Girl, learned to waltz before I was a teenager, and always wished for more *real* dancing at school formals... a historical ball like this is an absolute dream.
So of course when Atlanta Historic Dance announced the 2023 Outlander Ball, I immediately knew I needed to go. And that meant I needed a ballgown.
Until now, most of my historical dress has been day wear, designed for a more frontier kind of setting. Fort Yargo is not exactly the best place for silks and saque-back gowns. Doing something formal is a new challenge!
I knew I wanted to do something inspired by Claire's dress from The Gathering in Outlander. I love this tartan/floral combo! It also seems to be the inspiration for the pattern I've been using for everything, Simplicity 8161, so I could use the same pattern I knew fit well.
I did want to dress up this gown a bit more, so I plan to wear the overdress a la polonaise and I'll probably add some trim as well.
So I set out fabric shopping! Thankfully, Fabric World in Stone Mountain had a fantastic selection of tartans, and after much deliberation, I had my materials.
I ended up with lightweight wool tartan, with a cream colored base and purple and green checks, this purple embossed material (possibly silk? unsure of the fibers), and this light green sort of damask pattern. I am so excited about these fabrics!
I was originally debating whether the stomacher would be purple or green, but decided to keep the petticoat and stomacher both purple, which has more contrast with the tartan. So the green damask is going to become the lining of a short velvet cloak (but more on that later...)
Without further ado, here are my sketches for this gown! I'm super excited for this project. Stay tuned to see how it turns out!
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